Editorial: Staying green

With natural-gas drilling posing one of the biggest challenges to Pennsylvania's environment since the days of coal strip mining, this is no time for Harrisburg officials to stand by and let funding dry up for the commonwealth's premier conservation effort.

That's just what could happen this year unless new money is provided for the state's $1.3 billion Growing Greener program - launched by a Republican governor, Tom Ridge, and enthusiastically expanded by a Democratic successor, Gov. Rendell.

While conservation and environmental advocates see an ongoing need for $200 million a year to preserve vanishing farmland, restore polluted waterways and urban brownfields, and launch other community revitalization efforts, only about $15 million annually will be available after 2010.

The state needs to begin paying off money that voters overwhelmingly agreed to borrow in 2005 to fund this important work. So rather than continue to fund environmental needs, most of the $65 million in fees from trash haulers who dump at state landfills will go toward paying off bonds.

Increasing the tipping fee would be one easy means of sustaining Growing Greener, especially since 40 percent of the fee would be paid by out-of-state trash haulers who import waste. But the most attractive source of new funding would be a share of a Marcellus Shale gas-extraction tax - a levy that's not only overdue but also critical to meeting other needs in the state budget.

Tough economic times might justify trimming Growing Greener spending on projects that stray too far from its mission, like subsidies to businesses relocating in Philadelphia or elsewhere. But initiatives like saving farmland, safeguarding watersheds from pollution, and restoring parks cannot be put off for another day.

Finding a safe harbor for Growing Greener would be a rare gift to future generations that can only be made by Rendell and state lawmakers.