On the 45th anniversary of Earth Day, New York’s environmental and public interest community reflected on the progress made, as well as the need to return New York to its status as the national environmental leader with implementation of key policy initiatives in 2015.
Since the first Earth Day in 1970, New York has been a national environmental leader on several fronts, including:
• Implementation of the State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQR), which ensures local environmental impacts are considered before development occurs which could endanger public health.
• Environmental bond acts in 1986 and 1996.
• Enactment of the nation’s first acid rain law curbing emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides from all power plants, and the subsequent Clean Air Compliance Act of 1993.
• Passage of the Bottle Bill, and subsequent Bigger Better Bottle Bill to encourage recycling of beverage containers.
• Implementation of the nation’s first multi-county, private land-use plan (Adirondack Park Private Land Use and Development Plan) and multi-county planning/regional zoning board (Adirondack Park Agency).
• Enactment of the Environmental Protection Fund.
• Enactment of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI), a nine-state collaborative which reduces climate altering carbon emissions and raises funds for clean energy development.
• Passage of e-waste recycling laws which reduces toxic metals and plastics disposed of in landfills.
• Ban of high-volume hydraulic fracturing (fracking).
“New York has a great history of leading on environmental issues, with Republicans and Democrats alike standing up to protect our environment and public health,” said Peter Iwanowicz, executive director of Environmental Advocates of New York.
