The Senate chairman of the Connecticut General Assembly’s Environment Committee wants to provide enough funding for the Department of Environmental Protection to streamline its permitting and enforcement.
State. Sen. Ed Meyer, D-Guilford, called on the 2011 legislative session to give DEP enough personnel to enforce the streamlining bill passed in 2010, which was touted as making the state more attractive to businesses.
“No business would ever set sales quotas without the people, machinery and materials in place to achieve that goal. No army would ever go to war without the men and munitions needed to win the battle,” Meyer said in a statement. “The DEP is no different in that it must have a sufficient number of people in place to review and inspect business applications if we are to ever see new job growth in this state.
DEP positions are at their lowest levels since 1987; its budget is the lowest since 1972, adjusted for inflation.
Meyer’s Senate Bill 60 requires DEP to set appropriate staffing levels. The bill had its first public hearing on Monday.
