Perfectly timed for the season is an otherworldly exhibition found in of all places at the St. Michaels Library. Dr. Andrew Thaler, a deep-sea ecologist and adjunct faculty at the University of Maryland Horn Point Lab, has assembled a miniature museum of bizarre sea creatures from the deep sea’s dark abyss. 

On Monday, November 6th, at noon, Dr. Thaler will present a special Lunch & Learn lecture at the library, discussing these lifeforms. Having spent over 20 years researching deep-sea ecosystems, Thaler has countless fascinating stories to share. Attendees will learn how technological innovations are rapidly expanding our access to one of the planet’s last unexplored frontiers, and they’ll discover just how much wonder and mystery still lurk in the unseen majority of our world.

Currently, Thaler runs a small environmental consulting firm in St. Michaels focused on deep-sea policy and conservation technology. But his passion for the abyss began decades earlier as a child, the first in his family to express interest in marine biology. “I’ve always been interested in studying deep-sea hydrothermal vents,” he says. “They’re unlike anything else on Earth – these oases of life dependent not on sunlight but on chemical energy gushing from undersea hot springs.”

When pursuing his Ph.D. at Duke University, Thaler specialized in researching the environmental impacts of deep-sea mining, a burgeoning industry poised to tap into valuable seabed resources. For his graduate work, he traveled to a series of hydrothermal vents off Papua New Guinea, racing to catalog species and gather ecological data before miners could disrupt the pristine sites. “The good news is, the company ended up going bankrupt,” Thaler said. “So the vents I studied were never actually mined. But it was an amazing opportunity to explore this incredible environment before any harm was done.”

Now, as a researcher and advocate, Thaler continues working to develop frameworks that allow us to study and harness the deep sea’s potential resources while safeguarding its fragile ecosystems.

The specimens currently on display at the St. Michaels library come from the archives of Thaler’s mentor, legendary deep-sea ecologist Dr. Cindy Van Dover, the first woman to pilot the DSV (deep submergence vehicle) Alvin. Van Dover retired in 2019, and Thaler inherited her samples to continue the research she had begun. “Once you’ve collected something from the deep sea,” he said, “we have a moral duty to get as much knowledge as possible out of it. So that the impact of taking it from the deep sea isn’t lost, and we get the opportunity to learn something.” 

Thaler curated the best of the samples into an educational mini museum – including the current star attraction, a giant deep-sea isopod.

Resembling a massive roly-poly or pillbug, this alien arthropod found deep in the Gulf of Mexico grows as big as a housecat, obviously dwarfing its terrestrial cousins. Thaler says the oddity appears to have become a destination for local curious kids, though some squeamish adults find it disturbingly huge and eerie. If that’s not mind-bending enough, there are also monstrous giant tubeworms, blind albino shrimp, scale worms that survive in near-boiling water, glass sponges, squat lobsters, and a menagerie of other creatures from the Gulf of Mexico, Atlantic Margin, and Western Pacific. As Thaler will explain, each organism hints at the outrageous forms evolution can take given the right conditions.

Dr. Andrew Thaler

“There are some truly astounding animals down there,” says Thaler. “Some of the weirdest creatures you’ve ever laid eyes on.” Yet, as he explained, only a handful of researchers, let alone ordinary citizens, have ever glimpsed such organisms in their natural habitat. Historically, undersea exploration has lagged behind space investigation. “I used to joke that we have more robots on Mars than we have vehicles capable of exploring the deepest parts of the ocean,” he said.

But that has changed dramatically. Now, dozens of robotic and autonomous vehicles are capable of going into the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Besides the manned submersibles, live-streamed remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) allow shore-bound scientists virtual access to the seabed. 

Still, most of us earthlings will never voyage to the abyss themselves. That’s what makes the St. Michaels exhibit so unique. “I don’t know of any other place where you can see specimens like this, from the deep ocean, somewhere so accessible as a public library,” says Thaler. “It’s a real testament to the library that they want to showcase something unusual yet evocative.”

Thaler hopes the creatures spark curiosity and wonder in visitors, especially children. He aims to share his own passion for the planet’s least explored realm. “We all share this amazing world, with incredible places most of us will never see firsthand,” said Thaler. “Yet they can still inspire us in meaningful ways.”

As part of his current research, Thaler is investigating how microplastics accumulate in the bodies of deep-sea organisms – a threat to vulnerable ecosystems we’ve scarcely begun to understand. But while environmental realities must be faced, a sense of awe persists.”The deep ocean is incredibly biodiverse,” says Thaler. “There are some of the most astounding animals down there. It’s an opportunity to discover something new and incredible, unlike anywhere else.”

Don’t miss this rare chance to glimpse the mysteries of the deep at your local library. Dr. Andrew Thaler’s upcoming lecture will illuminate how researchers are unveiling the wonders of the seabed while the ongoing exhibition lets you come face-to-face with denizens of the abyss. There is much left to explore.

Dr. Andrew Thaler will be the guest speaker for the November Lunch & Learn series at the St. Michaels Branch on Monday, November 6th, at noon. The deep-sea mini museum is currently on display until November 30th.

On a recent rainy afternoon, a dozen educators and environmentalists from Central New York were standing ankle deep in Charlotte Creek here, collecting water samples in test tubes, petri dishes and ice trays. As the rain pelted the group at a sideways angle, with the creek running faster than usual, Heather Grant, one of the leaders, felt compelled to offer a gentle warning.

“The teacher in me wants to say that the water is still high, so don’t go too far out by yourself,” she said. “Please don’t get washed away.”

