Groups push for funding to revive polluted waterways
Posted on Tuesday, 12 February 2008 (11:08:53) CST by admin
|
|
Federal money to fix most dangerous mine lands instead
Sunday, February 10, 2008
By Don Hopey, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
Watershed organizations aren't getting any of the $28 million allocated to Pennsylvania from the federal Abandoned Mine Lands Fund this year and they're not happy about it.
R. John Dawes, executive director of the Foundation for Pennsylvania Watersheds, said progress toward resurrecting 4,600 miles of biologically dead, mine-polluted streams will slow to a trickle if the state Department of Environmental Protection sticks to its decision to spend all of that federal money to fix the most dangerous abandoned mine lands instead.
Dozens of popular, cost-effective, stream restoration projects across the commonwealth will go begging, Mr. Dawes said, even though up to 30 percent of the federal allocation -- about $8.4 million this year and much more in succeeding years -- could be allocated by the DEP for the watershed work.
"It's ridiculous and it's fiscally irresponsible," said Beverly Braverman, executive director of the Mountain Watershed Association, which has built treatment projects on the Indian Creek watershed in Somerset County and has two more awaiting state funding decisions. "It's created a sense of uncertainty in our ability to move ahead on those projects."
At a meeting scheduled for Wednesday in Harrisburg, Mr. Dawes, Ms. Braverman and watershed group leaders from across Pennsylvania will press state DEP Secretary Kathleen McGinty to reverse course and free up the federal funding.
Future concerns
While that discussion will focus on how the DEP will spend this year's federal allocation, watershed groups are at least as concerned about how the much bigger future allocations from the fund will be divvied up and whether they'll be cut out.
They are worried that the DEP will use the federal money to paper over state shortfalls in its mine reclamation bureau and expand its own watershed reclamation program, which has designed and built about 40 projects statewide.
At stake is up to 30 percent or $408 million, of $1.36 billion the state is guaranteed to get in the next 15 years from the Abandoned Mine Lands Fund, which was established in 1977 to fix the scars left by previously unregulated mining.
This year's $28 million allocation is the first to reflect the increased funding mandated by the reauthorization. The annual allocations, funded by a royalty payment by mining companies on every ton of mined coal, will bump up to around $35 million in 2009, $60 million in 2010 and $90 million by 2018.
When the fund was reauthorized in December 2006, after hard lobbying in Washington by Pennsylvania's watershed groups, the amount allowed for remediation of mine water discharges was increased from 10 percent to 30 percent.
"We worked hard to get that 30 percent set-aside for watershed projects, and it's important to distribute that full amount to watershed groups rather than run the whole program out of state mining offices," said Mr. Dawes, who also chairs the Pennsylvania Abandoned Mine Land Coalition.
"We understand there's a backlog of dangerous mine sites in need of funding. But in many cases, water improvements are just as much a priority as a dangerous abandoned mine site and can have just as devastating an effect on a community."
Grass-roots efforts
Pennsylvania's long mining history has left deep scars on 184,000 acres of abandoned mine land -- more than in any other state. And the thousands of miles of drainage-impaired streams flowing off that acreage are its biggest water quality problem. Together the wasted land and dead water affect 44 of the state's 67 counties.
Across the state, more than 200 community-based watershed groups, run by volunteers and funded with a mix of federal, state and private grant money, have formed over the last decade to work on the problems. They've built approximately 200 mine drainage treatment projects around the state.
Ms. Braverman said watershed groups are better able to maximize the impact of the Abandoned Mine Lands Fund money by leveraging matching money from private sources and other government funding that the state can't tap. She said the groups also receive in-kind donations and use armies of volunteers to control project costs and provide quality control.
"We make $1 million work like $3 million," Ms. Braverman said. "We can get projects done quicker, better and cheaper than the state can."
Still, mine drainage treatment projects, almost all using a "passive" technology that channels mine drainage through a series of settling and aeration ponds where iron, aluminum and other metals drop out, are expensive to build and operate. The Mountain Watershed Association's planned Mellcroft project will cost more than $1 million, and its Marcellino project plan is priced at $900,000.
Scott Roberts, DEP's deputy secretary for mineral resources management, said the DEP is not trying to cut watershed groups out of stream reclamation, but is reassessing how the grant program will work.
"We're in a ramp-up period for the federal funding and this is the time for us to figure out how we want the program to look when we do get larger sums," Mr. Roberts said. "We recognize the value and benefit of the watershed groups and we're not trying to freeze them out."
Setting priorities
But Mr. Roberts also said it's important to fix quickly the kind of dangerous abandoned mine land problems that cause the deaths of 25 to 35 people a year nationwide. That's more than usually die at active surface and underground mines.
The state is targeting 5,100 of the most dangerous abandoned mine sites to reclaim cliff-like "highwalls" at old strip mines, douse underground mine fires and fill in open mine shafts and mine entrances.
"These are dangerous areas. If we can take care of them we should do it," he said. "In the east, where there are more of those types of sites, they're asking if we should spend any money on mine drainage until we get rid of the places where kids are getting killed."
Mr. Roberts said the DEP is rewriting the state's Comprehensive Mine Reclamation Program, which will guide planning on mining and watershed projects, including how much of the federal set-aside for watershed projects should be spent on new construction, and maintenance and rehabilitation of existing projects. One possibility under consideration is to create an interest-bearing fund for the maintenance and rehabilitation of existing projects.
The DEP has been funding some of the projects proposed by watershed groups with the state's Growing Greener I and II bond money. But the Growing Greener II funding stream will likely end after this year, several watershed group leaders said, leaving them scrambling for project financing and, possibly, survival.
"This decision by the DEP definitely puts us on the back burner," said Robert Hughes, executive director of the Eastern Pennsylvania Coalition for Abandoned Mine Reclamation, which has more than 70 member organizations working on stream restoration projects in the state's anthracite region. "The state's working on its backlog, but without this additional funding I'm not sure what our community members who want to participate in improving their watersheds will do."
Mr. Hughes said the AML Fund allocations would be "a huge shot in the arm" for the more than 200 community groups working on watershed projects in the state.
"We're missing a big window of opportunity to leverage the federal money with other federal and state programs and foundation grants to make it go even farther," Mr. Hughes said. "If DEP wants to create a maintenance trust fund they ought to do it and let these community groups get back to doing what they do best, taking care of the streams."
Amy Wolf, director of abandoned mine programs for Trout Unlimited, works mostly in the Susquehanna River watershed in central Pennsylvania and said many watershed groups are now facing project delays.
"We know Growing Greener money is dwindling for abandoned mine drainage projects, and we want to know where else we can go to get money for these projects," Ms. Wolf said. "A lot of them are ready to go."
Don Hopey can be reached at [email protected] or 412-263-1983.
First published on February 10, 2008 at 12:00 am
|
| "Groups push for funding to revive polluted waterways" | Login | comments |
|
| | The comments are owned by the poster. We aren't responsible for their content. |
|
|
|
|
or 
feeds
HostGator Technology Grant
Home - Content
