FYI: The City Council’s Environmental Protection Committee is holding hearings today on what members say is the state’s unfair allocation of environmental clean-up funds. In 1996, Albany set up a $1.75 billion fund through the Clean Water/Clean Air Bond Act to pay for a variety of environmental projects in localities around the state. Between then and 2000, the city has received just 23 percent of those funds (despite representing 40 percent of the state’s population), according to a proposed City Council resolution. The resolution would call on Governor Pataki to set up “objective standards” for dispersing Bond Act money. Check out Alex Ulam’s profile of efforts to win Bond Act money to develop more small, neighborhood parks in the City Limits archive. [10/9/03]