It would not have been apparent to anyone watching, but this simple scientific inquiry, 282 driving miles from Perryville in Cecil County, the first town in Maryland to touch the Chesapeake Bay, had profound implications for the health of the Bay — and for the imperative of preparing the next generation to work to combat climate change. The creek runs into the Susquehanna River near Oneonta, about five miles east of West Davenport, and the Susquehanna, the longest river on the East Coast, is the biggest and northernmost source of the Chesapeake Bay, one of more than 150 waterways that feed into the venerated estuary.

Not that very many people know it. The Susquehanna begins at Lake Otsego in Cooperstown, N.Y., a quaint village named for James Fenimore Cooper, author of “The Last of the Mohicans” and other 19th century yarns. It’s also home to the Baseball Hall of Fame, which draws a steady stream of tourists. Brewery Ommegang, a giant and popular watering hole, restaurant and event space, is just outside of town in a corn field, its wild success surely a beacon of hope for craft brewers downriver in Maryland.

The only indication that this is the source of the Chesapeake Bay comes from a historical sign in a shady copse in Council Rock Park, which overlooks the lake, three blocks from the Baseball Hall of Fame (or the “B-HOF,” as some locals call it). “This marker signifies the point where the beautiful Susquehanna River begins its 444 mile journey to meet the Chesapeake Bay,” the sign says.

But a number of environmentalists and teachers in this part of the world are taking their responsibility as stewards of the Chesapeake Bay increasingly more seriously. And they are thinking more often about how they can incorporate Bay health into the scholastic curriculum. It can seem at times like a lonely crusade.

“Sometimes up here it’s tough to get students — or anyone — interested in the Bay, which is 400 miles away,” said Jeff O’Grady, program director at the Otsego County Conservation Association (OCCA), a leading environmental group in the area.

For the past three years, OCCA has organized a summertime training for local teachers to learn more about the Chesapeake Bay watershed and to devise strategies for teaching their students about it. Run initially by a group of volunteers, the environmental group, which has been around since the late 1960s, was launched to protect forests in the area. But its size and mission have grown exponentially over the years. Today, nine full-time staffers tackle everything from water pollution to clean energy advocacy to climate resiliency. Three years ago, the group won a grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to organize the teacher trainings on the Bay.

“Education is part of everything we do,” O’Grady said.

Maryland policymakers and environmentalists have long been obsessed about upstream pollution that comes into the Chesapeake Bay. But most of their ire and frustration focuses on Pennsylvania, which by all accounts and a series of lawsuits, has been lax, until recently, about its responsibilities to curb agricultural runoff and other pollution that flows to the Susquehanna and its tributaries.

New York is often missing from the conversation. In fact, environmentalists from the area joke about being left off official maps of the Bay watershed and recall a recent document from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation referring to the city of “Binghampton” — a serious misspelling to the locals. That may help explain why it’s so hard for local educators to teach their students and communities about the Bay.

“That’s how little people think about New York and the Chesapeake Bay,” said Liz Brown, OCCA’s clean energy community coordinator, who was co-leader of this summer’s teacher training. “Our portion up here is really critical to the Bay watershed, but it’s obvious why people don’t think of it, because it’s so small in proportion to all the other states.”

Grant, the other co-leader, who is a middle and high school teacher in the Morris Central School District, northwest of Oneonta, recalled fruitlessly exhorting a student to be more curious about the Chesapeake Bay.

“I don’t like oysters,” he replied.

‘We want this to be a place to not let that fleeting idea go to waste’

In Maryland, Bay education is a common and essential thing — and the state has broad benchmarks for environmental instruction that school districts are required to hit. In New York, educators were never expected to think about the Chesapeake Bay until the Empire State signed on to a multi-state agreement to reduce pollution in the Bay more than a decade ago. But there are still no standards or requirements for teaching about it.

For three days teachers participating in the Otsego County Conservation Association training program met in a historic schoolhouse at the Pine Lake Environmental Campus of Hartwick College. Hartwick, a small liberal arts school in Oneonta, just down a steep hill from the bigger campus of the State University of New York at Oneonta, offers housing in small cabins at the environmental campus for students who wish to avoid the hurly-burly of typical dorm living. During the summer, the  environmental campus is used for youth summer camps — and, for the past two years, for the teacher training on the Bay watershed (it was held virtually the first year, due to the pandemic).

The nine teachers participating in the training were at different career stages and came for a variety of reasons. All were clearly committed environmentalists. On the first day, Grant wore a T-shirt that said “Teach climate science” on the front, and on the back said, “Teach climate science for…human health, food security, ecosystems, water resources, wildlife, the economy, our future.”

One member of the group, Amy Favinger, a 4th grade teacher in the Gilbertsville-Mount Upton Central School District, grew up in Baltimore County, taught in county schools, and moved with her family to Central New York during the pandemic after teaching for several years in Northern Virginia. Favinger said the training appealed to her partially out of a kind of nostalgia — she still has family in Baltimore — and partially to network with other educators, because she’s still relatively new to the area.

“Having that connection, living and growing up and teaching in that area, I wanted to figure out how I could use my previous experience to make connections for my students,” she said.

Throughout the three days, Grant and Brown were energetic and enthusiastic guides, mixing wonky science with knowing sympathy about demands and limitations teachers face in their daily lives, coupled with political realities of preaching climate action to reluctant or indifferent communities.

Teachers and environmentalists collect water samples in Charlotte Creek in West Davenport, N.Y., part of their training on how to teach about the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Photo by Josh Kurtz.

“We’ve got a lot of resources for you guys,” Grant told the teachers, later urging them to think creatively. “We want this to be a place to not let that fleeting idea go to waste.”

