1% for the Environment

The Massachusetts House Ways and Means Committee released its version of the state budget for fiscal year 2019 last week. And there’s good news: Funding for our State Parks and Recreation was increased to $40 million, $2 million over the Governor’s budget that was released in January.  Even better, Representative Smitty Pignatelli submitted an amendment to increase the line-item further — to $42 million. This amendment would bring us close to the Environmental League of Massachusetts’s Green Budget recommendation of $42.5 million for State Parks and Recreation. That restored funding will help bring back  staffing and begin to reverse deep funding cuts we’ve seen over the past decade. Today, I sent a note to my State Representative, asking her to co-sponsor Representative Pignatelli’s amendment, using ELM’s form.