Trump budget cuts: How they hit Jersey Shore

Goodbye, Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Hello, higher flood insurance premiums.

Those are just some of the more dramatic proposals in the federal spending plan unveiled Thursday by President Donald Trump.

But there are cuts to literally hundreds of lower-profile programs whose impact reaches across the Jersey Shore.

The $480 million federal program that supports the Edwin B. Forsythe Wildlife Refuge, a swath of natural habitat that spreads south from Brick across portions of Ocean and Atlantic counties? Gone.

The budget also eliminates the $73 million Sea Grant program, which does coastal research in 33 states, including New Jersey. It was labeled a "low priority" by the Trump administration.

The New Jersey Sea Grant Consortium is located at Sandy Hook, and for years has hosted the field trips for school-aged children who come to learn about the marine environment through seining and other activities.

Nearly 30,000 participants, students, their families, teachers, Scouts and the general public take part annually in the consortium’s education programs and special events.

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"This will have a wide impact from kids to our young scientists. The consortium provided matching grants to our college students so they can get their research supported directly," said Tony McDonald, director of Monmouth University's Urban Coast Institute.

The budget cuts other environmental programs as well.

Tim Dillingham, who has been executive director of the American Littoral Society since 2003, said the proposed budget cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency would result in the elimination of $9.5 million for water quality testing, which includes the Jersey Shore’s ocean beaches during the summer tourist season.

"To make sure it’s safe to swim in, in the summer," Dillingham said.

There would also be cuts to estuary reserves and coastal resilience funding for NOAA; 5 percent in cuts to National Marine Fisheries Service, $1 billion in cuts to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for beach nourishment, flood control and storm protection, he said.

As a result, the cuts to the EPA would undercut key parts of the Shore’s economy, Dillingham said.

Additional cuts for environmental protection in the proposed budget include $100 million for the U.S. Geological Survey, a federal agency which evaluates threats from natural disasters to the nation’s natural resources and landscape, he said.

The Trump budget also eliminates major EPA coastal restoration programs (it specifies Great Lakes Restoration and Chesapeake Bay), eliminates the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Pre-Disaster Mitigation Grant Program and eliminates funding for the National Flood Insurance Program’s Flood Hazard Mapping Program, he said.

"We will be working towards having the Congress turn these cuts back as they are clearly unacceptable and severe," Dillingham said. "Our Republican congressmen – (Frank) LoBiondo, (Chris) Smith and (Tom) MacArthur – have voted against some extreme, anti-environmental ideas that have come up in the past. On the other hand, this is also a Congress in which the majority has voted lockstep with President Trump."

The public should not assume that reason prevails, they should be outraged, Dillingham said.

Cuts to school programs

Other educational programs will disappear as well under the proposed plan: literacy programs for students with disabilities or who are learning English; some financial aid for college students; grants that support before- and after-school programs, among others.

School districts that educate students who live on military bases, including Lakehurst and Tinton Falls, are set to lose their student impact aid. These school districts cannot tax the federal property on which the students live, so federal impact aid is designed to help pay for their education. School officials in Lakehurst and Tinton Falls did not immediately return a call for comment on Thursday.

Steve Baker, a spokesman for the New Jersey Education Association, said the cuts to the Department of Education represent only a small fraction of school spending in New Jersey, but the reductions appear to target the neediest student groups, like those living in poverty.

"We’re in a situation in New Jersey where, because of the governor's (Gov. Chris Christie) school funding practices, our schools are in pretty dire straits for funding," he said. "They’ve had years and years and years of essentially flat funding."

Because of that, schools need all the resources they can get, he said.

Arts programs throughout the state? Eliminated as money for the National Endowment for the Arts disappears. 

"In my area, there are grants to translate Spanish poetry in Highland Park (for Enriqueta Carrington to translate the poetry of 17th century Mexican poet Juana Ines de la Cruz), at Crossroads (Theatre in New Brunswick) there's a grant for African-American singers and in Perth Amboy there's a grant supporting Latino  arts and culture. (Trump) and his administration do not want to support the funding of Latino arts projects," Rep. Frank Pallone, D-N.J., told an Asbury Park Press reporter on Monday.

The impact on jobs

A worker advocacy group panned Trump’s proposed cuts to the Labor Department, saying they would hurt job training and worker safety programs. The proposed budget eliminates $434 million for the Senior Community Service Employment Program for low-income adults over the age of 55 and $11 million in training grants for the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Among the proposals is a 21 percent cut to the Labor Department budget.

But the worker advocacy group held out hope that the administration would provide more money for re-employment services and apprenticeship programs.

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"Overall, the Trump budget reflects a poorly conceived intention to abandon millions of workers struggling to get a toehold in our economy and those whose rights on the job are best protected with an effective government watchdog on their side,” said Christine Owens, executive director of the National Employment Law Project, based in New York.

Trump has proposed cutting $221 million from the Economic Development Administration. New Jersey in fiscal 2015 received four grants from the agency for $728,674. Among the recipients in years' past are universities like Rutgers and Rowan for work force training.

What will increase in the proposed federal budget is military and defense spending, and $3 billion in money for a wall along the southern border with Mexico.

Check back to APP.com for more on this developing story. Contributing: Michael L. Diamond, Erik Larsen, The Associated Press