Sawyer Bailey, Executive Director of AdkAction, testified at the February 6th NY State Joint Legislative Hearing on the 2025 Executive Budget Proposal for Transportation, emphasizing the urgent need to reduce road salt pollution in the Adirondacks and across New York. She highlighted the widespread contamination of private wells downslope of state highways, where oversalting has led to unsafe sodium levels and potential heavy metal leaching.
Bailey argued that implementing smarter, more sustainable winter road maintenance practices—such as live edge plows, salt brine, and advanced tracking technology—would not only protect drinking water but also save money. She urged legislators to empower the Department of Transportation to reallocate existing snow and ice management funds to scale these proven solutions, which could achieve an initial 20% salt reduction and ultimately cut usage by 50%. She closed by calling on the state to prioritize the health and safety of rural communities over maintaining the status quo.
A recording of her testimony and a complete transcript are available below.
Read Sawyer Bailey’s Written Testimony Here
Read the transcript of Sawyer Bailey’s oral testimony below.
My name is Sawyer Bailey and I’m the Executive Director of AdkAction, a nonprofit in the Adirondack Park working to solve problems to help vibrant communities and ecosystems.
If you couldn’t tell, I am coming to today’s hearing 8 months pregnant. And anyone pregnant in the winter will tell you they are extra cautious to avoid slipping and falling on snow and ice. People are salting the steps a little extra for me this year.
And I realize they salt because they care, but the problem is, there’s a slow violence salt causes when it’s consistently overapplied. What’s preventing a sudden fall is causing significant harm across the vast geography of a state like ours.
Road salt has polluted the water throughout the Adirondack Park and across New York, at times to extents comparable to saltwater estuaries. Of nearly 500 wells tested by the Adirondack Watershed Institute, 64% exceeded sodium levels set by the EPA. And the most significant contamination zones are abundantly clear: wells downslope of state highways.
Oversalting state roads has polluted the wells of hundreds of people in the Adirondacks who live downslope of state highways and rely on well water for drinking, cooking, and washing. For those who don’t know the extent of the pollution in their private wells, especially people who live in older homes, they may be drinking water compromised by heavy metal leaching from salt corrosion. Think about my safety, something you can see, and now think about theirs, compromised by a magnitude of potential lead contamination we can’t begin to imagine.
But I want you to know that change costs zero dollars. AdkAction and 30 Adirondack towns and counties have proven it. More sustainable, cost effective winter road maintenance measures work, and the Department of Transportation should be empowered to scale these methods, especially in a budget season where every dollar matters and affordability is of the highest priority.
Of the $156 Million set aside for snow and ice management in this year’s proposed budget, too much of that will bounce and scatter off the road, showing up as wasted salt. The department should have the ability to reclassify a portion of this money to actually do something, to fund the recommendations offered in the Adirondack Road Salt Task Force Report: to start using live edge plow equipment, salt brine and spreaders, and state of the art salt, snow, and temperature tracking equipment.
With the support of our legislators, the DoT can reach an initial 20% reduction in salt use funded simply through material spending reductions in a single winter if given the opportunity to be entrepreneurial. From there, a 50% reduction of road salt use and road salt pollution can be achieved. I think we owe it to communities like mine, our rural, upstate residents. Let’s show them they matter, that their wellbeing is worth more than our fear of leaving business as usual behind.
