Trump would cut Chesapeake Bay cleanup from $73M a year to $5M

By Tamara Dietrich
tdietrich@dailypress.com

March 2, 2017 6:40 p.m.

As Donald Trump visited Hampton Roads on Thursday to tout his intention to boost military spending by $54 billion, reports emerged that he also wants to gut federal funding for Chesapeake Bay cleanup, from $73 million annually to $5 million.

The Washington Post reports the massive reduction is part of the president's draft fiscal year 2018 budget that would slash funds, staff and programs at the Environmental Protection Agency. As a candidate, Trump vowed to reduce the EPA to "little tidbits."

The EPA oversees the Chesapeake Bay Program, a regional partnership formed in 1983 to restore the badly polluted estuary. Nearly two-thirds of the program's budget is given to Virginia and other bay states for clean water projects. It's that funding that Trump's plan, if approved, would decimate.

"That's an elimination of the program," said Eric Schaeffer, director of the D.C.-based Environmental Integrity Project, on Thursday. "When you drop down to that level, I don't know what you are left with. Basically, security guards or something guarding an empty building."
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Dietrich can be reached by phone at 757-247-7892.