Riverkeeper
Perdue’s PR Campaign of Deceit
(Posted by Bob Gallagher)
A group of legislators, following a script conceived by the public relations machine of Perdue and the Maryland Farm Bureau, have joined in Perdue’s unprecedented effort to derail an environmental lawsuit that has singular importance for the Chesapeake bay watershed. The effort is unprecedented in the extent to which Perdue and its enablers are attempting to use the media and the political process to win a case that they have as yet been unable to win in court.
Here is the story.
Read MoreWorcester County Commissioners Kick the Clean Water Can Down the Road
(Posted by Kathy Phillips.)
In an extremely disappointing move, the Worcester County Commissioners have failed to take some very simple steps to protect our local waterways while contributing to state-wide efforts to save the Chesapeake Bay.
At the Worcester County Commissioners December 6th regular meeting, the County Commissioners threw out the Phase II Watershed Implementation Plan documents that county staff had spent months preparing and voted 6-1 not to submit their plan to MDE by the December deadline. In fact, they intend to bury the document and “take their time” cooperating.
Read MoreFoundation Among Critics of O’Malley’s Law Clinic Interference
(Posted by Jeanne McCann.)
Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley’s attempt to get the University of Maryland Environmental Law Clinic to drop its water pollution case against Hudson Farm has drawn criticism from a long list of environmental, legal and news organizations. Joining the list is a somewhat unexpected institution – the Town Creek Foundation.
Foundations don’t regularly take public stands on policy, but in this case Town Creek has sent a letter to Dean Phoebe Haddon of the University of Maryland Law School expressing thanks for the Dean’s strong response to the governor and the foundation’s continued support for the law clinic’s work.
Read MoreO’Malley Piles On
(Posted by Tom Horton.)
Governor Martin O’Malley presumably thinks he’s helping Maryland poultry growers and processors by pressuring the University of Maryland’s environmental law clinic to drop out of a lawsuit aimed at stopping chicken farms from polluting.
But the pollution is real, it’s substantial and it’s not going to get better until the governor and agricultural interests acknowledge we have a problem with too much poultry manure.
Read MoreMitigation Madness
(Posted by Fred Tutman.)
The legend of Robin Hood is about a fabled band of brave outlaws in medieval England who took money from the rich under a repressive monarchy and redistributed it to the poor. Sounds like a good thing right? Take something from somebody who has too much and give it instead to somebody who has not enough. What could be wrong with that? Fast forward into reality on the Chesapeake Bay, the 21st century and the lopsided world of “net environmental impacts” where we can take a perfectly good and functioning wetlands site, turn it into a parking lot and then make up for it by restoring a wetlands half way across the state.
Read MoreSprawl Poisons the Bay
(Posted by Gerald Winegrad).
The recent deluges leading to massive stormwater runoff into the Chesapeake Bay may cause great damage to an already seriously impaired system. We previously have discussed in this spot the huge flows of Bay-choking nutrients and sediment from farms each time it rains. Now, we will devote discussions to the pollution flowing from developed lands including huge amounts of nutrients, sediment, and toxic chemicals.
The Chesapeake’s watershed before 1607 was 95 percent forested with huge acreage of intact wetlands. These forests and wetlands absorbed and held nutrients and sediment. The flow of these Bay-killing pollutants was greatly accelerated due to enormous changes in land use when we converted forests and wetlands to agriculture and then, more recently, to development. The Bay region has since lost about 50 percent of its forest cover and 72 percent of its wetlands. No change has been more devastating for the Bay.
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