The proposed federal budget released by President Donald Trump this week would likely result in fewer environmental inspections and enforcement actions in Alabama, according to the Alabama Department of Environmental Management.

ADEM gets about 40 percent of its budget from grants issued by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to enforce national environmental laws in Alabama. The EPA would see a 31 percent cut in Trump's proposed budget, among the steepest reductions of any federal agency. That would include cuts in the grants passed along to the states.

"There would be a proportional decrease in services and enforcement," ADEM external affairs chief Lynn Battle said. "If two inspections are required but normally you'd do three inspections of a particular facility, you'd just have to do the bare minimum: Respond to complaints, the minimum amount of inspections, the minimum amount of everything."

Those minimum levels required to achieve compliance could also be decreasing. Battle said the EPA grants include minimum requirements for the number of facility inspections and other benchmarks, and that those requirements could be negotiated down if the grants include less money.

ADEM requested $16,362,686 in EPA grants for fiscal year 2017, and has long said it receives far less in state appropriations than most other state environmental agencies.

Those budget issues were highlighted during Alabama's budget crunch of 2016, when the state legislature passed a budget requiring ADEM to transfer $1.2 million to the general fund from the permit fees and other revenue the department collected.

That year, the legislature allocated just $280,000 to the department, all of which was earmarked for the state's Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations program, and which didn't cover the full cost of that program.

Battle said the last three budgets have included no money from the state legislature that wasn't earmarked for the CAFO program, and there has been no indication so far that the legislature plans to change that.

Mitch Reid, program director for the environmental group Alabama Rivers Alliance, said any EPA funding reductions would be bad news for the waters of the state.

"Alabama really can't afford any cuts to our federal assistance because we already woefully underfund our state program," Reid said. "Unless Alabama is willing to step up and shoulder our responsibility, I can't imagine how we could even provide the bare-bones level of protection that [ADEM Director Lance LeFleur] talks about."

Reid cited the state's backlog of water pollution permits that stretches years, ongoing issues with impaired waters due to mercury and PCB contamination, and wastewater treatment plants that "chronically" violate their permits as evidence that Alabama's Clean Water Act program is already stretched thin.

"There's already no room for error," Reid said. "There's no fat in this system. We're already at the bone."

Battle said the proposed cuts would take a significant toll on ADEM, though the budget document that exists now is simply a proposal and the final budget passed by Congress could look a lot different.

"If there is an approximate 30 percent cut [to EPA grants], that would amount to a reduction of as many as 40 [ADEM] employees," Battle said.

Battle said the department has never had to lay off employees and expects that it could lower its headcount through attrition and reorganization rather than resorting to layoffs. Negotiating down the EPA grant requirements could also allow the department to stretch the reductions over a period of time to avoid layoffs, Battle said.

ADEM has not had any contact with or guidance from the EPA regarding the proposed cuts and Battle said the department is relying on media reports to get their information. The EPA Region 4 Administrator position in Atlanta is currently vacant.

Battle said ADEM has already increased its permit fees more than 100 percent in the last three years to cope with decreased funding from the state, so the department would be reluctant to increase them again.