I am writing this letter in response to Matt Pluta’s Letter to the Editor. First, I want to thank the Talbot County Council for their support. It is a comfort to know that in our time of need they take action. When 50% of Talbot & Dorchester County’s productive oyster bars were taken to create 3 tributary size sanctuaries our counties experienced a great loss economically, socially, and, yes, environmentally. As president of Talbot Watermen’s Association, member of Oyster Advisory Commission, member of Oyster Futures, Chairperson of the Talbot County Oyster Shell Committee, and past member of Choptank Trib Team (now known as ShoreRivers). I would like to share some of the scientific data that shows that Harris Creek Sanctuary is not performing as well as Public Oyster Harvest Areas and why sanctuaries success is still unproven.

Since I live on Tilghman, I have watched every phase of the reef construction in Harris Creek including many years of the planting of Spat on Shell (SOS) until its supposed completion in 2016. I say supposed because, in 2017, I started to see more plantings of SOS, and a total of 31 of the 64 reefs were replanted. See attached Harris Creek Reseeded in 2017.

At an Oyster Advisory Commission (OAC) meeting, I brought up the question of why a project that was announced to be completed the year before would need such extensive reseeding. The response was that the sanctuary restoration plan allowed for additional plantings if bars did not meet certain metrics. In other words, as the oysters die from disease or old age, new oysters are planted at taxpayer’s expense. How convenient that the plan was written with safeguards so that it would not fail! I thought that, once completed, the reefs would sustain themselves through natural reproduction and, according to the disproven computer model created by UMCES, this spat would spread outside of Harris Creek to harvest areas.

Low spatfall is another factor. Spatfall is clearly not occurring as evidence from the current 2017 Fall Survey (a survey of oyster bars done around the state for the past 60 years by the DNR). See Table 2 – Spat pg. 32. In Harris Creek, the number of spat per bushel is 55, slightly above the 33 year average 40.3 (see notation #1), but just outside of Harris creek the number per bushel is only 13 which is a lot lower than that bars 33 year average of 67.2 (see notation #2). Also noted is that both spat counts are well below that of Broad Creek which is 205 per bushel, almost double the 33 year average of 118.1 (notation #3), and let’s remember this is a creek that we harvest and have not planted over 2 billion SOS and spent 32 million dollar in taxpayer’s money.

As for the next computer model created by VIMS and UMCES mentioned by Mr. Pluta that shows the filtering capacity of Harris Creek and the removal of nitrogen of 100,000 pounds of nitrogen is a theory not real data. Lisa Kellogg of VIMS clearly states, “Through the model she and her colleagues hope to provide a tool that natural resource agencies could use to gauge the ecological benefits of this and other reef restoration projects”. Where can you find water testing data? I know ShoreRivers does water testing in Harris Creek. On ShoreRivers website, I found data showing nitrogen levels; the data shows Harris Creek was actually going backwards with nitrogen levels rising from .47 in 2013 to .958 in 2014  (see attached HC05), with overall numbers increasing.

Broad Creek, a public harvest area, during those same years was declining in nitrogen levels to .114 (see attached BC04).

Also of importance are high disease levels in restoration sanctuaries. Harris Creek, Tred Avon and Little Choptank River have 97% prevalence of Dermo and the intensity ranges from 3.3 to 4.1 resulting in death of the oyster when this range reaches 5. When oysters die, they re-release nitrogen back into the water. See Table A. Disease Levels at Three Restoration Sanctuaries and Adjacent Open-Harvest Areas from the 2017 Fall Survey.

On Tilghman Wharf, a public oyster bar outside of Harris Creek Sanctuary, had a 10% prevalence of Dermo and the intensity range was 0.2 in 2013 but by 2017 (when the sanctuary was well established), the prevalence rose to 70 with an intensity of 2.2 as the disease spreads to public oyster bar just outside the sanctuary area. See Table 3 – Dermo.

