DENVER—The Trump administration released its “skinny budget” today, calling for a 12% cut to the Department of the Interior.
The massive proposed cuts by President Trump are in stark contrast to statements made last week by Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke in his first remarks to Interior Department staff. Secretary Zinke said, “I’m going to fight for the budget. I looked at the budget. I’m not happy, but we’re going to fight about it and I think I’m going to win at the end of the day.”
The Center for Western Priorities released the following statement from Deputy Director Greg Zimmerman:
“President Trump’s budget cuts funding for America’s parks, public lands, wildlife, and water resources at the expense of communities across the West. With the Interior Department already under strain, this budget appears intended to break the agency. Secretary Zinke gets it. But if today’s announcement is any indication, the new Interior Secretary lost the budget battle with the White House. It’s a big loss for America’s parks and for the public.”
Trump’s budget proposal singles out critical land acquisition and protection programs like the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) for $120 million in cuts. This evisceration of LWCF—an already underfunded program—would pave the way for trophy homes in our national parks and make it almost impossible for willing land owners to work with the National Park Service and other agencies to protect their land for future generations.
The Department of Interior is charged with managing more than 500 million acres of American parks, wildlife refuges, and other public lands. Cutting Interior’s budget would mean less money for trails and recreation access, less money for land management, and less money for parks, monuments, and wildlife refuges.
The proposed budget defunds much-needed major maintenance and new construction in a park system already bursting at the seams from record-breaking attendance during its 2016 centennial. These cuts show President Trump is only paying lip service to addressing the $12.5 billion maintenance backlog facing our parks.
Secretary Zinke has committed to increasing employee morale and providing land managers on the front lines with the resources and tools to carry out their mission. These sweeping cuts will help with neither.
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The Center for Western Priorities is a conservation policy and advocacy organization focused on land and energy issues across the American West.
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Fostering Media Connections (FMC) has created a special print and digital magazine entitled FosterTech, where we describes some of the most exciting and vexing applications of technology in child welfare.
The magazine aims to create a base of knowledge for technologists, child welfare administrators, advocates, foster youth and social workers and to engage them in outlining technology’s role in the field of child welfare.
The issue’s 17 stories explore the advance of predictive analytics in child protection, using ridesharing apps to facilitate parent visitation, increasing foster parent recruitment through digital marketing techniques, bridging the digital divide foster youth face and much more.
The magazine will be distributed at a series of foster care hackathons, during which technologists and child welfare experts will work together to come up with solutions that bridge both domains. A digital version of the magazine is now for sale for $9.95. You can access it here.
FosterTech is a duel effort of the news website The Chronicle of Social Change and the print magazine Fostering Families Today. Both publications are part of FMC.
The Walter S. Johnson Founation and the Pritzker Foster Care Initiative, two philanthropies highly engaged in the nexus of technology and foster care, offered seed funding for this special edition.
Sponsors of FosterTech:
The Chronicle of Social Change Reader Survey
We are currently distributing a reader survey for readers of The Chronicle of Social Change. We really want to hear what you think, so please fill it out!
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U.S. EPA Media Relations (press@epa.gov)
WASHINGTON -- Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has provided over $90,000 in additional reimbursements to five entities in Colorado and Utah for their costs incurred responding to the August 5, 2015, Gold King Mine release.
These payments represent requests received by EPA prior to December 16, 2016, that had adequate documentation. They were evaluated following enactment of the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation (WIIN) Act on December 16, 2016. EPA is still evaluating other reimbursement requests, some of which were received after December 16, 2016.
The payments are made using EPA guidelines for determining which response costs related to the Gold King Mine release are eligible for reimbursement under the recently passed WIIN Act. A link to the guidance is below.
To date, EPA has dedicated more than $29 million to address the Gold King Mine release, including reimbursing more than $3.5 million in documented and allowable response costs to 10 state, tribal, and local governments.
“States, tribes, and local governments are valued partners. With the Gold King Mine and the rest of the Bonita Peak Mining District now on the Superfund Priorities List, we look forward to improving the environment for everyone involved and ensuring Gold King costs are handled in a timely and fair manner,” said EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt.
To view the guidelines: https://wcms.epa.gov/goldkingmine
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U.S. EPA Media Relations (press@epa.gov)
WASHINGTON -- Today, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has provided over $90,000 in additional reimbursements to five entities in Colorado and Utah for their costs incurred responding to the August 5, 2015, Gold King Mine release.
These payments represent requests received by EPA prior to December 16, 2016, that had adequate documentation. They were evaluated following enactment of the Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation (WIIN) Act on December 16, 2016. EPA is still evaluating other reimbursement requests, some of which were received after December 16, 2016.
The payments are made using EPA guidelines for determining which response costs related to the Gold King Mine release are eligible for reimbursement under the recently passed WIIN Act. A link to the guidance is below.
To date, EPA has dedicated more than $29 million to address the Gold King Mine release, including reimbursing more than $3.5 million in documented and allowable response costs to 10 state, tribal, and local governments.
“States, tribes, and local governments are valued partners. With the Gold King Mine and the rest of the Bonita Peak Mining District now on the Superfund Priorities List, we look forward to improving the environment for everyone involved and ensuring Gold King costs are handled in a timely and fair manner,” said EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt.
To view the guidelines: https://wcms.epa.gov/goldkingmine
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