Yesterday the Senate and House signed off on a budget for FY20 that included increases for our three top river-related budget priorities! This is our second year in a row seeing significant increases for our top funding priorities.
A HUGE thank you to you, our members, that lobbied for these priorities on Lobby for the Rivers Day, made phone calls, sent emails and helped us to advocate for these agencies!
We’ve been working with a great coalition of partners on this issue at the State House throughout the session, including the Appalachian Mountain Club, Environmental League of Massachusetts, The Nature Conservancy, Mass Audubon, and the Massachusetts Organization of State Engineers and Scientists. The Governor may still propose 9C cuts before signing off on the budget, but we will be keeping a close eye on that and will keep you all in the loop.
See below for the details on the budget increases:
Department of Environmental Administration (Line-Item 2200-0100)
FY20 Funding: $32,082,245 (10.13% increase over FY19 funding)
Division of Ecological Restoration (Line-Item 2300-0101)
FY20 Funding: $2,100,000 (67.31% increase over FY19 funding)
Department of Conservation and Recreation Watershed Management (Line-Item 2800-0101)
FY20 Funding: $1,523,447 (38.5% increase over FY19 funding)
If you have a moment, please consider taking a minute to call and thank one or more of the House and Senate Ways and Means leaders for their support for this funding. You can find the contact information for the Chairs and Vice Chairs using this link: https://malegislature.gov/Committees/Detail/J39
Thank you for your advocacy!