And finally, the Morgan State study (I actually participated in this study as a member of the Oyster Futures project) about increase in crab harvest to offset the economic loss of the oyster harvest. The theory is crabs will feed on the barnacles of the reef.  However, what about when the crab defecates (feces are high in nitrogen) after feeding? When I asked the scientist this question, he seemed perplexed and had not considered the impact. Second, our trotlines get snagged on the stone piles of the reef, so, not many watermen will crab on them. This combined with the loss of crab lays due to aquaculture water column leasing allowed in sanctuaries (i.e., Phillips Wharf Environmental Center and Green Pearl, LLC. leases on Lomax oyster bar in Harris Creek Sanctuary) creates a significant decrease in crab harvest.  And, lastly, what Mr. Pluta and others have failed to report is this study concluded the overall increase to the oyster population would not be significant at all.

So, my question to the citizens of Maryland, after reviewing all this data which proves that sanctuaries are not working, why would we make them permanent?

Jeff Harrison, President
Talbot Watermen Association

When I first heard that our Congressman Andy Harris was bringing a young protester up on charges for recently video streaming an interview from his Salisbury office, I was shocked that Harris would go that far to prosecute. But I was not in the least surprised that Harris approved this approach. It is unapologetically cowardly.

Just as a quick primer background history about Harris and Marijuana laws, Harris tried to derail a recent DC Referendum where voters approved a ballot initiative to allow for the legal sale of Marijuana in the District. Harris has sorely angered many in DC, ( not even his jurisdiction) , and to say the least, he his not loved by either the MD Marijuana justice group,  and the DC Marijuana justice group that attended the rally.

To be clear, I also have no love or affiliation with DCMJ or MDMJ, but I feel their civil rights as demonstrating citizens in a free country have been violated by our congressman ( pathetically) seeking “ sanctuary”’ from his own constituents. What could be more absurd or perverse! You can’t legally eliminate your political enemies by restricting access to government. As a public servant you must represent all sides.

When Harris’s office filed the current complaint that his office privacy had been violated , he employed an ancient ( an barely applicable) state statute that has regulated privacy in the State of Maryland to defend himself. This “wiretapping” statute is a term held over from the McCarthy Era. The use of this statute seems completely out of context to the event. The term , in an if itself, tends to incriminate the public nature of the event, as if covert evil was intended , which was not the case. Maryland’s “wiretapping” statute requires both parties must agree to be “tapped” to allow the covert information to go public. The protesters had no such agreement with the Harris office , thus the charges.

So we get to the big question, why wouldn’t an elected public official within his office expect to be in the public realm at all times? Isn’t personal privacy in a public state office an unreasonable expectation? Wasn’t this state business, and isn’t there a deliberate confusion attempting to confuse the differences between personal world and government business here? I think so.

In Maryland , the Open Meetings Act brought forth the idea that people deserve the right to see their government function. It blew open the “smoke filled “ lobbyist infested corridors of government and let the sunshine in. In many cities and towns there’s a requirement to videotape the town meetings and broadcast them publicly on a public channel to encourage open and transparent governance.

In the same way the MDMJ group felt they had a right to show others what was happening in the meeting with the Harris office. An attempt at making the meeting public is no crime. In this way , the Open Meetings act was more relevant a precedent to guide this public event than any questionable right to privacy our elected officials have conducting business in office.

What bothers me most about this is the lack of traditional protocol, 1) why didn’t Harris meet with the crowd as part of his responsibility to his constituents, 2) why didn’t Harris recognize that the MDMJ was only trying to bring others into the room with modern technology, and 3) why would Harris want to avenge a group perfectly within their rights to demonstrate, 4) Why did Harris used a completely outdated ( inapplicable) law to seek revenge on these perfectly peaceful protesters and claim personal sanctuary.

