密歇根新闻广播 失去基金来源 国家该如何治理污染?

Each year the state of Michigan spends about $15 million to clean up abandoned industrial sites. Contamination can threaten water sources and public health.

Now, however, the state is about to run out of money to do that clean up.

James Clift is policy director for the Michigan Environmental Council. He said in the past, Michigan used around $20 million a year from the General Fund – the state's big checking account filled with tax money – to clean up these sites.

When that general fund started to dry up around 2008, Clift said voter-approved environmental bond money was used for cleanup. That's the money the state's running out of now.

Governor Snyder has a proposal to fix this problem for one year by pulling from the Refined Petroleum¹ Fund, which pays for cleanup of old underground fuel tanks.

"Unfortunately you'll see a lot of this in state budgeting in general," Clift said, "and a lot of it within the Department of Environmental Quality budget … always kind of seems like they're scrambling² around to figure out, ‘Where do we have some available funds to deal with the problem that we think is most immediate³?'"

To address the funding gap long-term, Clift said some in Lansing are talking about introducing another bond proposal to voters in 2018, which would "cost us at least one and half times" the cost of cleanup.

But that's not the state's only option.

"So, if you look around the country, we've kind of liked the Minnesota model," Clift said. "A few years back what they did is they dedicated⁴ a quarter of one percent of the sales tax to dealing⁵ with their environmental issues. It actually funds their whole environmental agency."

Right now, Clift said there are approximately 15,000 polluted sites throughout the state.

Over the last few decades, he said the state of Michigan has worked to address the worst of these sites – the ones "threatening public health today."

"So they'll kind of rush in and spend a lot of money on that site," he said. "But they really haven't put a big dent⁶ in the backlog⁷ of sites."

Clift said the state began addressing this backlog around three or four years ago by checking out 250 sites a year.

Around 10% of them, he said, threatened public health and needed immediate attention. He said 30-40% needed work, but not immediately, and half of the sites surveyed did not pose threats to public health at the time.

(That means it's possible around 10% of un-surveyed backlogged⁸ sites could pose a threat to public health now.)

For the full conversation, including Clift's rundown of options the state has to fill the funding gap long-term, listen above.

1 petroleum   

n.原油，石油

参考例句：

• The Government of Iran advanced the price of petroleum last week.上星期伊朗政府提高了石油价格。
• The purpose of oil refinery is to refine crude petroleum.炼油厂的主要工作是提炼原油。

2 scrambling   

v.快速爬行( scramble的现在分词 )；攀登；争夺；（军事飞机）紧急起飞

参考例句：

• Scrambling up her hair, she darted out of the house. 她匆忙扎起头发，冲出房去。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• She is scrambling eggs. 她正在炒蛋。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

4 dedicated   

adj.一心一意的；献身的；热诚的

参考例句：

• He dedicated his life to the cause of education.他献身于教育事业。
• His whole energies are dedicated to improve the design.他的全部精力都放在改进这项设计上了。

5 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

6 dent   

n.凹痕，凹坑；初步进展

参考例句：

• I don't know how it came about but I've got a dent in the rear of my car.我不知道是怎么回事，但我的汽车后部有了一个凹痕。
• That dent is not big enough to be worth hammering out.那个凹陷不大，用不着把它锤平。

7 backlog   

n.积压未办之事

参考例句：

• It will take a month to clear the backlog of work.要花一个月的时间才能清理完积压的工作。
• Investment is needed to reduce the backlog of repairs.需要投资来減轻积压的维修工作。

8 backlogged   

（使）积压( backlog的过去式和过去分词 )； 储存； （为日后装运而）登账确认（订货）

参考例句：