Mia Cathell | The Daily Free Press | September 10, 2019
The Massachusetts Division of Fisheries and Wildlife announced its support for a bill in Congress that would provide $12 million every year to aid the state’s efforts to protect over 500 species, according to a Sept. 3 MassWildlife press release.
The “Recovering America’s Wildlife Act” was first introduced to Congress in December 2017 by Rep. Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE) and Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-MI), but was reintroduced this July after it stalled last year, according to the bill’s history on Congress’s website.
Beginning in fiscal year 2020, the bill would amend the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act, which diverts funds from the general excise tax for wildlife conservation, to allocate an additional $1.3 billion for the Wildlife Restoration Fund, according to the bill.
The bill also says it would allow states to determine how the funds will be used to protect fish and wildlife of the “greatest conservation need,” as well as for other conservation purposes.
MassWildlife’s press release called the bill “one of the most important wildlife conservation bills in decades,” and wrote that the bill would allow states across the U.S. to implement their own conservation plans.
“Conservation, business, government, and education leaders have come together in the Alliance for America’s Fish and Wildlife to create a 21st-century funding model for critically needed conservation of our nation’s most precious natural resources—our fish and wildlife,” the press release stated.
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