A decision by the House Finance Committee to cut more than $16 million from Gov. Lincoln Almond’s proposed $50 million open space and recreation bond has left some local organizations — and even the governor’s co-chair of Open Space 2000 — questioning just how much the state really supports land preservation. ”The open space we lose today is gone forever,” said Trudy Coxe, co-chair of Open Space 2000, in a statement released last week. “The other things they want to spend the money on are fine ideas, but they can wait without any harm to anyone. This cut is a slap in the face to every city and town, every land trust, to every environmental group that stood up for this bill. Remember every dollar lost in the bond bill is also dollars lost in matching funds.”
The initial proposal presented by Almond called for a $40 million bond for open space preservation, and an additional $10 million for recreation space – for a total of $50 million.
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The House Finance Committee cut more than $16 million from the bond, slicing almost $11 million directly from funds that would have provided the state’s Department of Environmental Management with funding to purchase “greenways and greenspace.”
Funds that would have given DEM Director Jan Reitsma money to award communities and local land trusts, and other environmental non-profit organizations matching funds for local land conservation was also cut –by close to $4 million.
”This is a crucial, time sensitive issues,” said Alicia Karpick, conservation program coordinator for the Rhode Island chapter of the Sierra Club. “Fifty million would scratch the surface of preserving what we must protect for generations to come. Rhode Island’s heritage is at risk. We must protect open space before it is paved over and we lose key habitat, storm buffers and natural places to recreate and relax.”
The decision to reduce the bond comes only months after Grow Smart Rhode Island released a study saying the state is headed for a $1.5 billion disaster if citizens fail to change the way they develop the state,
Grow Smart Rhode Island, a nonprofit group that promotes responsible land use, known as “smart growth,” contends that Rhode Island taxpayers could pay nearly $1.5 billion in unnecessary costs over the next 20 years if the state continues to allow suburban sprawl. By sprawl, the organization meant scattered, inefficient development.
Suburban sprawl has become a real concern for residents of South Kingstown. A proposed 86-acre commercial development along Route 1 in South Kingstown, known as The Village at South County Commons, has become a battleground between some residents and town officials.
Residents fear that the development, which includes a cinema as well as restaurants, office and retail space, and residential-housing will create “sprawl” in their community by attracting visitors away from Wakefield’s downtown area. Other South County residents are concerned about their shrinking waterfront. The Rhode Island coastline loses an average of three feet a year, putting waterfront homes and businesses in jeopardy.
Residents in Barrington watch erosion very careful this year especially around Allin’s Cove. While nature’s normal course of storms makes changes along the area inevitable, the area has become more susceptible since 1959, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dumped dredge spoils from nearby Bullock Cove into the 11-acre salt marsh in Allin’s Cove.
But earlier this year residents’ three year-fight to fix the problem was won, when the Army Corps agreed to right a wrong – and dig up the spoils dumped in the marsh. So far, the process is still in the review stages.
