“I am appalled that despite hours of testimony on the importance of the proposed DEQ budget to our economy and environment, we’ve now passed a budget that committee members received a mere 18 hours before being required to vote on it. The DEQ budget voted on yesterday is significantly different than the budget we received testimony on for the past two months and underfunds key health and economic priorities like preventing toxic fumes from entering homes and putting brownfields back to work to create jobs. The process by which this budget was drafted was faulty at best. Given President Trump’s most recent executive order, which rolls back significant and important measures to combat climate change, it is obvious it will be up to individual states to protect the environment, and more broadly, the world, for future generations. This is not a budget that provides those protections. The funding cuts in this budget, coupled with the secrecy in which it was drafted, does not hold corporate polluters for profit accountable and does not protect our environment for the families, hunters and anglers, conservationists, and DNR officers of tomorrow. Michigan, with our Great Lakes and abundant natural resources, should be a leader when it comes to protecting the environment."