Администрация Трампа планирует исключить программу устойчивого развития рек из федерального бюджета

One of the federal government’s most cost-effective investments — the Sustainable Rivers Program — is slated for elimination in the Trump Administration’s budget this year. Communities adjacent to rivers and dams know what it means to have healthy waterways for recreation, fishing and their overall economies. The House has moved to restore funding, but it is uncertain if the Senate will agree to preserve the program, which produces huge returns for every dollar invested. Before Congress makes a final decision, it’s worth understanding what we lose if the proposed budget becomes law. For example, the Des Moines River — shaped by Saylorville Lake and Lake Red Rock — had discharged excess nutrients from Iowa’s rivers into the Mississippi and ultimately into the Gulf of Mexico, where they fuel seasonal dead zones that devastated shrimp and crab fisheries hundreds of miles away. In 2015, the Sustainable Rivers Program (SRP), a partnership between The Nature Conservancy and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began working to address this problem at its source, introducing environmental flow strategies to restore the river’s natural seasonal rhythms, giving native mussels, shovelnose sturgeon and aquatic life the conditions they needed to thrive while improving the water quality that Iowa families and municipalities depended on. The ecological recovery has been dramatic and the projected return — nearly $20 million in discounted benefits against costs of roughly $2.2 million — is a nearly 9-to-1 ratio. It’s hard to understand why we would walk away from this program and waste such successful taxpayer investments. Nearby, the Melvin Price Locks and Dam, just 17 miles north of St. Louis on the Upper Mississippi, has derived similar benefits by making existing infrastructure smarter without changing what it does. The dam still moves commercial freight. But now it also mimics the natural spring river velocities that trigger lake sturgeon spawning in the tailwaters below. Upstream, modest adjustments to water levels exposed mudflats that drew migratory shorebirds, waterfowl, and wading birds to the Riverlands Migratory Bird Sanctuary, which attracted more than 111,000 vehicles last year. At Melvin Price, benefits are expected to exceed costs within three years, returning $12 for every $1 invested — largely from sturgeon recovery, migratory bird habitat, and recreation gains. These results must not be ignored by our leaders in Washington. Communities that have benefitted from innovative water management should raise their voices to preserve a program that has rejuvenated waterways across the country. Since SRP launched in 2002 on the strength of the recovery of Kentucky’s Green River — once considered “ecologically degraded” and now draws visitors for boating, fishing, and recreation throughout south-central Kentucky — it has supported nearly 15,000 miles of American waterways. Most of the 90,000 waterway miles in the U.S. were built decades ago, designed for flood reduction, navigation, hydropower, or water supply. Many still function the same way. The SRP works to adjust how they operate — without new construction and while fulfilling their original purpose — to give rivers more of what they need, when they need it. The benefits show up as stronger fisheries, returning wildlife, and more resilient local economies. Out of a federal budget in the trillions of dollars, SRP investment has been relatively small — at its peak, around $7 million annually. But the returns are astonishing. An analysis by the independent research institute RTI and commissioned by The Nature Conservancy shows the program delivers up to $14 in economic benefits for every $1 invested and is on track to generate an estimated $243 million to $265 million in net value by 2040. Yet, the president’s budget proposes eliminating the program entirely. We have both spent our careers advocating that government should spend carefully and prove its value. The SRP does both. The math speaks for itself. We implore our friends in communities that have benefitted from this program to urge Congress to fund the SRP. In a budget understandably defined by hard choices, this is not one of them.