Posted on January 16, 2023
Millions of dollars will go toward coastal environment projects and education programs in the Crossroads this year.
The Matagorda Bay Mitigation Trust, created in the wake of an environmental group’s legal victory over Formosa Plastics Corp. in December 2019, announced this week it will provide a total of $5.8 million to 15 projects this year.
This year’s selections cover habitat restoration, research projects and accessibility improvements. One project receiving funds from the Trust is a mercury concentration study inside an area of Lavaca Bay closed to fishing.
The trust also plans to give $25,811 to local public education programs and $186,213 to the Calhoun County YMCA for its Palacios Summer Day Camp.
Raabe said the efforts funded by the Matagorda Bay Mitigation Trust will begin during the first half of 2023.
Under the terms of its settlement with local environmentalists, Formosa agreed to pay the trust $10 million annually from 2020 to 2024. The payments from the plastics corporation fund the mitigation trust’s support of projects and programs benefiting bays and river deltas in the Crossroads.
“Some of the environmental research projects may take up to three years to complete,” Raabe said. “Even if we aren’t bringing in any new money after 2024, we will still have funds to provide.”
Here are the projects and programs the Matagorda Bay Mitigation Trust is funding this year:
Habitat restoration
- $271,280 to the Matagorda Bay Foundation for the Oliver Point and Oliver Reef Restoration Project
- $500,000 to the Coastal Bend Bays and Estuaries Program for Matagorda Island Gulf Shoreline Erosion and Pass Cavallo Exchange Restoration
Environmental research
- $500,000 to the University of Houston-Clear Lake for a study in mircroplastic distribution and impacts to the diamond-backed terrapin, highlighting public education effects and future levels of sea level rise
- $416,817 to Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi for the Sediment Quality Assessment Survey of San Antonio Bay
- $499,500 to the University of Texas at Austin Marine Science Institute for a study evaluating the photodegradation products of plastic nurdles and their toxicity in Matagorda Bay
- $396,691 to the University of Texas at Austin Marine Science Institute for research in the reproductive and developmental toxicity of “forever chem
- icals” to Matagorda Bay’s prey fish
- $499,985 to Texas A&M-Galveston for a study of microplastics in the Matagorda and San Antonio Bay systems
- $497,818 to Texas State University for a study of sediment mercury concentrations in the Closed Area of Lavaca Bay and the risk to wildlife from mercury remobilization during dredging
- $454,162 to Texas A&M-Corpus Christi for assessing the risk to ecosystem health from increasing nitrogen and phosphorus levels in Lavaca Bay
- $399,998 to the University of Texas at Austin Marine Science Institute for assessing the risks of lithium pollution on estuarine fishes
- $463,382 to Tarleton State University for assessing impacts of microplastic pollutants across macroinvertebrate food webs in Matagorda Bay
Public education
- $25,811 to the Calhoun County Texas A&M Agrilife Extension Service, Texas Sea Grant, Calhoun County 4-H and Calhoun County 4-H Sportfishing Club
Improving public access
- $494,000 to Calhoun County for bulkhead improvements at Swan Point
- $200,000 to the City of Port Lavaca for Phase 1 of the Harbor of Refuge Old Landfill Shoreline Erosion Response and Protection project
Youth camp$186,213 to the Calhoun County YMCA for the Palacios Summer Day Camp
