President Bush is ready to “meet the
environmental challenges of the future”: If approved by
Congress, his $2.4 trillion proposed budget will cut the
Environmental Protection Agency’s budget by 7.2 percent. The
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which administers
the National Marine Fisheries Service, will receive $300 million
less than it did in 2004. The Interior Department will see cuts to
its endangered species programs; and while the Agriculture
Department’s budget will be boosted to $19.1 billion, $760
million of that will go toward logging under the president’s
Healthy Forests Initiative.
Thought the Arctic
National Wildlife Refuge was safe from drillers? Think
again: In President Bush’s 2005 budget, projected revenues
from ANWR’s drilling leases are buried in the Interior
Department’s budget plan — despite the fact that the
Senate has consistently voted against drilling in the refuge (HCN,
8/18/03: Energy bill will likely boost drilling in the Rockies). To
reduce the nation’s “reliance on oil and natural gas
imports,” the Interior Department’s $10.8 billion budget also
includes increased funding for drilling on all public lands, “with
particular emphasis on coalbed natural gas.”
New
Mexico isn’t going to the pits — yet. The
National Nuclear Safety Administration has delayed “indefinitely”
its decision to build the Modern Pit Facility, which would
manufacture replacement plutonium “triggers” for the nation’s
nuclear bombs (HCN, 9/1/03: Rocky Flats, the sequel?). Last June,
the agency released a draft environmental impact statement naming
five potential sites, including two in New Mexico. Although the
final decision was expected this April, and Congress has already
set aside $11 million for the project, the agency says it must
“address congressional concerns” before going any further with its
plans.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services has announced new safeguards to protect
consumers from the spread of mad cow disease (HCN, 1/19/04: Have
another pig-brain/beef-blood/chicken-spine hamburger). These
guidelines — which will strengthen the “multiple existing
firewalls” that already protect beef-eaters — include banning
mammal blood, restaurant meat scraps and “poultry litter” (feathers
and chicken droppings) from cattle feed.
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Follow-up.
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