le and wildlife, and stop pesticide, fertilizer, oil, grease and other polluted run-off from farms and cities. It also supports efforts to confront invasive species like the Asian carp that threaten native fish and wildlife.The budget also contains more than $500 million to the eight Great Lakes states of Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin to confront the chronic problem of sewage overflows that close beaches, destroy habitat and contribute to harmful algae blooms.
“The 2012 budget represents a significant victory for fish, wildlife and the Great Lakes,” said the National Wildlife Federation’s Jeff Skelding, who serves as campaign director for the Healing Our Waters-Great Lakes Coalition. “This investment is critical for Great Lakes fish and wildlife.”
Delivering Results for Wildlife
In communities around the region, Great Lakes restoration activities are producing results and making a difference for wildlife.
- In Northern Michigan, replacing a culvert that restricted the Platte River, a blue ribbon trout stream, is helping to restore the river’s natural flow and to reduce stream bank erosion that was suffocating prime spawning areas for trout and salmon.
- Near Buffalo, N.Y., removing invasive plants and restoring a 15-acre wetland on Buffalo Creek, is helping improve fish and wildlife populations in the creek—as well as bolster efforts to restore the Buffalo River.
- In Cleveland, Ohio, removing an old dam from Euclid Creek is allowing fish and other aquatic life to return to the waterway and helping to improve water quality.
More, however, needs to be done.
Vision for a Revitalized Great Lakes
The decades-long assault on the Great Lakes will not be cured over night. Habitat destruction, sewage contamination, invasive species and toxic pollution like PCBs have taken a heavy toll on the Lakes and its wildlife, leading to the extinction of species like the blue pike and drastic decline of other species such as lake trout.
That’s why more than 1,500 citizens came together in 2005 to craft a plan to restore the Great Lakes and the fish species that relied on them, such as whitefish, lake herring, lake trout, yellow perch, walleye, coaster brook trout, lake sturgeon, American eel, and Atlantic salmon.
That plan—supported by the National Wildlife Federation—offers manageable solutions to bring back the Lakes and its wildlife. It’s great that the 2012 federal budget supports actions to restore the Great Lakes. It will be equally important for the U.S. Congress and President Obama to maintain support for these programs in the 2013 budget and beyond. Cutting funding will only make problems worse and more costly to solve.