Earlier this month, Congress overwhelmingly passed America's Conservation Enhancement Act (ACE). The legislation's dozen-plus conservation initiatives include reauthorizations for important programs that help protect the Chesapeake Bay and wetlands across the country.
Among other provisions, the legislative package authorizes $92 million in annual funding for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Chesapeake Bay Program through 2025, a $7 million annual increase. The program provides funding for states, local governments, and other partners to take measures that improve Bay water quality, and it also helps coordinate restoration efforts in the watershed. While Congress has appropriated funds to the program every year since it was created in 1987, its authorization expired in 2005. This reauthorization and increase in funding are a good sign for the future of Bay cleanup efforts, provided, of course, that Congress follows through with appropriations at the authorized level.
ACE also established a new program, Chesapeake Watershed Investments for Landscape Defense, with $15 million annually for coordinated restoration and protection activities throughout the Bay watershed. This program has a heavy focus on improving water quality and habitat to support fish and wildlife, but it also addresses the need to protect waterways that are used as drinking water sources. The program will also increase scientific capacity to support related planning, monitoring, and research activities.
The legislation also reauthorizes the North American Wetlands Conservation Act, with $25 million annually for various federal agencies to implement the program. This program has provided funding to thousands of coordinated efforts to restore wetland habitat for wildlife, especially birds, across the country. Improving wetlands for wildlife is a good deal for humans, too, because it will improve water quality and flood control and reduce coastal erosion. Similarly, ACE authorized $5 million a year to combat invasive species, which can wreak havoc on wildlife and ecosystems.
ACE does have some drawbacks, however. It prohibits EPA from regulating lead content in hunting and fishing gear any time before 2026, even though the harmful effects of lead ammunition and fishing tackle on wildlife, water quality, and human health are well documented. The prohibition language demonstrates a compromise between the House and Senate, which preferred a permanent ban on any lead regulations from EPA related to hunting and fishing.
President Trump is expected to sign the measure, which came as a surprise to some since he has repeatedly attempted to cut the Chesapeake Bay Program’s budget, along with EPA’s overall budget. Earlier this year, for example, Trump sought to cut the program’s budget by 16 percent. Likewise, the president's proposed 2021 budget called for more than a 26 percent decrease in funding for the EPA and would have imposed a draconian workforce cap on the agency, crippling its ability to carry out its important mission of protecting all of us from environmental and public health hazards.
The important caveat here is that authorizations are not appropriations. By authorizing these various environmental initiatives, Congress has laid important groundwork for the future and established important policy priorities. In the end, though, the money is what will matter, and Congress will need to follow through with appropriations to match.
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Katlyn Schmitt | October 22, 2020
Earlier this month, Congress overwhelmingly passed America's Conservation Enhancement Act (ACE). The legislation's dozen-plus conservation initiatives include reauthorizations for important programs that help protect the Chesapeake Bay and wetlands across the country.
Darya Minovi, Katlyn Schmitt | October 21, 2020
Dangerous nitrate pollution has contaminated the groundwater that supplies private drinking water wells and public water utilities in several agricultural regions across the United States, posing a significant threat to people's health. A new report from the Center for Progressive Reform (CPR) indicates that this problem has reached Maryland's Lower Eastern Shore, an area that's home to hundreds of concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs) and millions of chickens.
James Goodwin | October 19, 2020
For many of us, the prospect of a Supreme Court with Judge Amy Coney Barrett giving conservatives a solid 6-3 supermajority is nightmare fuel. The consequences extend beyond hot-button social issues, such as women's reproductive rights or individual access to affordable health care. If confirmed, Barrett would likely spur the aggressive pro-business agenda that the Court has pursued under the auspices of Chief Justice John Roberts. A key item on that agenda is overturning something called Chevron deference, which some business groups have made a top priority in their broader campaign to bring about, as former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon put it, the "deconstruction of the administrative state."
James Goodwin | October 15, 2020
Recently, the Center for Progressive Reform (CPR) launched its Beyond 12866 initiative, which seeks to promote progressive regulatory reform as a key component of the progressive movement’s efforts to build a more socially just and equitable America. To accomplish this goal, though, we must come to grips with how the regulatory system is perpetuating racial injustice and reinforcing race-based inequities. In a new web article, I take this first step by sketching out some of the ways in which cost-benefit analysis has contributed to structural racism in the broader regulatory system.
Darya Minovi | October 5, 2020
Amidst the president and First Lady testing positive for COVID-19, an embarrassing spectacle of a presidential "debate," and a pandemic that has now claimed more than 200,000 lives in the United States and 1 million worldwide, the West Coast wildfires have lost the attention of the national news cycle. But California and nearby states are still very much ablaze.
James Goodwin | October 1, 2020
In a previous post, I discussed the essentially undemocratic ways that conservatives have come to the brink of a 6-3 majority on the Supreme Court and examined one significant implication for regulatory policy: the likely effect on the Court's view on Chevron deference. In this second post, I explore several other ways the Court could undermine the essential democratic character of the regulatory system.
James Goodwin | September 30, 2020
Last week, Matthew Yglesias published an important piece at Vox explaining the many ways conservatives have succeeded in exploiting fundamentally undemocratic features of our constitutional structure of government to advance their policy agenda. This strategy will have reached its grotesque culmination if they manage to seat Judge Amy Coney Barrett on the U.S. Supreme Court. He’s rightfully angry about the situation -- as should we all be -- but the story he tells, thorough and infuriating as it is, misses an important point: It could actually get much worse.
Michele Janin | September 28, 2020
As many of our allies and supporters know, CPR is now in the midst of a nationwide search for our next executive director. We're looking for a dynamic leader prepared to guide our nearly 20-year-old organization into its next stage of growth and impact.
Robert Verchick | September 25, 2020
For the Member Scholars and staff of the Center for Progressive Reform, Justice Ginsburg's passing is a moment for reflection, a time to celebrate her achievements, mourn what has been lost, and gird for what is to come. Because her death has triggered such an outpouring of emotion, we asked the CPR family to offer reflections on her life and legacy and have gathered them on our website. I encourage you to take a few moments to read them.