Maryland 1998 Bay Program Highlights
Chesapeake Bay Programwome I I comments
MARYLAND
1998 BAY PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
The annual Executive Council meeting is an excellent time to review and highlight the
accomplishments of the state of Maryland as it strives to meet the goals and commitments of the
Chesapeake Bay Program partnership. As a partner in the Chesapeake Bay Program since the signing of
the historic 1983 Chesapeake Bay Agreement, Maryland has worked hard in many areas including
nutrient and toxic reduction, habitat restoration, growth management, education, land preservation and
public outreach and participation. The hard work of the citizens of Maryland is paying off. The Bay and
its tributaries are cleaner and healthier than they were just 15 years ago when the first Bay agreement was
signed. Today, we would like to take a few minutes to give you an overview of how we have been
working to insure a cleaner, healthier more resilient Chesapeake Bay system.
OVERVIEW
1998 was a mixed year for the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. In some areas of our Bay restoration
effort we continued to make steady progress. Water quality improved especially in those areas where
point source pollution dominates. In other areas however, especially where nonpoint source pollution is
most prevalent, not only did water quality not improve, but living resources, especially Bay grasses,
declined in both range and vitality. Both crabs and menhaden numbers were down this year. However,
whether this is an anomaly or the beginning of a trend, it is too early to tell.
In areas of resource protection, outreach, education and citizen participation, Maryland continued to
set a strong pace. The introduction of the state's new Rural Legacy Program put thousands of acres of
the state's most ecologically valuable land under new protection, the more than 350 members of the
state's Tributary Teams continued to demonstrate their value in developing new ideas and implementing
current plans, Governor Glendening hosted a first-in-the-watershed Youth Environmental Summit, and a
new way to learn about the Bay and the land/water connection, Bay Link, was debuted. Other important
milestones in 1998 included Bay Game II and its companion the Mountain Game, the commitment of
more than $ 170 million in aid to landowners, through the US Department of Agriculture's Conservation
Reserve Enhancement Program, a new goal of 60,000 acres of wetlands to be restored by the state, and
the passage of comprehensive nutrient management legislation to help prevent future outbreaks of the
microorganism, Pfiesteria.
MARYLAND PROGRAM SPECIFICS
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Maryland 1998 Bay Program Highlights
•	Smart Growth and Neighborhood Conservation - Maryland initiated an unprecedented series
of actions to control sprawl and change the patterns of development which have destroyed habitat,
degraded water quality, and adversely affected the state's communities. These actions resulted in
the enactment of Smart Growth and Neighborhood Conservation legislation that establishes:
Priority Funding Areas ~ This program focuses State investment in "smart growth" areas in local
jurisdictions. State funds for roads and highways, business development financing and economic
development, water and sewer improvements, and most housing programs are targeted to areas
that meet select density and growth criteria. The Priority Funding Area program discourages new
development in open spaces and aims to prevent problems associated with sprawl such as water
pollution from stormwater and construction runoff, additional air pollution from increased
commuting miles, and loss of wildlife habitat. Priority Funding Areas include all municipalities,
all areas inside the Baltimore and Washington beltways, and designated revitalization areas,
enterprise zones and empowerment zones. Counties have until October 1, 1998, to designate other
areas they wish to be considered as Priority Funding Areas, but those areas must meet minimum
State criteria for water, sewer and minimum residential density.
•	"Brownjields" Redevelopment ~ This program will spur redevelopment of properties that are
contaminated, or even perceived to be contaminated, while ensuring that the environment and
public health will continue to be protected. Since the program began, the Maryland Department of
the Environment has received 30 applications for the voluntary cleanup program, covering 27
different sites and more than 585 acres. Fourteen of the cleanup applications (for 12 sites) have
been approved and four of the applications were deemed by MDE to "require no further action."
• Conservation Reserve Enhancement Program (CREP) ~ provided new momentum to the Bay
cleanup momentum as Governor Glendening was joined by Vice President A1 Gore, U.S.
Department of Agriculture Dan Glickman, Senators Sarbanes and Mikulski, and Representative
Wayne Gilchrist, to introduce a major new initiative to protect Maryland waterways from nonpoint
source pollution runoff ~ at least $170 million, and perhaps as much as $300 million in federal
grants was earmarked to assist farmers in their efforts to plant stream- side forest buffers on
agricultural lands throughout the state.
Water Quality Improvement Act of 1998 - establishes several programs to improve water
quality and help fight toxic Pfiesteria. As a direct result of this bill, Maryland becomes the first
state in the nation with a comprehensive nutrient management planning policy.. Preserving
Maryland's environment, improving the quality of its waters, and protecting the Chesapeake Bay
from disease are the goals that this legislation will help to achieve. The proposal, as approved by
the General Assembly, included:
-Sewage Treatment Plant Upgrades	-Budget Increases
-Reducing Nutrients from Non-Point,	-Transitional tax credit
Non-Agricultural Sources	-Manure disposal assistance
-Septic systems	-Use of the phytase enzyme
-Agricultural Source Reductions	-Penalty provisions
-Assistance to farmers	-Funding research projects
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Maryland 1998 Bay Program Highlights
•	Watershed Pollution Limits ~ The Administration recently committed to establish pollution
limits for Priority State watersheds, a commitment matched by few States in the country. These
limits, called Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs), effectively build upon the 40 percent
nutrient reduction commitments made in 1986 by establishing numeric commitments for other
pollutants. During the past two years, Maryland assessed the status of water quality throughout the
State, and identified those waters that are currently not meeting designated uses. The State will
establish a TMDL for the substances causing the impairment of the waterways and the source of
the substance (both point and nonpoint). Priority water bodies include the Chesapeake Bay
Tributary Strategy watersheds, the Maryland Coastal Bays watershed, the Baltimore Harbor
watershed, and water bodies impaired by toxic chemicals. The Administration included new
funding in the Department of Environment's FY1998 budget to accomplish this task.
