In an effort to conserve natural resources and protect our quality of life, Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner (D-Round Lake) announced the Assembly has passed several measures as part of a package in honor of Earth Day.

“I am working to build on New York State’s long legacy of protecting our environment,” said Assemblywoman Woerner. “The Earth Day legislation we passed would work to reduce the impacts of climate change, ensure fairness in siting of industrial facilities and phase-out the use of dangerous, unhealthy products.”

The Earth Day package contains several measures that would help improve our community’s quality of life. One measure would require the state Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) to establish limits on greenhouse-gas emissions and create a greenhouse-gas reporting system (A.6072). This measure would allow the state to take effective action on climate change, noted Assemblywoman Woerner.

Industrial facilities are sometimes disproportionately located in working-class neighborhoods. The Earth Day package contains two measures to ensure fairness in siting new industrial facilities. One would require state agencies to adopt and abide by environmental justice policies and the other would require DEC to publish a list of “high local environmental impact zones” (A.3063, A.3382).

Additional measures would prohibit the sale of dangerous products that are polluting our environment and are putting our children’s health at risk, including banning sales of:

• cosmetics that contain microbeads that are polluting our rivers and are impacting recreational fishing (A.5896);
• toys that contain dangerous toxins that our children could ingest (A.5612); and
• light-bulbs that contain excessive amounts of mercury, which pose a health-hazard if broken (A.5844).

As part of an ongoing effort by Woerner to protect the environment, she supported the 2015-16 state budget that includes $177 million in appropriations for the Environmental Protection Fund (EPF), which is a $15 million increase over the previous fiscal year. The EPF helps protect working farms, develop new recycling programs, protect historic sites and enhance parks and outdoor activities. The budget also includes $200 million over three years to assist municipalities in rebuilding sewer and water lines, helping to keep our region’s water sources clean.

As part of the state budget, Assemblywoman Woerner also helped secure nearly $4.5 million in additional funding for the Capital Region Transit Authority (CDTA) to help it address record ridership of its buses and a growing demand for transit services. Woerner noted that public transit is a convenient, environmentally-friendly way of getting around our community.