One of many messages group leaders attempted to drive home was that any scientific or environmental lesson or conversation, no matter how local, could be tied to broader discussions about the health of the Chesapeake Bay watershed. At one point, Brown and Grant asked each of the teachers to think about environmental challenges near their schools that could warrant academic inquiry — and could impact Bay health.

One teacher mentioned a “sketchy” visible gas pipe on the school property, leaking effluent of unknown origin. Another talked about her school being close to an old dump notorious for its methane emissions. Another talked about wanting to study microplastics in local waterways. And another wondered about the ecological impacts of the highly popular vineyards in the nearby Finger Lakes region.

They also talked about opportunities for civic action, at the school level and in their communities — everything from Earth Day cleanups to planting pollinator gardens to pulling tires out of rivers to advocating for meatless Mondays in the school cafeteria. One teacher, Chad DeVoe, a career counselor from the Onondaga-Cortland-Madison counties BOCES (a vocational educational program), said that when a school field trip was canceled in the late spring due to unhealthy air caused by Canadian wildfires, he urged his students to call the local congressman, Rep. Marc Molinaro (R), to ask his office what he was doing to fight climate change. They never got a particularly satisfactory answer, DeVoe told his colleagues, but it was still a valuable exercise. 

“We do letter-writing [to political leaders on climate change] earlier in the year,” DeVoe he said. “But this is far more effective. The kids loved it.”

Over the three days, the group of teachers took several short field trips on the wooded grounds of the environmental center’s campus, and also received visits from a range of experts and advocates: a scholar on local leaves and an authority on archaeology, as well as the director of an agricultural extension office affiliated with Cornell University, the leader of a regional environmental group that specializes in tree planting, and the district manager of the Otsego County Soil and Water Conservation District.

The quick hike to Charlotte Creek, through a piney forest, was part of an exercise to gauge water quality and monitor macroinvertebrates living near the shore. The teachers and environmentalists examined small critters in the test tubes, petri dishes and ice trays they brought with them, and discussed what they collected: mayflies, stoneflies, and two types of crayfish, among others.

The very same experiments, Brown told the teachers, can be done with their students if there is a stream nearby. “Macros are a good way, especially if you do it year after year, to assess water quality,” she said.

‘We need the next generation to participate’

Any educational endeavor, almost by necessity in modern America, comes with its own jargon and series of acronyms. The three-day teacher training was no exception.

The grant from NOAA that the Otsego County Conservation Association received came from a program the federal agency has established called B-WET, which stands for Bay Watershed Education and Training. B-WET teacher trainings have been taking place throughout the Bay watershed for several years, but the OCCA offering is the first in New York state.

More broadly, the B-WETs borrow from a teaching concept known as MWEEs — Meaningful Watershed Education Experiences, pronounced mee-wees. MWEEs can be any number of things and have existed for decades — many teachers in Maryland know a thing or two about them. The four elements they require, educators say, are issue investigation, outdoor field experience, synthesis and conclusions, and stewardship and civic action. Every conversation during the OCCA session was geared to shedding light on those goals.

New York teachers learning from a local leaf expert at a training session on the Chesapeake Bay watershed earlier this summer. Photo by Josh Kurtz.

On the second day of the three-day training, Elise Trelegan, the B-WET program coordinator for NOAA’s Chesapeake Bay Office in Annapolis, joined the meeting on Zoom from her home on the Eastern Shore. Trelegan told the teachers that the work they are doing in New York is part of a bigger effort; there are 637 school districts in the Chesapeake Bay watershed over six states and the District of Columbia, she said, and the B-WET office has an annual budget of $2.7 million — a pittance in the federal budget — to try to reach them all.

“We recognize that if we’re going to do anything on conservation and stewardship, we need the next generation to participate,” Trelegan said. “We haven’t done a lot of work in New York, so we’re really excited to have you all here. This funding catalyzes this kind of environmental literacy, environmental education, in all these school districts.”

Trelegan also explained that NOAA, like other federal agencies, is increasingly trying to emphasize equity and environmental justice as it funds climate and education programs.

“We’re looking for a long-term commitment from school districts to change the culture on environmental education,” she said. “We see this grant as the beginning of more things happening in New York.”

One teacher asked Trelegan why it took New York so long to “jump on the bandwagon” of providing education about the Bay watershed.

“I think it’s a sort of perception,” Trelegan suggested. “If people don’t see there’s a connection to the Bay, they don’t see how the upstream decisions affect things downstream.”

A teacher told a story that illustrated that very phenomenon. “It’s interesting,” she said. “I ask my students, ‘where do you think our water winds up?’ And they may say, ‘Oh, the Susquehanna,’ or ‘Binghamton.’ They don’t really know it goes to the Chesapeake. They don’t know we’re in the headwaters of the Chesapeake.”

Trelegan signed off of the Zoom, from Maryland, and expressed gratitude to the assembled teachers. “Thanks for doing these jobs and being the role models that you are,” she said.

Throughout the three-day session, there were more reminders of Maryland. At one point, the group watched a half hour video about ongoing MWEEs in three Bay watershed school districts, organized through the B-WET program. One was a high school in Lancaster County, Pa., one was a middle school in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley, and the third was Lewisdale Elementary School, in Prince George’s County. The teachers in the room watched with great interest as a Lewisdale teacher led her students to Sligo Creek to take water samples and examine the macroinvertebrates they collected.

“Some of you are saying you have a lobster,” the teacher says in the video. “I don’t think that’s right.” Her students laugh.

