By Kitty Gifford
On March 31, 2019 the New York State Legislature and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo signed off on the FY2019-2020 state budget.
The New York Soil Health (NYSH) initiative was allocated $200,000 under the state’s Environmental Protection Fund. Visit our page Current Priorities and Plans for 2018-2019 for updates on year three of NYSH.
In total the Environmental Protection Fund was allocated a record $300 million in the FY19-20 state budget, which maintains support for a number of farming and farmland programs, as well as funding for climate change mitigation research.
In addition to funding for New York Soil Health, the Environmental Protection Fund includes funding for these programs of interest:
- $4.5 million for the Climate Resilient Farming program which invests in GHG emissions reduction, resiliency, and soil health on farms,
- $400,000 for a Hudson Valley Carbon Farming Pilot program first proposed by Assemblywoman Didi Barrett,
- $500,000 for Cornell University to develop an agricultural GHG inventory,
- $18 million for the Farmland Protection Program, and
- $2 million for Smart Growth.