If enacted, President Donald Trump's proposed budget cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency could slow down environmental efforts in Gowanus.

The Gowanus Canal is notoriously known as one of the most polluted waterways in the country.

State Attorney General Eric Schneiderman chose it as the backdrop Tuesday as he praised the EPA's role in keeping resources clean and safe.

The canal is undergoing a $500 million cleanup as a Superfund site.

But the president's proposal would cut 31 percent of the EPA's budget -- or about $2.6 billion. Much of that money would be taken from the Superfund program, decreasing its budget by about 43 percent, Schneiderman says.

Although the Gowanus cleanup funding has already been secured from the parties responsible for polluting, elected officials say it would still be affected by the cuts because the EPA must individually approve each stage of the process. The slashes in funding would slow it down significantly, officials say.

"If the administrative budget is cut, and the Superfund staff can't work on the administrative order, then the polluters won't pay to clean up this canal," Schneiderman says.

Congress has final say on the federal budget.