Speaking to the camera, the teacher says her students’ families regularly use the park by the creek for picnics and other recreational activities and that the program makes them more attuned to their own responsibility for keeping the park and the water clean. And she praises the B-WET grant for helping to frame her lessons.

“The MWEE does not add on to all the standards that I have to teach,” she says. “To me, it frames [the lessons] in a much different way.”

When the video was over, the New York teachers remarked on the diversity of the student populations in the video they saw, especially the kids from Lewisdale, who were primarily Latino. The teachers, whose districts are small, rural and largely white, also wondered aloud about the resources which school districts in the video may have to enable them to run well-organized and successful MWEE programs.

When the three days had ended, several teachers said they learned a lot and planned to apply what they heard to their classroom instruction in the coming school year.

“It’s pretty great,” said Bryan Hill, a science teacher at Penn Yan Academy, a high school in Penn Yan, N.Y. “I think the coolest thing, apart from the litany of resources, is using hands-on activities that show kids environmental stewardship in real-world ways.”

Hill, who dropped out of medical school to teach at Penn Yan Academy, his alma mater, said he was “shocked, given that we have so many bodies of water around here,” that so little attention has been paid to the impact upriver activities have on the Chesapeake Bay. “It’s so easy to be complacent, to say, ‘I don’t know where the water goes.’”

Favinger, the 4th grade teacher who grew up in Baltimore County, was also impressed — and grateful.

“The resources are there,” she said. “You just have to know where to look and what you need to take in. It’s empowering when you get to make the decisions and set up the programs. There’s a way to do this and meet the standards of what you have to teach.”

Several teachers said the MWEEs appear to allow for a level of creativity and flexibility that many academic programs and mandates don’t have.

“This is not marked in stone,” Grant told the teachers. “We’re not going to show up in your schools in October and check back on these.”

All politics, all environmental action and all educational activities may, at a certain level, be local, but the leaders of the Otsego County Conservation Association were quick to remind the teachers about their small but vital place in a vast watershed.

“It’s important to stay focused on your waterway, but also taking a bigger look,” Brown advised. “Not just where you are, not just the Chesapeake Bay, but globally.”

By Josh Kurtz

The new leader of the Maryland Public Service Commission said Tuesday that he plans to convene meetings with interested parties over the next few months to discuss the increasingly controversial issue of where to place renewable energy installations in the state.

Testifying before a virtual hearing of the state Senate Committee on Education, Energy and the Environment, Fred Hoover, who took over as PSC chair in July, said he wanted to “get all the parties together to lower the temperature in some of these siting topics.”

The PSC is Maryland’s chief energy and utility regulatory agency, but it also has a historical role in approving proposals to build energy-generating facilities in the state. Where once that job meant considering and approving large power plants, as the industry evolves the commission now is tasked with becoming involved in decisions about where to place renewable energy installations. Those fights, especially over whether to allow solar projects on land zoned for agricultural uses or forests — and the PSC’s role in them — have become increasingly contentious.

Four years ago, the state’s highest court, then known as the Maryland Court of Appeals, ruled that the PSC can supersede local zoning laws when it came to applications to build large renewable energy installations.

Sen. Brian J. Feldman (D-Montgomery), chair of the Education, Energy and Environment panel, said in his view the court ruling suggested “the PSC is top dog” in these disputes. But he acknowledged that other entities, including the powerful Maryland Association of Counties, may have a different interpretation of the court decision.

“This issue has been very controversial over the interplay between the Public Service Commission and local governments,” Feldman said. “…This is still a muddied water kind of topic.”

Hoover pointed out that any entity applying to build a large renewable energy installation, such as a solar array on agricultural land, still must obtain relevant permits from local governments before they can proceed.

Earlier this month, Feldman, along with House Economic Matters Chair C.T. Wilson (D-Charles) and House Environment and Transportation Chair Marc Korman (D-Montgomery) wrote a letter to Gov. Wes Moore (D) seeking guidance on how the state should approach controversies over renewable energy installations given the necessity of increasing the state’s renewable energy generation to meet aggressive climate goals, among other things. Under legislation required last year, the state is required to hit a 50% renewable energy goal by 2030 and to use 100% clean energy by 2035.

“To achieve these targets, Maryland must dramatically and equitably increase its deployment of solar installations across the State and identify appropriate locations for energy storage,” the committee chairs wrote. They asked Moore to direct several state agencies to coordinate these efforts, “as well as identifying innovative policies being pursued in other states.”

Hoover told senators that his decision to convene meetings on siting was, in part, a response to the lawmakers’ query.

The Task Force to Study Solar Incentives, which was set up by state legislation this year, is also expected to examine this topic in months ahead.

So far, local governments have taken a piecemeal approach to renewable energy siting policies. In 2021 Montgomery County passed legislation effectively limiting the number of solar arrays that can be installed in the county’s vast Agricultural Reserve. Just last month, the Carroll County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to ban large solar projects from being built on land zoned for agricultural use. Next week, the Anne Arundel County Council is tentatively scheduled to vote on amended legislation that could limit the amount of solar arrays permissible on undeveloped land.

Several stakeholders — including leaders of renewable energy companies, environmental groups, agricultural concerns, business organizations and local governments — have begun wondering openly if the state needs uniform standards on where and how to build renewable energy installations. A bill passed in this year’s General Assembly session makes it easier to install solar arrays on industrial lands, public and private rooftops, parking lots and other public facilities. Baltimore County officials, including County Executive Johnny Olszewski Jr. (D), are participating in a ribbon-cutting Wednesday for a rooftop solar project in Rosedale that will eventually provide power to 6,000 area homes.

