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It’s budget time again on Beacon Hill, and like last year, the Riverways is under pressure from the Romney administration. Riverways is a small outfit within the state government that runs a variety of programs designed to advocate for the health of rivers and streams throughout the Commonwealth. In recent years, Riverways has facilitated the removal of dams in the state, focused on a program designed to improve upstream and downstream passage at road crossings, and advocated for adequate instream flows for cold water fisheries.
Riverways was instrumental in the 1990s in helping get the Rivers Protection Act passed into legislation, a groundbreaking law that limits development within 150 feet along rivers and streams throughout the state.
Riverways is included in the governor’s budget for fiscal year 2006 (FY 06). However, the funding of $382,150 falls short of the $434,719 needed to keep it operational. With the current proposed funding level, two positions will be lost. One of these positions is the coordinator/scientist for Riverways “River Instream Flow Stewards” (RIFLS) program, a first-in-the-nation program involving volunteers to gather scientifically valid flow measurements necessary to protect their local streams. The second position is staff for the Adopt-A-Stream program, a program that has trained and supported more than 120 local groups and thousands of citizen river advocates across the Commonwealth on river protection, restoration and stewardship efforts.
TU has benefited from both of these programs. It would be a tragedy to let Riverways be gutted in the 2006 budget. So, here’s what needs to be done to stop it.
First, call or write your state representative and ask them to ask all four of the following people to restore the Riverways Budget to FY 01 levels:
* Representative Frank I. Smizik (House Chair, Natural Resources Committee)
* Senator Pamela Resor (Senate Chair, Natural Resources Committee)
* Representative Robert A. DeLeo (House Chair of Ways and Means Committee)
* Senator Theresa Murray (Senate Chair of Ways and Means)
You can find your legislator at www.mass.gov/legis/citytown.htm.
Please do this immediately!
Please do not send e-mails. They will not be effective.