Press RoomPress ReleaseFor Immediate Release
February 7, 2006
For more information contact:
Tim Zink, (202) 654-4625 Several TRCP Working Groups Pleased With Administration’s 2007 Budget ProposalsWASHINGTON - Several of the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership’s (TRCP) policy working groups have weighed in with positive reviews of funding proposals within the Bush Administration’s 2007 budget. “There are some clear instances where we can see that the administration listened to the concerns of the conservation community,” said Terry Riley, the TRCP’s Vice President of Policy. The TRCP is a coalition of hunting, fishing and conservation organizations working to conserve fish and wildlife and their habitat and increase funding for conservation and management. The TRCP’s Agriculture and Wildlife Working Group (AWWG), which engages in development and administration of Farm Bill conservation programs, applauded several of the administration’s proposals. Among these is a proposed increase of almost $300 million to the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), a 20-year-old cornerstone program that compensates farmers and ranchers for removing environmentally sensitive cropland from production and planting permanent vegetative cover. In the past two decades CRP has simultaneously boosted wildlife populations and habitat while reducing harm to fragile and marginal lands. “CRP is one of the most effective wildlife enhancement programs to which the government has ever committed,” said Dave Nomsen, Vice President of Governmental Affairs for Pheasants Forever and an AWWG co-chair. “By proposing $300 million for CRP, the administration has sent a much-needed signal of lasting support for the program.” Agriculture and Wildlife Working Group members also praised the administration’s proposal to fully fund the Wetlands Reserve Program (WRP), a voluntary program that provides technical and financial assistance to eligible landowners to restore marginal cropland back to wetlands. The budget would allow for enrollment of 250,000 acres, the full amount initially authorized in the 2002 Farm Bill. The proposal would increase program spending to about $400 million in fiscal 2007, more than $150 million greater than its funding for this year. The praise on this front was echoed by the TRCP’s Wetlands Conservation Working Group, which also hailed an increase of $2.2 million, for a total budget of $41.6 million, for the North American Wetlands Conservation Fund. The fund provides matching grants to private or public organizations and individuals to carry out wetlands conservation projects that benefit waterfowl resources in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. "We applaud the administration's decision to emphasize wetlands protection in its budget proposals," said AWWG co-chair Bart James, a Government Affairs Representative for Ducks Unlimited. "These moves will certainly help waterfowl populations, as well as other wildlife. The increase in WRP acres is especially important because the demand for this program is so strong among landowners. It's also great for working farms and ranches, because it allows farmers to farm the best and conserve the rest." The TRCP Freshwater Fisheries Working Group (FFWG) met two proposals to improve fish passage with praise, but indicated that more needs to be done to address the issue in the future. “With more than 2.5 million barriers to fish passage in the country’s rivers and streams, we are glad to see action to reduce these impediments,” said FFWG co-chair Noreen Clough, the Conservation Director for BASS/ESPN Outdoors. “We would like to see the new NOAA Open Rivers Initiative, which is designed to remove obsolete small dams and impassable road culverts, funded at a more robust level than the $6 million being proposed, but we are buoyed by the $1.4 million increase sought by the administration for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Fish Passage Program, which works toward similar ends.” Similarly, the TRCP’s State Wildlife Grants Working Group lauded the proposed funding levels for several programs administered by the Fish and Wildlife Service. Foremost among these is the State and Tribal Wildlife Grants Fund. This program provides key funding to empower state wildlife managers striving to keep wildlife species from becoming threatened or endangered. The administration has proposed an increase of $7.2 million for the program, “a funding level that will greatly aid state wildlife biologists working to put their wildlife action plans in motion,” according to Naomi Edelson of the International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies, who also serves as the chair of the TRCP State Wildlife Grants Working Group. Edelson also pointed to proposed increases in funding of the Landowner Incentives Program and Private Stewardship Grant program, which assist the efforts of property owners and NGOs respectively, to improve the ecosystem functions and wildlife habitat on sensitive landscapes. For contact information, for any of the people or groups mentioned above, please contact TRCP’s Tim Zink at tzink@trcp.org or 202-654-4625. *** The Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership is a coalition of leading conservation organizations and individual grassroots partners, working together to conserve fish and wildlife and their habitat, increase funding for conservation and management, and expand access to places to hunt and fish. |