State House News Service 

January 11, 1999 -- Advocates called on the governor and Legislature today to boost state budget funding by $20 million for clean water and land use initiatives that have become victims of the socalled environmental deficit. 

At a press conference this afternoon to unveil the Environmental League 
of Massachusetts' "Green Budget 2000," ELM Legislative Director Namrita Kapur called the state budget "the single most important factor in protecting the state's public health and environment." 

"We're still playing catchup in terms of dollars for environmental 
programs," Kapur said.  "New problems and responsibilities have arisen 
over the last decade, but the environmental budget has actually lost ground." 

Environmentalists say funding for their favored programs has increased in 
recent years, but the percentage of the state budget devoted to 
environmental issues has shrunk considerably during that same period. 
That shrinking percentage, which ELM dubbed the "environmental deficit," amounts to $26 million, a gap that has opened up since fiscal year 1989.  The extra $20 million requested in the Green Budget equals about one-tenth of 1 percent of the entire state budget. 

The funding infusion would help the state make progress in areas like 
pollution control, forest and park maintenance, recycling, river and 
watershed protection, hazardous waste cleanup, open space acquisition and drinking water protection. 

On the topic of environmental justice, Veronica Eady, director of Roxbury based Alternatives for Community and Environment, said urban areas 
have a disproportionate share of brownfields and Superfund sites.  As a 
result, she said, urban residents suffer the highest rates of pollution-related medical problems such as asthma. 

"We're asking for significant increases, but when you have years and 
years of environmental degradation and discriminatory siting, it's really 
critical that we have the money to address those sites," Eady said. "It's 
so disproportionate that we really need more money to look into these 
cumulative issues." 

The Green Budget recommends an additional $750,000 to study the 
cumulative health impacts of pollution, and an extra $200,000 apiece for the Urban Rivers Initiative and for communities with hazardous waste sites.  It calls for $2 million more for the Metropolitan District Commission's parks, which can be the chief outdoor recreation area for city dwellers. 

Water quality improvement is the second main theme of the Green Budget, which requests more than $4 million in new funding for water projects. 

Kapur said more than half of Massachusetts' rivers and streams do not 
pass muster with state water quality standards, and that the Ipswich River, in particular, is classified as one of the 20 most threatened rivers in North America.  The state also lacks coastal pollution monitoring for its 1,500 miles of coastline, which generate an estimated $1.5 billion in tourist 
revenues each year. 

Budgetary recommendations for water quality improvement include an extra $1.9 million for the Watershed Initiative; $1.5 million for enforcement of the Clean Water Act; and $750,000 in seed money for a coordinated coastal pollution monitoring program. 

Mark Rasmussen, director of the Coalition for Buzzards Bay, said the 
state's history, economy, and way of life are all linked to its waterways. 

"We are calling on Gov. Cellucci to recognize and protect our heritage by 
adequately funding programs that deal with drinking water quality, runoff 
pollution, marine monitoring and a whole host of other issues that impact 
our water resources," Rasmussen said. 

The encroachment of urban sprawl upon the state's everdiminishing open 
space and farmland is the third main concern of the Green Budget, which 
recommends an additional $3.25 million be spent on land use management. 

Whitney Hatch, New England regional director of Trust for Public Lands, 
illustrated the development problem with a startling statisticnationwide, 
two acres of farmland have been lost every minute since 1970, he said. 

"We're using up our land faster than ever," Hatch said.  "Acre by acre, 
our most productive lands are being paved over and destroyed by scattershot development." 

While Massachusetts' population has grown 28 percent in the last 40 years, the amount of developed land has jumped 188 percent.  Every year, about 20,000 acres of open space are taken by new development.  In the last year alone, the state lost 8 percent of its farmland. The 280,000 acres of state forests only have about onethird of the staff needed, and the accelerated development of land has left 124 species of plants and animals in danger of extinction. 

Under the rubric of land use, the Green Budget recommends $2 million for preservation of farms and farmland; $871,000 to fully staff the forest 
management program; $250,000 to establish a statewide habitat protection strategy; and $150,000 to help towns plan for development. 

MassPIRG environmental attorney Paul Burns pointed to recent publicity 
surrounding the release of the movie "A Civil Action," and said that while progress has been made in recent years, more needs to be done. 

"It's not just a movie. It was not just a onetime, longago event," Burns 
said of the portrayal of the reallife water poisoning tragedy in Woburn. 
"We must go even further, we must do even more, and we need state 
resources to make that happen." 

Rep. Jim Marzilli (DArlington) said he expects the House to grant funding 
increases for some Green Budget recommendations, particularly in the 
areas of open space and brownfields cleanup. 

"The state has a budget surplus this year that we expect is going to be 
in excess of $300 million," Marzilli said. "I think it's entirely reasonable 
to expect that some of that surplus money be used to address some of the 
Commonwealth's unmet environmental needs." 

Sen. Stephen Brewer (D-Barre) said the state's economy is dependent on 
tourism and the state must make sure it preserves its natural resources. 
"We're talking not only about the environment, we're talking about the 
economy," he said. "Are we going to do all $20 million?  I doubt it. But 
you need to have an aggressive opening salvo here, and hopefully we can 
push the agenda together if we all work together." 

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