Most of all, this is a sets dangerous precedent that leaders are no longer bound to represent their constituents , can hide behind the wall of secrecy ( privacy) and continue to pretend to do public business in their own shuttered world of dark folly. A hearing for the MDMJ indictment is scheduled in Salisbury in March 22.

Jay Corvan
Trappe

An important piece of legislation is currently being considered by the Maryland General Assembly that would protect our oyster sanctuaries “in perpetuity,” giving actual meaning to the word “sanctuary,” and allowing oyster aquaculture to occur within and as a complement to protected wild oysters inside these sanctuaries. The bill is labeled House Bill 298 and Senate Bill 448 “OYSTERS-TRIBUTARY-SCALE SANCTUARIES-PROTECTION AND RESTORATION.

ShoreRivers has been working for years to advance measures to restore and protect our oyster populations. On behalf of our several thousand members, we strongly support this bill. Numerous other organizations dedicated to Chesapeake Bay restoration support this bill. ShoreRivers’ staff professionals, in fact, have been testifying in Annapolis in support of this bill. It came as quite a surprise to learn, not from our county council, but from others while testifying in Annapolis, that the Talbot County Council is trying to undermine these efforts and has written a letter to state legislators formally opposing this bill.

In the letter, the council made statements such as, “we are very concerned that the state’s focus on aquaculture in sanctuaries is being done at the expense of maintaining a viable public oyster fishery.” And, “sanctuaries have not yet proven themselves as a better restoration option than a well-managed oyster fishery.” Going further, the council wrote, “A properly maintained fishery can keep the oyster stock healthier and more vital than an unattended and unmanaged sanctuary.”

At ShoreRivers, we have been studying this issue for years. We are science-based. We find these quoted statements surprisingly uninformed, and, in our view, contrary to the science, to the welfare of our rivers, and to the views of many county residents. Moreover, to our knowledge, there was no opportunity for public input in the council’s decision to attack this bill, no public advance notice that the council was considering this issue, and no public vote by the council.

Regarding the council’s letter, first, there is no scientific basis to call our oyster fishery “well-managed, properly maintained, or viable.” It is well known that our current oyster population is less than 1% of historic levels. Since 1999, our population of adult oysters has diminished by half. Whether our state should allow the harvest of wild oysters at all is a reasonable question. No other fishery in the world that has been so decimated even permits a wild harvest. In the late 1980s, Maryland imposed a five-year moratorium on striped bass fishing, and in the 1990s, goose hunting was suspended to protect populations that were nowhere near as decimated as our oyster population.

Second, these sanctuaries are, in fact, working. Millions of taxpayer dollars have been spent by state and federal agencies, and countless efforts have been made by numerous private nonprofit organizations and concerned citizens to create and populate these sanctuaries. Two of these key sanctuaries benefit Talbot County directly, one in Harris Creek and one in the Tred Avon River. Data from Harris Creek, the first of these to be seeded, show that oyster reefs within the sanctuaries are meeting the success metrics for oyster density and biomass. A recent study by The Nature Conservancy found that restored reefs in Harris Creek are able to filter all the volume of water in the creek in less than 10 days during the summer months, and they have the potential to remove one million pounds of nitrogen over a decade. The sanctuaries have exceeded all expectations. The benefits of similar type sanctuaries to restore decimated fishery populations has been proven to be effective countless times around country and the world.

Third, to say that large tributary-scale oyster restoration will “seriously or fatally injure the industry, causing loses in both jobs and revenue” is shortsighted. A study released earlier this month by Morgan State University found that “fully mature oyster reefs in the Chesapeake would yield a 150 percent increase to blue crab harvest and an estimated $10-million increase in annual fishing revenues in the region.” Hotels, marinas, bait shops, and other marine industries in the county would surely support the added benefits from a boost in recreational fishing and tourism brought by having restored oyster reefs.

