Summary of Accomplishments

of the

Pennsylvania Environmental Council

1970--2010

Water and watersheds: In its infancy in 1970, PEC was instrumental in getting legislative approval of the state’s Clean Streams Act, which was among the nation’s landmark environmental actions in 1970 aimed at making our waterways swimmable and fishable. PEC helped to defend that law for several years until the state Supreme Court finally upheld its applicability in 1973. From adoption of the Safe Drinking Water Act in 1984 and the Storage Tank and Spill Prevention Act in 1989 through the adoption of stormwater regulations and re-authorization of the Abandoned Mine Lands program that lets 30 percent of the funds address mine discharges in the past few years, PEC has been in the forefront of water policy development.

Protecting waterways: PEC’s long history of addressing pollution and conservation issues in our most vital waterways dates to 1971, when the organization petitioned to intervene before the state regulators to insist that raw sewage be addressed in Pine Creek – Pennsylvania’s Grand Canyon. By the 1990s, PEC developed an estuary management plan for the Delaware and held the Pittsburgh Riverfront Development Conference. Soon, PEC formed the Allegheny Watershed Network, developed Watershed Conservation Plans for the North Branch Susquehanna River and other streams, and published the Pennsylvania Guide to Watershed Issues. PEC was instrumental in creating the French Creek Project in 1995 to conserve the most biologically diverse stream east of the Mississippi River. PEC’s water advocacy continues in part through the partnership it formed in 2008 with the Pennsylvania Organization for Watersheds and Rivers.

Recreation and livable communities: PEC wrote the state’s Scenic Rivers Act, which was signed into law in 1972, and convened a task force on wild and scenic rives in 1975. The following year, PEC began a study of the Schuylkill River, which in 1979 was approved as a state’s first Scenic River based on PEC’s study. A decade later, PEC had added land trails as a focus, helping to launch a statewide Greenways Partnership initiative and helped write the Pennsylvania Greenways and Trails How-To Manual. PEC was a central player in forming the Susquehanna Greenways Partnership in 2001, about the same time it started work on developing greenways along the Delaware Riverfront. Water Trails are key to safe boating on unfamiliar streams, and PEC developed several of the early water trails along with workshops to help others develop them through the 2000s. PEC also helped to draft the Elm Street legislation in 2001 to support livable neighborhoods and continues to clean up illegal dumps through the Community Illegal Dumpsite Cleanup program.

Waste management: PEC wrote part of the Solid Waste Management Act, which was passed in 1980, and from 1982 to 1985, supported a toll-free hotline through which people could get information about hazardous waste issues. PEC sponsored a series of roundtable discussions on municipal waste in 1986 and by 1987, began a multi-year project to support waste-minimization by industry. PEC’s current green enterprises initiatives include a focus on reducing waste in homes and businesses.

Smart growth and farmland protection: In 1973, PEC mobilized 60 groups on behalf of the Clean and Green amendment to the state Constitution, and a year later, helped pass the Farm and Forest Tax Assessment Act to reduce incentives for heirs to sell off large private land holdings. PEC supported amendments to strengthen the act in 1980. Long before the general public was thinking about the many impacts of unmanaged growth, PEC made this a seminar topic in 1987. By the early 1990s, PEC had created the GreenSpace Alliance to advocate for preserving open space, was sponsoring municipal programs on growth and “greening”, and had published the Guiding Growth handbook, which won a Pennsylvania Planning Association award. By the mid-90s, PEC was successfully advocating for a program to help re-use abandoned industrial lands, or “brownfields,” and was working to form a new land-use coalition that became 10,000 Friends. In the late ‘90s, PEC published a landmark report aimed at reducing sprawl impact through Transit Oriented Development.

Energy and climate change: PEC began seriously discussing climate change as early as 1997, when it featured a front-page article on the subject in a newsletter. PEC advocated for energy conservation, smart growth and renewable energy over the years, and its Commonwealth Community Energy Project through the early 2000s demonstrated how families can save money by saving energy. In 2006, PEC created its Energy and Climate Center of Excellence and convened financial experts and investors in conjunction with the state Treasurer, leading to creation of the Keystone Green Investment Fund. By 2007, with general consensus from business, academia, state agencies and environmental advocates, PEC developed the Climate Change Roadmap for Pennsylvania. PEC advocated for the Alternative Energy Portfolio Standards that now require utilities to meet energy demands with certain percentages of renewable energy, and helped to develop the Carbon Management Action Group report that focused largely on potential to use state lands in 2008.