Former Senator Bernie Fowler opened the Summit with his annual Prayer for the Patuxent, which he followed with his own perceptions of the situation based on over 40 years of work on achieving cleaner water in our bay and rivers. He was followed by William Baker, President of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, who laid out the broad outline of the 2009 lawsuit that CBF and others had filed against the Environmental Protection Agency for not enforcing the mandates for water quality in the Chesapeake Bay contained in the Clean Water Act. After the Obama administration took office, the lawsuit was settled as the initiative turned to the president’s executive order for the Chesapeake Bay. Carin Bisland, Associate Director for Ecosystem Management at the EPA Chesapeake Bay Program Office, provided the basic tenets of the executive order. She stressed that never, in the history of the agency, has such a sweeping program been attempted. Not only are there long range goals, but there are two year benchmarks
that each bay state will be held to.   One of the critical steps in implementing the required actions from the lawsuit and Executive Order is passage of Senator Ben Cardin’s legislative proposal to fund the necessary federal, state, and local projects needed to comply with the law and E.O..

The executive order rests on the concept of TMDLs- the Total Maximum Daily Load of pollutants that a waterway can absorb before becoming unhealthy. Every state and jurisdiction in the Chesapeake Bay watershed must develop a Watershed Implementation Plan (WIP) for achieving the TMDL for every waterway. It is a monumental task that involves agriculture and wastewater treatment plants, but also lawn treatment, pet waste, septic systems, air pollution from engines, storm runoff – in other words, everything.

Ann Pesiri Swanson, the executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Commission, provided an overview of the work that has been done, and is still to be done to clean up the Chesapeake Bay. She pointed out that while those who have been working on this problem for many years bemoan the fact that so little has been achieved, across the country environmentalists ask how we have accomplished so much. For them, she reported, our glass is half full while we see it half empty. She went on to review the history of efforts that have been undertaken over the last 40 years to return the bay to health. Her message was that this is an enormous task that cannot be accomplished by government alone, but must involve everyone who lives in the watershed.

The responsibility for implementing the order falls to the state and local governments. Speaking for the state of Maryland, Dr. Robert Summers, Assistant Secretary of the Maryland Department of the Environment, said that Maryland was working hard to complete the required Watershed Implementation Plans that will guide changes. Greg Bowen, Director of Calvert County Planning and Zoning, represented the local level. He talked about the historic rational for some of the actions that are now identified as key problems, like septic systems and land use. He agreed that it would require much more than changing laws or better enforcement, it would require a lifestyle change to make a significant impact on long term water quality.

During the second half of the summit, Dusty Rhoades moderated a question and answer period with the audience. A lively exchange ensured during which citizens expressed their frustration with the slow pace of improvement, the lack of enforcement, or the ability of property owners to get exceptions to the existing rules.  One questioner noted that, despite the legal requirements of the Clean Water Act and the President’s Executive Order, developers, building contractors, farmers, and home owners would offer still opposition to many of the required changes and that concerned citizens need to show support for federal, state and local officials in their efforts to implement mandated actions and exert pressure if they fail to do so. 

The following are web sites where you can learn more about the executive order and how it is being implemented.
 
The Chesapeake Bay Program site where you can download the EPA’s “pollution diet” for for the bay and its tributaries:
www.chesapeakebay.net

Maryland Department of the Environment web site:
 http://www.mde.state.md.us/Water/index.asp   

Following are sites managed by the Federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)

To go directly to the TMDL website that has all of the state watershed implementation plans as well as the draft TMDL go to:
http://www.epa.gov/chesapeakebaytmdl/

To download the Executive Order documents go to:
http://executiveorder.chesapeakebay.net/

To monitor the EPA’s goals and progress, visit the Chesapeake Stat website at:
http://stat.chesapeakebay.net/

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation website is: www.cbf.org

The Chesapeake Bay Commission website is: www.chesbay.state.va.us

Patuxent Riverkeeper website: www.patuxentriverkeeper.org