DCR cannot afford an 8.3% cut in its operations budget
First Budget Hearing for DCR
As the Legislature begins to review the Healey-Driscoll Administration's proposed FY2027 budget for the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), we will be calling on you to help us drive home the point that the agency can not afford to suffer an 8.3 percent cut in its operations budget (2810-0100), and an additional 2.9 percent cut in its seasonal employee budget (2800-0501) and still keep our parks fully staffed and fully open for their full seasons.
In contrast, Mass Parks for All (MPA) is calling for a 3.5 percent increase from the FY2026 appropriations in both of those accounts. That is a half-percent over the state inflation rate for calendar 2025, and will allow the agency to continue to dig out of the massive hole it found itself in during more than a decade of inadequate funding during and after the 2008 recession.
The first opportunity we have to publicly support adequate funding for DCR is on Tuesday, March 10, at 11 a.m. That’s when the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Ways and Means will hold its first budget hearing. This hearing, during which the environmental agencies will give testimony on the governor’s proposal, will be held at UMass Amherst, in the Campus Center’s Amherst Room, One Campus Center Way, Amherst MA.
While only agencies will be able to give live testimony at the hearing, Mass Parks for All thinks it’s important to have as many park advocates in the room as possible to show that we will be united in the fight to get DCR the funding it needs to keep from taking a large step backwards from the progress of the last three years.
If you can join us at this hearing, please contact MPA’s Assistant Executive Director Kat Powers and get added to our list. As the event approaches we will let everyone on the list know where and when to meet. We will have stickers for all of our attendees so everyone will know why we’re there.
Later in the process, we will be presenting legislative testimony at a future hearing and we will keep you informed on what and where that will be. Meanwhile, we also have a sign-on letter supporting our position that we will submit to Ways and Means. The letter proposes a way to get DCR this modest but critical increase with no effect on the state operating budget, while still banking almost $85 million in the state Stabilization Fund, the so-called Rainy Day Fund. This savings account now has more than $8.0 billion. If you are affiliated with a group that supports our parks, we welcome your organization to sign this letter.
Suffice it to say, the more groups we have on board for this effort, the greater our chances of success. Meanwhile, a large show of support at the March 10 hearing is just the beginning of this effort. Thank you for supporting us, our parks, and the $16 billion annual outdoor recreation economy, the fastest growing in the nation, that we all support with our park patronage.
Environmental Bond Bill Update
Earlier in the legislative session, the new environmental bond bill, the Mass Ready Act, received favorable recommendations from two legislative committees, Environment and Natural Resources (ENR), and Bonding, Capital Expenditures and State Assets. In the past, ENR has amended, or marked up, environmental bond bills before sending them to other committees. However, neither committee amended this bill before sending it to the Senate Committee on Ways and Means, which, in addition to developing the state budget, assesses the cost of other bills.
Senators can now suggest changes they would like to see Ways and Means include in the Mass Ready Act to the bill. The bill contains proposed authorization levels for capital spending projects the state will bond, or borrow, funds to accomplish over the next several years. Ways and Means will consider these proposed changes, then send its version of the bill to the Senate floor. Once on the floor, senators will debate the bill and be able to offer amendments before the full Senate votes on it.
The bill will then undergo a similar process in the House. Once the House approves its version, a House-Senate Conference Committee will negotiate a final bill for the Legislature to vote on before sending it to the governor for consideration.
If you’ve been following this issue here, you know MPA and our partners on the Environmental Bond Bill Coalition are seeking significant increases in four line items in the bill. Three are specifically for DCR and the fourth is for MassTrails grant funds administered by Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs (EEA), the cabinet level agency that oversees DCR.
Specifically, we are asking that the DCR land conservation funding (line 2800-1123) be increased from $40 million to $60 million, that the DCR parks funding (line 2840-7028) be increased from $587 million to $787 million, and that the DCR parkways funding (line 2890-7036) be increased from $177 million to $400 million, the portion of DCR’s $1.0 billion deferred maintenance backlog that is parkways related. Funding for MassTrails is currently in a catch-all line item that covers several priorities (line 2000-7082) set at $120 million. We are asking that MassTrails funding be set at $75 million and that it be in a separate line item as it was in the 2018 Environmental Bond Bill.
State Sen. Jamie Eldridge is asking that these increases be included in the Senate Ways and Means version of the bill, and has asked his colleagues to join him in supporting this via a sign-on letter he circulated earlier this month. So please join Mass Parks for All in thanking Sen. Eldridge for his leadership on this issue, as well as cosigners, senators Peter Durant, Mike Rush, John Keenan, and Nick Collins. Please also ask your own senator to support including these increases in the bill that Ways and Means will bring to the Senate floor. This is particularly important if your senator is on Senate Ways and Means.
MassTrails Grants
Now that the deadline for MassTrails grants has passed, we’re interested in the projects you applied to get funded. Send us a description of your project and if you get funded, we would be happy to feature your project in our blog.
MassTrails grants help the nonprofits who support our parks and open spaces with funds for project development, design, engineering, permitting, construction, and maintenance of trails. Taking on a grant is a lift because it’s a reimbursement grant and requires matching funds – and we’d like to learn how your organization got it done. Share your stories with us so we can help other organizations learn how to get their own trails grants. We will feature some of them in the blog and on our website.
Doug Pizzi is Executive Director of Mass Parks for All