•	Rural Legacy ~ This program redirects existing State funds into a focused and dedicated land
preservation program specifically designed to limit the adverse impacts of sprawl on our
agricultural lands and natural resources. The program creates "Greenbelts" - green spaces that
generally define where a community or developed area ends and where the countryside begins.
The program reallocates State funds to purchase conservation easements for large contiguous tracts
of agricultural, forest and natural areas subject to development pressure, and fee interests in open
space where public access and use is needed. Over the next five years, the program will commit
approximately $163 million to preserve nearly 90,000 acres of farms, forests and open spaces.
•	Tributary Teams ~ Maryland's innovative Tributary Teams continued to play an increasingly
important role in environmental management, more thoroughly involving people and local
governments in cleanup activities, testifying before special commissions, and helping achieve the
40 percent nutrient reductions we have been working towards since 1987. Their second annual
meeting brought together team members from across the state to meet with the Governor and other
state officials to help chart the course for the coming year. In a new activity, many teams
organized "Wade-In's" ala Senator Bernie Fowler's famous Patuxent Wade-In to help dramatize
the need for personal responsibility in restoring the Bay.
•	Bay Link: A natural connection to the Chesapeake— endows citizens with a new way to enjoy
the beauty and wonder of our natural world and provides them with a new way to better
understand the interrelationship between the land and water. Bay Link, the first-of- its-kind park
system in the US, connects 29 Maryland parks, forests and natural areas with each other and the
Bay and is, what the Annapolis Evening Capital newspaper calls the Chesapeake's "String of
Pearls."
•	Pfiesteria Summit- brought together the governors of Maryland, West Virginia, Pennsylvania,
Virginia and Delaware to sign an agreement that pledged cooperation in the fight against the
dinoflagellate Pfiesteria.
•	Whitbread "Round the World" Race - more than 425,000 yacht-racing enthusiasts came to
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Maryland 1998 Bay Program Highlights
Maryland looking for a once-in-a-lifetime experience as the state played host to the Whitbread
'Round the World Yacht Race. Another 100 million arm-chair sailors looked over our shoulders
via tv and satellite as Maryland coordinated the nine-boat, on-the- water start of the globe's
premier sailboat race and managed over 5,000 small craft all crowding into a very small stretch of
the Bay at the same time. The state turned this opportunity into a way to educate tens of
thousands of people about their responsibility to "save the Chesapeake Bay," while at the same
time fed, watered, kept comfortable and entertained thirty thousand guests at Sandy Point State
Park, as well as play host to the ESPN tv anchors as they called the start of Leg 8 of the
Whitbread.
•	Maryland Bay Game II - Created for children 3 years and up Maryland's Bay Game helps
parents avoid the eternal question, "Are we there yet? The Maryland Bay Game II is an
interactive educational activity designed for children, played during car/bus trips between the
Chesapeake Bay Bridge and the Ocean City coast, and designed to help young people identify
Bay-related objects, features and items (e.g., osprey nests, wetlands, farm fields, watermen's boats)
as they travel to Ocean City.
•	Maryland's Youth Environmental Summit ~ Maryland's first Environmental Youth Summit
was designed to be a beginning, a genesis of environmental understanding and action that would
help more than 900 students leaders and their teachers, from across the state, take a closer look at
the environment and their role in its preservation. The discovered not only why growth needs to
be smart, how to maintain the delicate balance between the economy and the environment, and
why the price of chicken, soy beans and Silver Queen corn affects crabs, oysters and rockfish; but
what they could do to insure that Maryland doesn't grow dumb, and that the state keeps its
eco-equilibrium, and preserve the water quality of the Chesapeake Bay without putting half of
Maryland's farmers out to pasture.
• Bay Grasses in the Classes - teaches students about submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV) and its
importance as habitat. Through a partnership between the Department of Natural Resources and
the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, students study SAV, obtain various SAV seeds, grow hem in the
classroom and then assist DNR biologists planting them.
As we head into 1999, Maryland's place in the natural world is a vital one. The state embraces the
largest and most productive estuary in North America, the Chesapeake Bay, and much work and effort
has been dedicated to its restoration. Every Marylander should continue to give unyielding support to
the cleanliness of our state's waters, the vitality of its living resources, the purity of Maryland's air and
the protection for future generations of a quality of life unmatched anywhere in the United States.
Up to: [ Top ] [ News Room] [ Home ]
For more information, contact the Chesapeake Bay Program Office, 410 Severn Avenue, Suite 109, Annapolis, MD 21403,
Tel: (800) YOUR-BAY, Fax: (410) 267-5777.
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Maryland 1998 Bay Program Highlights
Last modified 12/15/98.
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