POUGHKEEPSIE – The recently adopted state budget starts to reverse the trend of deep cuts to environmental programs, Scenic Hudson President Ned Sullivan says.  Too often, the recession has used environmental efforts and parks programs as a scapegoat, he said.

“The prolonged and deep economic recession and government fiscal crisis have been used by some federal and state policymakers as a pretense for disproportionately slashing the budgets and staffs of the agencies responsible for stewardship of our natural resources. This makes no sense,” he said. “Those agencies are crucial to maintaining clean air and water, access to public parkland and working farms, the very foundation to healthy communities and people.”

But, Sullivan said for the first time in years, the new administration of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the state legislature have begun to reverse that trend of cutting funding to environmental and parks programs and seek to restore money to needed programs through “a new brand of leadership.”