37 senators: Big Trump cuts will gut EPA's 'core mission'
SEATTLE -- The huge cut to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency budget, proposed by the Trump administration, sparked protests from U.S. senators in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, as well as a pro-EPA waterfront demonstration in the "other" Washington.
EPA programs marked for extinction are "a critical piece of a coordinated effort" to clean up Puget Sound, as well as other waterways from San Francisco Bay to Chesapeake Bay, Dennis McLerran, former EPA Region X (Northwest, Alaska) administrator, told a rain-spattered crowd at Waterfront Park.
The senators' letter, signed by all six senators from the West Coast states of Washington, Oregon and California, used President Trump's own words in decrying the cuts.
"During the President's February 28th address to Congress, he pledged to 'promote clean air and water,'" they wrote. "Such a pledge is meaningless when the President follows it by proposing a 31 percent cut to EPA's budget and 20 percent reduction in its staff.
"If enacted, this funding cut would effectively eliminate the EPA's ability to execute its core mission to protect public health and ensure citizens have clean air, clean water and are protected from hazardous waste and contaminants."
The letter was sent to the senior Republican and Democratic members of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which will have decisive say over the slash-and-burn proposals by the Trump administration.
"The EPA must receive funding and staffing levels that ensure the agency can fulfill its mission to protect the environment, reduce pollution and safeguard public health," said the letter.
The letter cited such cuts as elimination of money to clean up Puget Sound, the Great Lakes, Chesapeake Bay, the Columbia River Basin, Long Island Sound and San Francisco Bay.
The proposed Trump budget would also eliminate all money going to Alaska's Native American villages and rural communities, federal dollars that pay to supply critical drinking water and sewage systems.
The cuts would be felt at a time when Puget Sound is vastly cleaner than 40 years ago -- when bays in pulp mill towns had water the color of tobacco spit -- but an immense amount of work needs completion.
Seattle's only river -- the Duwamish -- is a federal Superfund cleanup site due to decades of industrial pollution. The Trump administration wants to slash funding for Superfund sites by 30 percent.
"If we are going to clean up Puget Sound, we must clean up streams going into Puget Sound," said James Rasmussen of the Duwamish Valley Cleanup Coalition, as he waited to speak at the waterfront.
The feds' Puget Sound money has been passed through state, local and tribal governments, McLerran explained. "Multi-year projects will come to a halt if this funding is lost," he said.
Laura Blackmore, with the Puget Sound Partnership, noted the economic stakes, the people employed and contributions made by the state's shellfish industry.
"This is no time to retreat in our effort to save this national treasure," she said.
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., is a senior member of the Senate Appropriations Committee and an outspoken EPA member. So is U.S. Rep. Derek Kilmer, D-Wash., a member of the House Appropriations Committee. Kilmer represents the west side of Puget Sound, Hood Canal, and the northern Washington Coast.
Two Republican House members from Washington state -- U.S. Reps. Jaime Herrera Beutler and Dan Newhouse -- also sit on the House Appropriations Committee. Neither has yet been heard on proposed cuts to the EPA, and to programs of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. The district of Herrera Beutler includes the southern Washington Coast and Columbia River estuary.
The Trump administration wants to eliminate the federal Sea Grant program, used by the University of Washington to support and leverage money for fisheries, ocean acidification and water quality work.
At the waterfront, Seattle City Councilman Mike O'Brien put it succinctly: "We do not have a dictatorship. We have a Congress."
By: Joel Connelly
Source: SeattlePI