But it’s widely acknowledged that some agricultural land will have to be set aside for renewable energy installations if the state is to hit the clean energy goals laid out in the 2022 Climate Solutions Now Act.

Hoover acknowledged the possible need for statewide legislation to quell the siting controversy when he told the senators Wednesday that he may approach them for “a legislative fix.”

The discussion about renewable energy siting came at the end of a two-hour hearing by the Senate committee that enabled lawmakers to learn more about the Public Service Commission and its myriad responsibilities. The Senate panel was renamed and given a new portfolio at the beginning of the year, so many members of the panel are still learning about energy issues. Additionally, three of the five PSC commissioners have taken office in the past few months, as Moore attempts to make the agency an aggressive partner in the administration’s desire to combat climate change.

PSC officials led the Senate committee through discussions ranging from how the commission considers utilities’ requests to raise rates, to how to read an electric bill, to whether utilities are being given too much license to beef up natural gas infrastructure, to some of the particulars on electric supply competition.

“To me it seemed like the right level of high-level and basic,” said Sen. Cheryl C. Kagan (D-Montgomery), the committee vice chair.

By Josh Kurtz

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and Hershey Co. on Tuesday pledged $2 million to support Pennsylvania dairy farmers in adopting environmentally friendly practices, part of a larger conservation effort to protect the Chesapeake Bay Watershed.

They made the announcement at Central Manor Dairy in Manor Township, a 200-cow operation that has been a member of Land O’Lakes (and its predecessor) since 1943.

The Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, in collaboration with Land O’Lakes, Inc., will use the funding as part of the ongoing “Sustainable Dairy PA” initiative that the agency and the two companies first launched in 2021.

Sustainable Dairy PA participating farmers work with the Alliance to establish best practices to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and improve Chesapeake Bay watershed water quality. At launch, the initiative prioritized 119 Land O’Lakes member-owner farms in central Pennsylvania that ship 50% or more of their milk supply to Hershey. Land O’Lakes operates as a member-owned cooperative, representing more than 1,000 farms across the U.S.

Jenna Mitchell Beckett, Pennsylvania director and agriculture program director for the Alliance, told the Capital-Star that the Sustainable Dairy PA program is voluntary for farmers who want to participate.

“The $2M funding from Hershey and EPA will help Land O’Lakes member farms accelerate their sustainability efforts by investing with them in the implementation of manure storage facilities, soil health practices, riparian forest buffers and other efforts to enhance sustainability on farms supplying to Hershey,” Beckett said in an email, “which builds farm resilience, improves water quality, and reduces emissions.” The Sustainable Dairy PA model focuses on all parts of the supply chain working together, she added, rather than the farmers managing everything themselves.

The EPA is supplying $1 million of the new round of funding, with Hershey providing a matching $1 million. The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation will administer the portion of the funds provided from EPA to the Alliance, the EPA said.

Since 2018, the Alliance has worked to develop agriculture supply chain programs, with an eye toward improving the member farms’ long-term sustainability, improving soil health, and overall efficiencies.

A report released earlier this year by the Chesapeake Bay Program found that pollution reduction efforts by states in the watershed were “more challenging than expected.”

Pennsylvania, Maryland, and Virginia are responsible for around 90% of the Chesapeake Bay’s pollution, and according to a 2022 report from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, while the states were on track to meet their 2025 commitments for reducing pollution from wastewater, agriculture or urban and suburban runoff pollution reduction efforts lagged behind.

“States are not on track to reduce pollution to the levels needed for a healthy Bay, or implement the practices necessary to achieve them by the 2025 deadline,” according to the 2022 State of the Blueprint Report.

Under the terms of the Chesapeake Bay Agreement, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, Delaware, West Virginia, New York, and the District of Columbia have to reach specific milestones in pollution reduction.

The dairy industry is responsible for roughly 2% of the U.S.’ greenhouse gas emissions, according to the World Wildlife Fund.

“EPA’s funding commitment to Hershey, Land O’Lakes, and the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay brings $2 million of much-needed support to Pennsylvania dairy farmers to scale up conservation practices that are good for our farms, climate, local streams, and the Bay,” EPA regional administrator Adam Ortiz said. “With this funding, we are not only investing in the current environment, but into the long-term viability of Pennsylvania farmers – our frontline environmentalists.”

By Kim Lyons

When Kristen Lycett joined the Phillips Wharf Environmental Center in early 2020, the then 14-year-old non-profit was located where it got its start, on Tilghman Island. Under the aegis of founder Kelley Phillips Cox, the center ran a robust environmental program to educate the public on maintaining a healthy Chesapeake Bay.  With a focus on oyster aquaculture, the center began an oyster restoration project, planting over 835,000 oysters. The center also acquired an oyster lease and began selling oysters to local restaurants to underwrite its diverse operations which also included a visitor’s center and classroom on three acres by the Tilghman Island bridge. There was even a skipjack that took visitors out to the oyster reef.

In addition, the center housed an aquarium for up close interaction with creatures that depend on clean Chesapeake waterways—turtles, crabs, and dozens of native fish. Educational outreach was conducted by bus. Lycett, who has a PhD from the University of Maryland in marine science, was brought in to manage the center’s popular Fishmobile, a school bus colorfully transformed into a rolling aquarium for transporting tanks of creatures to local schools and community events.

Then along came COVID.

