The EPA has been regularly attacked by the extreme Right as thugs, destroying businesses through stringent environmental regulations. It seems to me that it is like blaming our soldiers for doing the job they were required to do to protect our way of life. Congress legislates the powers, duties and responsibilities of the EPA and its funding through passage of Bills and the signature of the President. Writing and implementation of EPA Regulations is their required way of defining the will of the Legislators, the Administrations Policies and the nations commercial, private and public understanding of standards to be met for the protection of our citizens. The standards are the result of science and prior tragedies and mistakes that reveal a need for better enforcement, clearer methods to achieve standards and consequences for failure. The Regulations are meant to protect the publics health, clean water and clean air. The Federal EPA is a second line of defense and ready source of science, resources and logistics. Rarely does the Federal EPA come down on polluters without the invitation of Local or State authorities. The information below was copied from the EPA Budget FY 2012 Report. There are many comparisons to the EPA Actual Budget Expense FY 2010. The FY 2012 budget reflects the many $Billions of reduced or cut funding. The cuts have been in mostly inspection, investigation and recovery of costs of pollution remediation. In other words protecting the profits and crimes of polluters. Goal 2: Protecting Americas Waters Geographic Water Programs The Administration has launched numerous cross-agency collaborations to promote coordination among agencies toward achieving Presidential priorities, which include a suite of large aquatic ecosystem restoration efforts. Three prominent examples of this kind of cross-agency collaboration for EPA are cooperative restoration efforts in the Great Lakes, Chesapeake Bay and the Gulf of Mexico. These three large water bodies have been exposed to substantial pollution over many years and a coordinated federal response is critical for maintaining progress on environmental priorities. Coastal estuaries and wetlands are also vulnerable. Working with stakeholders, EPA has established special programs to protect and restore each of these unique resources. EPA’s ecosystem protection programs encompass a wide range of approaches that address specific at-risk regional areas and larger categories of threatened systems, such as urban waters, estuaries, and wetlands. Locally generated pollution, combined with pollution carried by rivers and streams and through air deposition, can accumulate in these ecosystems and degrade them over time. EPA and Federal partners will continue to coordinate with States, Tribes, municipalities, and industry to restore the integrity of imperiled waters of the United States. Great Lakes: EPA is providing $350 million in funding for ecosystem restoration efforts for the Great Lakes, the largest freshwater system in the world. This EPA-led interagency effort to restore the Great Lakes focuses on priority environmental issues such as contaminated sediments and toxics, nonpoint source pollution, habitat degradation and loss, and invasive species. To restore and protect this national treasure, the Obama Administration developed the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI). Led by EPA, the GLRI invests in the region’s environmental and public health through a coordinated interagency process. Principal agencies involved in the GLRI are USDA, NOAA, HHS, DHS, HUD, DOS, DOD-Army, DOI, and DOT. In FY 2012, EPA will continue to lead the implementation of the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, implementing both federal projects and projects with states, tribes, municipalities, universities, and other organizations. Progress will continue in each of the GLRI’s five focus areas through implementation of on-the-ground actions. The GLRI provides the level of investment and the interagency coordination required to successfully address these five issues across the region. The initiative will specifically target work to restore beneficial uses in Areas of Concern, including Great Lakes Legacy Act projects, nearshore work, and habitat restoration, prioritizing delistings of Areas of Concern. The initiative identifies $350 million for programs and projects strategically chosen to target the most significant environmental problems in the Great Lakes ecosystem, a $125 million decrease from FY 2010, the first year of the initiative. The initiative will implement the most important projects for Great Lakes Restoration and achieve visible results. FY 2012 activities will emphasize implementation and include grants to Goal 2: Protecting Americas Waters implement the Initiative by funding states, tribes and other partners. EPA expects substantial progress within each of the Initiative’s focus areas by focusing on the following actions within them: • Toxic Substances and Areas of Concern: EPA is working closely with non- Federal partners to address beneficial use impairments in areas of concern including Great Lakes Legacy Act clean-ups of contaminated sediments. • Invasive Species: GLRI has supported priority Asian Carp work including; the installation of structures by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ (USACE) at the electric barrier site to reduce the risk of bypass by Asian carp; and Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and Illinois Department of Natural Resource efforts to detect and remove Asian Carp from the system. As needed, GLRI will invest in additional efforts to keep Asian Carp from becoming established in the Great Lakes while continuing to address Invasive Species priorities such as the development of Ballast Water Treatment technologies; assistance to states and communities in preventing the introduction of invasive species and controlling existing populations; establishing early detection and rapid response capabilities; and the implementation of Aquatic Nuisance Species Management Plans by the FWS partnership. • Nearshore Health and Nonpoint Source: Targeted watershed plan implementation will be undertaken by EPA, U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), FWS, USGS, state programs, and tribal governments. Additionally, GLRI funds have been marked for NRCS to work directly with agricultural producers in specific, high priority watersheds to install conservation practices on their operations to reduce soil erosion and non-point source nutrient loading to waters of the Great Lakes Basin. • Habitat and Wildlife Protection and Restoration: GLRI funding has been targeted for FWS efforts to fund projects related to species and habitat management such as restoring wetlands, improving the hydrology of Great Lakes tributaries, reforesting habitats, reducing impacts of invasive species, and creating and/or improving corridors between habitats. Additionally, NRCS supports habitat restoration and protection efforts of agricultural lands through the programs such as the Wildlife Habitat Incentives Program • Accountability, Education, Monitoring, Evaluation, Communication, and Partnerships: EPA’s National Coastal Condition Assessment will provide a framework and organization for a Comprehensive Great Lakes Coastal Assessment that will establish baseline conditions of environmental quality and variability of the near-shore waters, bottom substrate, and biota. All agencies will participate in the Great Lakes Accountability System where partner agencies will report quality controlled information regularly on GLRI progress in meeting the objectives and targets of this Action Plan. EPA expects to reach a target of 23.9 using a 40.0 scale for improving the overall ecosystem health of the Great Lakes by preventing water pollution and protect aquatic Goal 2: Protecting Americas Waters systems. Also by FY 2012, EPA expects to have removed 26 beneficial use impairments from AOCs within the basin.
Posted on: Sun, 03 Aug 2014 03:30:04 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015