New Yorkers Pass Environmental Bond Act by Wide Margin

 


By Lucy Grindon. Report for America Corps Member and NCPR.

Nov 09, 2022 – New York voters passed the state’s Clean Water, Clean Air, and Green Jobs Environmental Bond Act of 2022 yesterday, approving a plan for the state to borrow up to $4.2 billion to fund water, air, and energy programs, and environmental conservation.

The act passed by a wide margin, with about 60% of voters in favor and almost 30% opposed. It was printed on the back of voters’ ballots, and about 12% did not vote on it at all.

The act will allow the state to sell bonds to investors, and then spend the money generated by those bonds to reduce flood risks, mitigate effects of climate change, and preserve land.

John Sheehan of the Adirondack Council, a lobbying organization, said he was pleasantly surprised by how much support the act got in the Adirondacks.

“I think there’s an assumption that the Adirondacks are a more conservative part of the state, and I’m not necessarily sure that that’s true in every situation,” Sheehan said.

He added that the Adirondack region may stand to benefit more from the act than any other part of the state. That’s because funding from the bonds will pay to upgrade water and sewer systems. The costs of such upgrades would ordinarily fall straight to local taxpayers.

“If you have a multi-million-dollar project you have to complete, and only a couple hundred people to pay for it, that’s going to be very expensive for individual landowners and individual residents in those communities,” he said. “Since the Adirondacks are such a source of clean water for the rest of the state, it makes sense to invest in keeping water clean at its source.”

Sheehan said the act will also bring more jobs to the North Country.

“A large component of this will help provide new sources of clean energy, and renewable sources of clean energy. Those facilities are going to need a lot of people to install and maintain them,” he said.

The state will start selling bonds gradually, as the need arises to fund its new environmental projects.

 

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