Just five weeks into her new job, the pandemic brought operations at Phillips Wharf to a grinding halt.  Lycett, said, “We closed to the public, canceled all in-person programming, and created a virtual Fishmobile program for fourth graders in Talbot County.” Going from in-person to onscreen was a big challenge. “It was definitely hard,” said Lycett.  “I have minimal video editing skills and had minimal resources at the time.” And because not all students had access to the Internet, Lycett had to come up with alternative formats for students. She said, “A lot of work went into making this program accessible.”

Red Eared Terrapins

But as Lycett dedicated herself to maintaining the Fishmobile program, the shutdown set off a cascade of bad news. When restaurants closed, revenue from oyster sales plummeted. A tropical storm later in the summer caused costly damage to the center’s classroom and aquarium facilities. In spring 2021 the Philips Wharf board made the hard decision to sell its assets, divesting itself of the oyster farm and then the environmental center. When Phillips Wharf closed down, all that remained was a small endowment and the Fishmobile. Heartbreakingly, in the midst of this, Kelley Phillips Cox died.

But a new door was waiting to open. As it happened, the Town of Easton had planned to move its public works facility from an industrial area on Easton Point to another location.  In its place, the town began creating a park. Back in 2009, then Mayor Bob Willey determined he could provide something residents had long asked for: access to Easton’s waterfront on the Tred Avon River. He asked newly elected council member Megan Cook to oversee park development.  Cook led the effort with a focus on environmental stewardship, using native plantings, developing a living shoreline, and favoring greenspace over hard-top and cement. From the start, the town wanted an organization to help visitors to enjoy and learn about the park’s natural resources. 

“It turned out that the town was looking for an environmental center for Easton Point Park,” said Phillips Wharf board vice-president Barbara Boyd.  “The Town of Easton was very, very accommodating.” The Phillips Wharf board had been exploring a move to Dorchester County but, she said. “We owed it to Kelley (Cox) to keep the center in Talbot County. And Easton is a much easier location to get students here for our programming.  For Easton, Phillips Wharf brings educational, environmental, and community purpose to help visitors understand how to support the Chesapeake Bay.”

It was a natural fit. Mayor Megan Cook said, “It’s a great partnership. Phillips Wharf is an asset to the community and a win-win for everyone involved.”

The Fishmobile and its menagerie rolled into the park in March 2022. Its new home consists of office spaces and open bays that the town had used for parking trucks and storing materials. As the public works moves out, the center is moving in.  “Our goal is to turn the closest garage bay to the building into additional aquarium space and aquarium prep space,” said Lycett, who is now the center’s Executive Director. By September she hopes to have access to more space to use as classrooms.

Phillips Wharf is adapting its offerings to Easton Point Park. “From the new location most of Phillips Wharf’s charter is still the same. But there’s less aquaculture and history and more emphasis on STEM (Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics),” Boyd said. At Easton Point, the center provides free onsite educational tours where children have hands-on experience with a mini oyster reef.  “They test the waters and count and measure the oyster spats,” Boyd said. “We offer this as summer programming that camps can take advantage of.”  In July came big news and a big boost for the center’s educational programming. Phillips Wharf was awarded a three-year NOAA B-WET grant, the Meaningful Watershed Educational Experience (MWEE), to teach environmental literacy to all fourth-graders in Talbot County. Lycett also hopes to eventually offer adult education programs on topics in ecology and sustainable living. In addition, the tireless Lycett manages a scaled down oyster growing program on Tilghman Island.  She has also run a very successful spring cleanup called “Tidy Up Talbot.” As Boyd put it, “We are unbelievably lucky to have Kristen onboard.”

And, of course, there’s the ever-popular Fishmobile. If you miss the bus this summer, you can always come to the park to meet Larry, the irrepressible Diamondback terrapin, and other creatures at the aquarium. “Our animal collection changes throughout our programming season as we find species in our oyster cages or go out and catch them,” notes Lycett. “We do release some animals to minimize the amount of care and food required during months when our Fishmobile program is not running (end of November through March). However, the turtles are with us for life, so we care for them year round.” In the end Lycett hopes the animal experiences are memorable. “My hope is our visitors take something from that interaction–whether that it’s OK to be excited and interested in something or a love for weird critters or just an interest in marine science and the Chesapeake Bay.”

While Phillips Wharf busily settles into its new home, Easton Point Park also continues to transform. Town Manager Don Richardson says the town is now in the planning phase to build a marina with a boat ramp and parking by the water. The building opposite to the one occupied by Phillips Wharf will be torn down to create parking space for a new entrance to the park accessed from Flood Street.  Eventually there will be trails, including a connection to Easton’s expanding Rail-to-Trails paths. There’s much to see and more to come at Easton Point Park.

 Marion Arnold is leader of the Plastic-Free Easton action committee. She lives in Easton. For more information on Phillips Wharf please go here.

With a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision sharply curtailing federal oversight of streams and wetlands, environmental groups working to restore the Chesapeake Bay say they’re worried about gaps in state laws and enforcement practices that now leave those waters vulnerable to unrestricted development and pollution.

In a May 25 ruling the nine justices unanimously agreed that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency overstepped its authority in declaring part of an Idaho couple’s home site wetlands and demanding that they get a permit to fill it.

But the court’s majority went further in Sackett v. EPA and, with a 5–4 vote, drastically redefined which streams and wetlands are protected under the Clean Water Act. In doing so, it sought to settle decades of debate by removing federal regulation of activities affecting isolated wetlands and tiny streams that flow with water only after heavy rains.

“I’m not aware of anyone who predicted this,” said Peggy Sanner, Virginia executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.

She called it a “serious setback” for environmental protection efforts in general, as well as for the Bay restoration effort.

