One of the most significant ways people on the East End of Long Island interact with the state is through quality of life issues, such as clean air and water — and the state is a critically important player in coping with our ever-eroding shoreline. Gov. Kathy Hochul’s State of the State speech Tuesday offered a mixed set of policies regarding the environment. But while there was some good news for natural resources in her raft of programs, organizations involved in fighting climate change were disappointed.
First the good. The governor proposed $400 million in additional 2025 budget funding for the environmental protection fund. Money would be provided for buying out homeowners with property at risk of repeat flooding and replacing existing structures with environmentally friendly erosion control, including natural shorelines and salt marshes. Money would be included for further limiting stormwater reaching bays and harbors or contaminating groundwater, and there was even cash for planting 25 million carbon-sequestering trees.
New York is behind in meeting climate goals it set for itself in 2019 — way off-track of getting to net-zero emissions by 2050. But “cap and invest,” as the state’s new concept has been called would have worked to lower greenhouse gas emission by charging companies and then putting that money into green alternatives, such as solar power or minimally polluting household heat pumps. Opponents have insisted that the program would drive up the cost of doing business in the state, perhaps even showing up in increased prices at the gasoline pump. Backers of the concept counter that a cap-and-invest program could actually save residents money immediately by cutting ever-increasing energy bills.
In the lead-up to the State of the State, Governor Hochul’s office had appeared to put the brakes on the cap and invest policy. Instead of providing a timeline for draft regulations, her watered-down approach now only instructs state agencies to develop reporting requirements for companies and polluters. We read that as capitulation to the fossil fuel sector — delaying a thorny issue by calling for additional study.
“Putting a price on pollution,” as advocates have described the idea, is overdue. And, with a second Trump administration poised to gut federal protections, a greater share of combating climate change will fall to the states. New York has no dedicated stream of climate funding. Cap and invest would have fixed that. It is a shame that the governor has chosen to move away from this badly needed initiative at such a critical time.