Cuomo signs Adirondack road salt reduction bill

AARON CERBONE Adirondack

After months of requests from North County advocacy groups, local governments and state representatives, Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the Randy Preston Road Salt Reduction Act late Wednesday night. It is intended to reduce road salt pollution in the Adirondacks, and it becomes law just as concerns about snow, salt and safety on the roads are making their annual appearance.

However, any reduction in salt use is still at least a year away, and will only be a trial run. Relief from salt runoff corrupting wells, rivers and lakes — and rusting vehicles — is a long way off.

“We’ve been using salt on our roads for about 50 years, and in that time … by my math, about 7 million tons of salt have been put on our roads, and a lot of it has accumulated in our soils and groundwater,” said Dan Kelting, executive director of the Adirondack Watershed Institute at Paul Smith’s College. “No matter what we do, it’s going to take a considerable amount of time to reverse the contamination of folks’ drinking water.”

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