Environmental expenditures

Funding and number of staff do not always translate into effective management, but there is a threshold below which it can be difficult for organizations to perform well or even to meet basic program commitments. Over the past several years, fiscal situations in both states have led to reduced appropriations for program budgets, including reduced allocations for department staff.

These tables are a first-cut assessment of state funding for environmental and natural resource programs; though this information provides a useful yardstick, it does not capture all environmental expenditures. Much land preservation, for example, is funded with private or municipal dollars. Stormwater mitigation is often funded through state departments of transportation, and some federal grant programs are not reflected in these figures, while others not directly associated with water quality are included.

Even with these caveats, accurate information is difficult to obtain from sources readily available to the public. The key source in Rhode Island is the website of the state’s Budget Office in the Department of Administration. In addition to posting the annual budget from the Governor’s proposal through final revisions and supplemental decisions, the Budget Office also provides budget documents from previous years. In Massachusetts, budget information can be found on the legislature’s website and on the websites of a number of independent groups that analyze annual appropriations and their impacts. A difficulty is that budget format and categories have changed from year to year, including departments incorporated under the Massachusetts Executive Office of Energy and Environmental affairs. In addition, rapidly changing fiscal situations may affect budget information for 2009. Finally, data for Massachusetts that reflect staff work and state expenditures in the watershed are still to be developed. A full and accurate picture of investments in the Bay and watershed will require agreement among all parties on how to characterize and account for categories of expenditures, including which departments, federal grants, and staff to track.