CHICAGO — EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, who chairs the federal Great Lakes Interagency Task Force, released a new Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) Action Plan at a meeting of Great Lakes Mayors in Chicago, according to a press release.
The GLRI Action Plan lays out steps federal agencies will take during the next five years to protect water quality, control invasive species and restore habitat in the largest surface fresh water system in the world, stated a press release.
The release reported that the GLRI was launched in 2010 to accelerate efforts to protect and restore the Great Lakes and to provide additional resources to make progress toward the most, critical long-term goals for this important ecosystem.
Summarizing the actions federal agencies plan to implement during Fiscal Years 2015 through 2019, using GLRI funding, the newly released plan will build on restoration and protection work carried out under the first Action Plan, with a major focus on: Cleaning up Great Lakes areas of concern, preventing and controlling invasive species, reducing nutrient runoff that contributes to harmful and nuisance algal blooms and restoring habitat to protect native species, noted the release.
“The new [GLRI] Action Plan lays out the steps we need to take to get us closer to the day when all Great Lakes fish will be safe to eat, all beaches will be safe for swimmers and harmful algal blooms will not threaten our drinking water supplies,” said McCarthy.
Read the entire release here.