Wetlands and those periodically dry stream beds help keep water-fouling nutrients and sediment from reaching the Bay while also providing critical habitat and soaking up floodwaters.

Farmers, developers and other business organizations welcomed the ruling. The Virginia Farm Bureau’s blog called it “a major victory for farmers and property rights,” while the chair of the National Association of Home Builders dubbed it a win against “federal overreach” and for “common-sense regulations and housing affordability.”

Passed in 1972, the Clean Water Act gave the federal government jurisdiction over “navigable waters” and set up a permitting program to regulate discharges of dredged or fill material into “waters of the United States,” including wetlands.

A legal and political dispute has flared on and off since then about how far upstream that authority applies. Congress amended the Clean Water Act in 1977 to specify that it also covered wetlands “adjacent” to navigable waters, but that hasn’t quelled the controversy. The Supreme Court has weighed in repeatedly since the 1980s, with shifting and conflicting opinions.

In 2015, the Obama administration sought to clarify what’s regulated with a rule that protected isolated wetlands and “ephemeral” streams with a “significant nexus” to navigable waters.

That drew fierce backlash from farmers, developers and energy companies. The Trump administration repealed it and proposed a much narrower rule that applied federal regulations only in cases where surface water contributes to the wetland or waterway in question. States and environmental groups sued.

A court threw out the Trump rule, and the Biden administration has been working on another, more expansive version.

Environmental lawyers say the Sackett ruling appears to restrict federal jurisdiction even more than the Trump regulation. The EPA and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the two agencies that regulate activities affecting wetlands and waterways, had estimated that the Trump regulation would have stripped federal protection from more than half of the nation’s wetlands and roughly one-fifth of its streams.

Bob Dreher, legal director for the Potomac Riverkeeper Network, estimated that the recent court decision removes protection from as much as 65% of wetlands nationwide and more than 80% of the streams.

In the Bay watershed, the impact is somewhat muted. Five of the six states and the District of Columbia provide at least some protection under their own laws for wetlands and streams now removed from federal jurisdiction. Delaware is the only outlier, one of 24 states nationwide that rely entirely on the Clean Water Act for safeguarding their waters, according to the Environmental Law Institute.

Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia each have comprehensive state laws that provide protection from disturbance for their wetlands and all waters, even groundwater, noted the Bay Foundation’s Sanner.

West Virginia law also contains a broad definition of “waters of the state” but, according to the law institute’s James McElfish, the state has not always required permits for activities in wetlands and streams that fall outside the federal interpretation.

New York last year strengthened its protections for freshwater wetlands, but the state only requires permits for activities affecting wetlands larger than 7.4 acres, unless they’re deemed to be of “unusual importance.”

David Reed, executive director of the Chesapeake Legal Alliance, foresees trouble, even in states with strong legal protections on the books. State and federal agencies have jointly reviewed applications for permits to disturb a wetland or stream. Now, with the federal role shrinking, he said, there won’t be a backstop for state regulators facing intense pressure to look the other way.

“It will push them inevitably toward laxer enforcement,” Reed said of the states. “It will be this insidious direction toward less and less protection.”

Before the court’s ruling narrowing federal jurisdiction, Virginia, for instance, had relied on the Army Corps to review developers’ delineations of wetlands and surface waters when they were seeking permits.

In late June, the state’s Department of Environmental Quality announced that it would take over that task and would prioritize those applications where the delineations are performed by certified private wetlands professionals.  The agency said the change would “restore certainty in the permitting process and allow projects to move forward in a timely manner.”

The Bay Foundation’s Sanner said she was encouraged by DEQ’s “thoughtful” process for continuing to protect wetlands while ensuring efficient permitting.  But she cautioned that “many questions remain” about the state’s response to the court ruling.

Another major concern is that most states do not offer their citizens the same right to go to court to enforce their laws as the Clean Water Act does. The federal provision for “citizen suits” has allowed environmental groups to go after polluters in federal court and often prod state regulators to act when they haven’t before, Reed said.

Environmentalists say the Supreme Court decision also puts a cloud over the section of the Clean Water Act that establishes federal and, by extension, state authority to regulate discharges of stormwater and other pollutants into dry stream beds or isolated wetlands.

Activists say the Supreme Court’s ruling means they’re going to have to press for stronger state laws and for staffing and budget increases for regulatory agencies to enforce them.

“If we’re going to have hope for states to be a little of a backfill here, we’re going to have to help states get up to speed,” said Betsy Nicholas, the Potomac Riverkeeper Network’s vice president of programs.

by Tim Wheeler

 U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen and Congressman John Sarbanes introduced the Chesapeake National Recreation Area Act, which, if passed into law, would create the Chesapeake National Recreation Area (CNRA). The CNRA would be a land-based, 21st-century park, uniting new and existing National Park Service (NPS) sites and trails, as well as partner parks, to increase public access to the Chesapeake Bay and create a national park-worthy visitor experience for all to enjoy. Co-sponsors include Senators Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Mark Warner, and Tim Kaine (both D-Va.) and U.S. Representatives Don Beyer (D-Va.), Gerry Connolly (D-Va.), Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), Glenn Ivey (D-Md.), Jennifer McClellan (D-Va.), Kweisi Mfume (D-Md.), Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.), Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.), Bobby Scott (D-Va.), David Trone (D-Md.), and Rob Wittman (R-Va.).

One year ago, a July 2022 public opinion poll showed profound support for National Park Service status for the Chesapeake, with 83% of Maryland, Virginia and Washington, DC respondents in favor of establishing a Chesapeake National Recreation Area. A congressional working group was formed in June 2022, and draft legislation was shared in November 2022. Hundreds of public comments were submitted.

