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North Carolina Legislative Building, Raleigh.
As budget plans begin to gel in Raleigh, it’s growing more likely that North Carolina’s Land and Water Fund, a longtime driver of clean water and conservation projects in the state, could receive funding this cycle at levels not seen in more than a decade.
The fund, which was formed under the 2013 merger of the Clean Water Management Trust Fund and the Natural Heritage Fund, issued just over $21 million in grants in its last cycle from a list of applications totaling four times that amount. One of several areas of state government not funded through one of last year’s mini budgets, the Land and Water Fund appropriation has remained where it was in 2018. This year’s Senate budget calls for upping that amount considerably to $73.2 million in this fiscal year and $53.2 million next year.
A proposed levee along the Neuse River at Seven Springs and a pilot project to address chronic flooding in the Stoney Creek watershed are two of the items in flood-mitigation legislation making its way through the General Assembly.
The âDisaster Relief and Mitigation Act,â House Bill 500, would allocate more than $200 million on projects to prevent flooding and to plan ahead for damaging storms. It would be âthe largest and most comprehensive statewide investment that North Carolina has ever made to prepare for future storms,â said House Majority Leader John Bell, R-Wayne, one of the primary sponsors.
Approximately $15.2 million of that funding would be for projects that have an impact on Wayne County, Bell said.
Driving through Tyrrell County on the eastern coast of North Carolina, the impacts of climate change are clear.
Roads flood regularly, cutting off people in isolated areas from their jobs, schools and basic necessities. Hurricanes and powerful storms are frequent, the most recent being Tropical Storm Claudette in June. The county sits at sea level and is surrounded by water on two sides the Albemarle Sound to the north and the Alligator River to the east.
Saltwater intrusion is dramatically shaping the environment and its economy. Acres of forests and farms are being replaced by grassland.
“These are the ghost forests,” said Willy Phillips, pointing through the window of his rumbling white truck towards haunting fields of dead pine trees. “Forests that give in as the sea level rises. Gradually, it becomes uninhabitable for them.”
A pilot project to address chronic flooding in the Stoney Creek watershed and a proposed levee along the Neuse River at Seven Springs are two of the items in flood-mitigation