The Talbot County Council represents more than one constituent group. ShoreRivers has thousands of members, and we were never given the opportunity to have our views considered by our council. To our knowledge, other constituent groups, such as our growing aquaculture industry, were not given such an opportunity. The public at large was not given this opportunity. We find it objectionable that our council would seek to undermine this important State bill without providing its entire constituent base with the opportunity to be heard. And that it would seek to undermine it based on uninformed and misleading statements.

Robust oyster populations are essential in restoring and protecting our rivers and bay. We hope the members of our community who support real “sanctuaries” will let their views be known both to our state representatives and to the Talbot County Council.

Matt Pluta
Choptank Riverkeeper
ShoreRivers

As a co-equal member of the St. Michaels governing body, I respect Commissioner Bill Boos, but he and I have very different views of the town’s efforts to build a new town office.

For the record, Mr. Boos was speaking for himself as a private citizen, not on behalf of the Commissioners of St. Michaels in his recent guest opinion (Star Democrat 2/19/2019) and in the Talbot Spy. To paraphrase a respected U.S Senator; he is entitled to his own opinion, but he is not entitled to his own facts. What follows is my personal opinion.

I believe the taxpayers of St. Michaels deserve an informed decision on where to build a new town office and police station. And I believe the most fiscally responsible choice is to build a joint one-story facility on the 1.2 acre lot the town owns across from the current town office on Mill Street. Mr. Boos believes the best choice is to build a two-story town office on a much smaller lot on Fremont Street, while renovating the current police station. We will never definitively know which is the most economical choice without an independent architectural and engineering assessment of both sites.

On at least three occasions, I have introduced resolutions at town commission meetings to conduct a feasibility study comparing both lots. And on every occasion, except one, Mr. Boos and Commissioner Jaime Windon have succeeded in blocking the motion. More on that one exception in a moment.

Mr. Boos asserts that the issue has been studied thoroughly and that we did spreadsheets comparing the sites. In fact, there has not once been a comprehensive study of all of the town’s options. I served with Mr. Boos on the ad hoc committee that was empaneled to study the issues with the existing town office and police station. Throughout that process, the Mill Street lot was never on the table. We were told by Mr. Boos and Town Manager Jean Weisman that it was not available because the town had signed a letter of intent to sell it to the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum. A letter of intent is not a contract and is non-binding. We were also told the lot was unbuildable because of a network of underground sewer lines. We now know that’s not true.

In his guest opinion, Mr. Boos asserts that the final decision to build a town office on Fremont Street and renovate the police station was based, in part, on the opinions of two architectural firms hired by the town. Those two firms, in fact, did not recommend building a new town office on Fremont Street. The initial firm, Crosby & Associates, recommended building a new town office on another lot the town owns on Boundary Lane, and building a new police station on the Fremont Street lot. The second firm was brought on to look at only the Fremont Street site for a new town office. Neither firm was directed to also take a look at the Mill Street lot.

In March of 2018, the town solicited proposals for design work on a new town office to be located either on the Fremont Street lot or the Boundary Lane lot. The Mill Street lot wasn’t even in the running. The town received bids from nine architectural firms. The bids were opened on April 13th, and the wheels were in motion.

The decision to build on Fremont Street came together rapidly over a three month period last summer, and Mr. Boos was the driving force.

Here is how it unfolded: On June 28th, at a meeting of the ad hoc committee, I raised the possibility of using the Mill Street lot. But, that notion was dismissed because, according to a memo the committee sent to the Commissioners, “the sewer plant parcel had been looked at earlier in our meetings and had been disregarded because of the letter of intent with the museum and the sewer lines that run through the property.”

