Greetings,

If this heat is not enough to get under your skin, I am sure the current budget debate will do the trick.

The Senate’s version of House Bill 97 (2015 Appropriations Act) passed the Senate late last week and included a variety of controversial changes tucked neatly into its 508 pages. On Tuesday, the House unanimously shot down the Senate’s two-year spending plan. Currently, both versions are up for debate in conference committee. Although both include dramatic provisions (Medicaid overhaul, Voter ID laws, elimination of teacher assistants), some of the more downplayed elements of the budget pose serious threats to environmental safeguards.

Here are a few of those anti-environment special provisions:

§14.16A Purging of Noncommercial LUST Cleanup Fund

In the Senate’s budget, the state’s Noncommercial Leaking Petroleum Underground Storage Tank Cleanup Fund faces elimination. The purpose of the fund is to reimburse property owners for the cost of cleaning up contamination caused by leaking underground petroleum storage tanks. The Senate budget only allows cleanup money to address leaks reported before August 1, 2015 and claims for compensation filed by July 1, 2016. This small window leaves landowners with no state assistance or incentive to mitigate soil and groundwater pollution.

§14.26 SCC repeal and reduction of penalties

This special provision added to the Senate budget eliminates the Sediment Control Commission (SCC) by transferring its role to the Environmental Management Commission (EMC). It also severely weakens the penalties enacted through the Sedimentation & Erosion Control Act. The likely outcome is the complete gutting of the act altogether because the EMC is poorly equipped to take on the role of SCC both in terms of work force and expertise. This will cause problems with erosion control and protection of riparian buffers, which will essentially condone land-disturbing activity due to insufficient penalties and safeguards. The House budget did not address the SCC.

§14.29 Federal energy grants

This special Senate provision prohibits DENR from applying for funding from two federal grant programs: the State Energy Program Competitive Grant Program and the Clean Energy and Manufacturing Grant Program. The rationale behind this is unclear, but it limits opportunities for North Carolina’s growing clean energy market and is not good legislation. The House did not address this in its budget.

§14.30 Transfer of state parks and attractions

In a move to shrink the size of the state government and consolidate responsibility, the Senate budget aims to create the Department of Natural and Cultural Resources (DNCR) by combining parts of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) (like the Division of Parks and Recreation) with cultural resource programs (such as the Museum of History). Consequently, DENR would undergo a name-change, becoming the Department of Environmental Quality. This confusing move, whose merits are unknown, is likely to reduce the conservation thrust of the State Parks. In its combination of many separate entities, the move is likely to cause inefficiency and lower quality work as a large number of tasks are assigned to a lesser number of people with disparate backgrounds. The House budget called for a joint plan by DCR and DENR to transfer in 2016-2017; this gives more time for adjustment but is still contentious.

The Senate riddled its budget with controversial environmental provisions creating a bill considerably different from the House. Although the House rejected the Senate bill as a whole, it is unlikely they will object to all of their special provisions. We will wait and see.

Thanks for reading,

Peter Magner, Stanback Intern
NC League of Conservation Voters

The HotList is a weekly email the North Carolina League of Conservation Voters (NCLCV) sends out during session where we talk about relevant legislation and share information on key environmental issues as they come before the General Assembly. While primarily intended for elected representatives, the HotList is also made public to any and all who are concerned about the environment.