Representatives of United4CNRA, a coalition of organizations and people advocating for the CNRA, issued the following statements celebrating this significant step toward establishing the CNRA:

“Latino Outdoors wholeheartedly endorses Senator Chris Van Hollen and Congressman John Sarbanes’ vision for the Chesapeake National Recreation Area.  It is a vision that has been thoughtfully crafted by a broad range of stakeholders, and it centers the protection of diverse landscapes, increased diverse public access, and the celebration of cultural diversity.  We applaud the efforts of Senator Van Hollen, Congressman Sarbanes, and the entire CNRA working group.  We see their actions as an affirmation of the importance of diversity, not for diversity’s sake, but rather for its potential to be a catalyst for a thriving and sustainable regional economy, community, and recreational asset. – Latino Outdoors Executive Director Luis Villa

 “Thank you, Senator Van Hollen and Congressman Sarbanes, for making a more than 30-year-long dream come true. The Chesapeake Bay is as spectacular as Yellowstone or Yosemite, as great as the Great Smokies and as grand as the Grand Tetons. Establishing the Chesapeake National Recreation Area expands resources for environmental protection and makes it clear that the United States cherishes the Chesapeake, the birthplace of American identity. As a great gift to future generations, this legislation ensures everyone’s right to visit and recreate on our nation’s largest estuary while balancing the needs of those who live here and depend on the bay for their livelihood.” – Chesapeake Conservancy President & CEO Joel Dunn

 “We appreciate the many years of hard work that Senator Chris Van Hollen, Representative John Sarbanes and the Chesapeake working group have dedicated to charting a path forward for the Chesapeake National Recreation Area.

“There is only one Chesapeake Bay, and everyone deserves a chance to experience its wonders. Working together to create a Chesapeake National Recreation Area would expand public access to the largest estuary in the world, bring economic growth to nearby communities, and help the National Park Service, native Tribes, and Chesapeake watermen interpret thousands of years of impactful history. Introducing legislation is the next step to make the dream of this park a reality.” – National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA) President & CEO Theresa Pierno

“The Chesapeake Bay has nourished Indigenous people both physically and spiritually for more than 10,000 years. The Chesapeake National Recreation Area would help educate our young people about the long-standing connection between the Chesapeake Bay and American Indians and ensure that the bay’s plants and animals, which are so essential to the sustaining power of life for everyone, are protected while preparing our next generation of leaders for the future.”  – Rappahannock Tribe Chief Anne Richardson

“The National Park Service serves as one of our nation’s foremost storytellers and steward of our rich and diverse natural and cultural heritage. The Chesapeake National Recreation Area would allow all of the American people and our international visitors to learn about our country’s history and how the Chesapeake Bay has been the landscape of Indigenous history, European exploration, colonialism, independence, slavery and freedom.” – former National Park Service Director “Bob” Robert Stanton (retired)

The overall health of the Chesapeake Bay is showing significantly improving trends over time, but some regions still score poorly, reported the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science (UMCES) in its annual Chesapeake Bay and Watershed Report Card released today. Similar to 2021, the overall Chesapeake Bay received a C grade.

“While the trajectory of improvements, particularly concerning nutrients in the Bay, is in the right direction, we need to pick up the pace of restoration so that we can hit our nutrient reduction targets in the future and ensure our resilience to climate change,” said Peter Goodwin, president of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science.

The overall Bay health score has increased by six points in the past two years, an encouraging sign in the recovery of the Bay. Of the seven indicators, there were improvements in water clarity, nitrogen, phosphorus, and aquatic grasses. Although conditions in the bay overall are improving, many bay tributaries still have poor scores with a concerning trend of poor scores in the Eastern Shore watersheds.

“A clean Bay supports a healthy economy and a healthy environment. That’s why we’ve fought so hard to protect and restore this national treasure, and this progress shows that the historic federal investments are making a real difference. While this is a positive step forward, we know that we still have much work ahead to ensure a healthy Bay for today and generations to come,” said U.S. Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland.

Watershed health was scored in three categories—Ecological, Societal, and Economic health. In 2022, Ecological scored a B-, Societal scored a C, and Economic scored a C. Overall, the ecological, social, and economic conditions on the Eastern Shore of Maryland and Virginia are worse than other regions across all three categories. This helps explain the poor Bay scores for the Eastern Shore tributaries.

This year is the first time an integrated environmental justice index has been included in the report card. Environmental Justice is about creating a healthy and equitable society in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. The Environmental Justice Index developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Agency for Toxic Substances Disease Registry, in partnership with the Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Environmental Justice, includes social vulnerability, environmental burden, and health vulnerability indicators. Overall, there are strong disparities in different areas of the watershed. Cities and rural areas tend to experience higher relative impacts, and more suburban areas tend to experience lower relative impacts.

“The addition of the Environmental Justice Index provides a more holistic perspective of Chesapeake Bay and watershed health than has previously been available,” said Bill Dennison, Vice President for Science Application at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. “This holistic approach will make sure the report card is relevant to all communities in the Chesapeake watershed. We need to have healthy communities to ensure that we achieve a healthy Chesapeake Bay. Addressing environmental justice is critical

to ensure that restoration enhances long-term sustainability of the Chesapeake Bay watershed in an equitable way.”

The Environmental Justice Index characterizes the cumulative impacts and patterns of environmental injustice across the watershed. The index considers social factors such as poverty, race, ethnicity, and pre-existing health conditions, which can increase these impacts. The Environmental Justice Index was not included in the calculations for the 2022 Watershed Health score, pending additional input from bay communities.