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Senator calls for funding restoration for Great Lakes projects

Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown

A member of the Senate Ag Committee doesn’t want federal funding removed for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative.

President Trump’s 2018 budget proposal eliminates the $300 million fund. Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown says programs funded by the initiative have helped farmers address the algae bloom issues.

“The challenge we have is Lake Erie is the shallowest lake, it’s only 30 feet in the western basin. So when it’s that shallow it’s more vulnerable to pollution. For the President to back off of this bipartisan, decades long commitment to cleaning up this lake is irresponsible and bad policy, says Brown.

He tells Brownfield he is working to restore the funding and discussed it with Ag Secretary nominee Sonny Perdue.

“He committed to that both in person and discussed it with the committee. This needs to be bipartisan, the administration needs to back down on this and work with local communities. Farmers have worked hard on this through conservation programs. We need to step it up and not back down,” says Perdue.

More than 3,000 projects in the 8-state Great Lakes Region, including Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, have been completed since the fund was established in 2010.

Audio: Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown

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