from Fred Tutman (the Patuxent Riverkeeper) and Barbara Sollner-Webb (President of the West Laurel Civic Association)

You may have seen recent articles in the Washington Post, Baltimore Sun and Laurel Leader about the Patuxent River Commission — this is an update and call to action.

The Patuxent River Commission (PRC) is Maryland’s only governmental river commission, created in the 1980’s as a safety valve for concerns about the decline of the Patuxent River. The creation of the PRC and the Patuxent Watershed Act that sparked it were the culminations of years of lawsuits, activism and governmental studies seeking solutions to the steady decline of the State’s longest and deepest intrastate river. Fred served on this Commission for the last 23 years, Barbara for the last 19 years; only recently departed Senator Bernie Fowler had a longer PRC tenure.

For very many years, the PRC was impressively effective in helping preserve and enhance the Patuxent River. One example of the PRC’s numerous environmental successes that was near Laurel was it bringing attention to massive ongoing sediment releases into the Patuxent River (from improperly constructed and untended sediment ponds, during major re-grading to move Rt 29 east of the old Giant shopping center in Burtonsville). Following this attention, state inspectors insisted the site’s sediment control be brought up to code, a sediment-laden inlet partly remediated, and training for State Highway Administration contractors was revamped. In contrast, earlier efforts by individuals and civic associations did not have enough clout to bring any corrective action. The PRC has also been known for creating the much-used “Patuxent Water Trail” website and initiating a recurring Patuxent Environmental Summit, as well as for tunning numerous stream clean-ups and tree-planting sessions – actually, all arranged by Fred through his role as the Patuxent Riverkeeper. It should be noted that throughout these years of being effective for the river, the PRC functioned quite independently of government pressure.

Problems on the Commission began almost four years ago, when the Secretary of Planning, who is a member of the Commission by charter but had never previously participated in our meetings, announced that we lacked legal authority to discuss private development plans that could affect water quality and were under consideration by a local government. He handed us an internal legal memo to support his edict.

Most the Commissioners were stunned. Not only does our enabling legislation specifically direct that we “review and comment on plans…related to the Patuxent River and its watershed” but the Commission has from time to time done precisely that. Let’s be clear: the PRC is an advisory commission with no regulatory authority, no budget allocation, and no full-time staff. In effect, the only thing we can do about watershed issues is to discuss matters and issue comments. To be suddenly notified by a political appointee that we lack that discretion, indeed never had those powers, was stunning and more than a little insulting. The Hogan Administration, through the Department of Planning’s Secretary, appeared to be trying to use a falsified legal opinion to coerce us into not discussing things in the watershed that really matter, environmentally. We say “falsified” because it was a highly questionable legal opinion produced by a lawyer aimed at misleading the Commissioners by misrepresenting the plain text of the enabling statute–such that Commissioners would follow the legal memo instead of the law.

Fearing that the PRC would lose its effectiveness if it can discuss river problems only in a very general way but without acknowledging improper real estate growth, we gave the Secretary’s legal opinion to the Maryland Attorney General. His office quickly issued a fresh opinion saying exactly opposite of the Secretary: that there is no restriction in our deliberations about river-related policy, reinforcing the directive of our enabling statute.

Most of us on the Commission felt the matter was settled, and we continued working on the effort we had been engaged in — bringing attention to an inequitable and hence illegal planned transfer, to a private developer, of a tract parkland purchased with Land Water Conservation Fund money. Despite the Department of Planning’s continuing to discourage this PRC effort, our attention ended up with the environmentally desirable outcome of the county not doing this questionable land transfer and protecting additional sensitive land abutting the river from development by acquiring it as parkland.

Another proposal we recently looked at, despite the Department of Planning’s discouragement, was high density development in the headwaters of the Middle Patuxent branch of the Patuxent River, a project where high-quality land that had been in the Agricultural Preserve (MALPF) was questionably “swapped” for essentially un-buildable land. That the PRC might extend its analysis to address an underappreciated 2017 law on removing land from under Agricultural Preservation (HB155) seemed especially discouraged by Department of Planning representatives.

Indeed, it appears that the Secretary of the Department of Planning still believes our Commission is his to control (which he acknowledged in media accounts). He evidently waited for the appointment cycles of five of the most independent voices on the Commission to reach the stage when in previous appointment cycles we would have been semi-automatically renewed, but instead instructed that we not be reappointed. The legitimate appointments procedure actually requires that they ask advice from the serving Commissioners for new individuals to fill any vacancies and then obtain “the advice and consent of the [Maryland State] Senate” before the Governor can officially appoint any new Commissioner to those positions. But so far as we know, that has not happened this round. Furthermore, while the PRC’s enabling legislation mandates that our positions are to be chosen to “represent…interests within the [Patuxent] watershed“, one of the new replacements neither lives nor works within the Patuxent watershed and gave no indication of any involvement with the Patuxent in his introductory speech.

This latest is a coup d’etat over an independent Commission, reflecting the Hogan administration not only thumbing its nose at the rule of law but also seeking to silence and censure dedicated voices for the river who are guilty of no more than fulfilling the oath they took as Commissioners: to protect the river!

It surely is relevant that projects the PRC has questioned tend to be the sort that cannot withstand much scrutiny, including ones requiring vacating conservation easements on parkland, changing zoning on sensitive lands, and waiving various local standards, rules, and laws. These are projects on which the proponents seek as little commentary a possible because if brought to light, they risk not being approved. We know this makes the applicants angry and makes their governmental allies angry too. So it surely is much easier to get rid of pesky tree-huggers.

We do not know if the Governor has any profit participation or direct business connection to these projects because, as most Maryland citizens know by now, our Governor is not transparent about such things.

So what are we to make of a wholesale replacement of several of the most dedicated, outspoken and longest serving Commissioners with people who have not been lawfully appointed? Removing the Patuxent Riverkeeper, who has a long and admirable history of working to preserve and enhance the Patuxent River, is striking, especially in light of the Secretary of the Department of Planning saying he wants “new perspectives” for the Commission. Might there be any desire to likewise retire the Riverkeeper’s perspective of preserving and enhancing the Patuxent River?

The response from the Maryland General Assembly has been speedy and resolute. Senate legislation drafted by Senator Paul Pinsky and cross filed in the House of Delegates by Mary Lehman seeks to update the charter of the PRC to fulfil more of its original purpose as a watchdog. It hopefully could return the PRC to being the best forum in the State for raising and exploring solutions to the problems of a formerly healthy river that now consistently gets a D- in water quality. This legislation is called the “Bernie Fowler Water Protection Act of 2022″. Watch for it when it emerges from the legislative drafting process and encourage your State legislators to vote for it.

Citizens should also write to Governor Hogan and express their disappointment with this unworthy course of action to silence and sabotage the important and necessary work of this Commission: The Honorable Larrym Hogan, 100 State Circle, Annapolis, Maryland, 21401-1925,

As the late Bernie Fowler would say, “Never, Never, Never, Never, Never Give Up!”