At the Commissioners meeting on July 11th, Mr. Boos introduced a resolution to build a new town office on the Fremont Street lot. No one seconded the motion. I suggested the Mill Street lot would be a better choice. Commissioner Harrod agreed. Commissioner Gorman said he favored Fremont Street but could be persuaded that Mill Street might be a better choice if the numbers supported it. Commissioner Windon said she’d like to see financial comparisons. Mr. Boos then agreed, according to the minutes, that “a more in depth look at the costs associated with the Mill Street lot was appropriate.” Minutes later, he voted against doing just that. I moved that we ask the county to take a look at the sewer line issue before eliminating the Mill Street lot from consideration. The motion passed 3-1 with Commissioner Gorman recusing himself and Commissioner Boos casting the only nay vote. Mr. Gorman recused himself because he is an employee of the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum which had been seeking to acquire the Mill Street lot for parking.

On July 19th, the county engineer and the town’s consulting engineer took a look at the Mill Street lot at our request. The county engineer suggested the sewer lines could easily be moved at minimal expense, and that the move could be paid for with grant money at no cost to the town. Town Manager Jean Weisman shared that information with the Commissioners in a memo, and added that she would receive final word on the county’s investigation by the second week of August.

But Mr. Boos apparently decided there was no need to wait for that report before voting. In his guest opinion Mr. Boos claimed that the commissioners were “completely aware” that the Mill Street lot could be built on before the vote for Fremont Street. How could we be completely aware before we received a professional report from the county, or anyone else?

At the commission meeting on August 8th, before the county completed its investigation, Mr. Boos again introduced a resolution to build a new town office on the Fremont Street lot. The meeting was packed with supporters of the museum, who had been encouraged to be there, urging us to choose the Fremont Street lot. Museum President Kristen Greenaway, who is not a town resident, was among those who addressed the Commission. According to the minutes, she “encouraged the Commissioners to choose the Fremont Street location for the new Town Office as the best and most logical location.”

I felt pressured at the time, and now regret that I failed to buck the momentum, and voted for the motion to build on Fremont Street. I did so with the conviction that the lot was too small to accommodate the required parking, and that it would have a prohibitive problem with storm water drainage. In my mind, those were insurmountable obstacles and I was sure the Fremont Street lot would have to be abandoned. I clearly underestimated Mr. Boos’ determination.

The town Planning Commission is currently in a year-long process of rewriting the town code to bring it up to modern standards. Instead of waiting for their final recommendations, Mr. Boos went to the Planning Commission and urged them to change the code’s parking regulations now. He was able to convince them to reduce the required number of parking spaces for municipal buildings, thereby clearing the decks for the small Fremont Street lot. At our January meeting, I and Commissioner Harrod voted against the the parking code change. The final vote was 3-2 in favor. This time Commissioner Gorman did not recuse himself.

The drainage issue at the Fremont Street site remains under investigation.

I am convinced that the course we are on now may be a costly mistake. I believe that building a joint town office/police station on the Mill Street lot could save taxpayers millions of dollars in the years ahead. And it’s certainly more economical than renovating the current police station, against the advice of the experts we’ve hired, only to be faced with replacing the building a few years down the road. Two years ago, Crosby & Associates concluded that it was not possible to expand the current police station and that renovating it would be a waste of money. Yet, here we are, planning to renovate and add on to the police station at considerable cost. Mr. Boos, in his guest opinion, stated that 90-percent of the deficiencies at the police station have been corrected. That is simply not true. As a qualified builder, I pitched in to erect new walls at the police station, but the full list of remedies has barely been scratched.

Mr. Boos claims, without offering any evidence whatsoever, that what I propose would cost upwards of $5-million. I believe that’s a grossly overinflated number. And it doesn’t take into account the economies of combining the town office and police station under a one-story roof. He states that the difference between the costs of a one-story and a two-story building are minimal. When Crosby & Associates looked at it, they concluded a two story building would cost almost $200,000 more.

There’s only one way to determine which of us is right. Let’s do what we voted to do back on July 11th; study the viability of the Mill Street lot. And this time, let’s wait until the facts are in before acting. Let’s have an independent study of the costs involved with both options. The taxpayers of St. Michaels need to know, without a doubt, that we are spending their money responsibly.

Michael Bibb
Commissioner, St. Michaels