Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley has abandoned an ambitious timeline to clean up the Chesapeake Bay watershed in the state after local governments asked for more time to implement costly Bay cleanup methods.
O’Malley has sought to place Maryland at the forefront of the multistate cleanup effort spearheaded by the Environmental Protection Agency, which established “pollution diets” designed to restore the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem over the next 15 years.
But Maryland’s plans to accomplish the EPA’s goals by 2020, five years ahead of the federal government’s deadline, were set aside after local governments asked for extra time to establish ways to meet the diet.
“In reality, 2020 was probably very optimistic,” said Jenn Aoisa, Maryland senior scientist for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. “Whether it was impossible, who knows? But given the realities of the economic climate that we’re in, and given the realities of some of the challenges we’ve seen, maybe 2020 was overly optimistic.”
Maryland counties were asked to submit local implementation plans to the state over the last month, and some came with steep price tags.
Prince George’s County officials estimated efforts could cost $777.2 million over the next decade, and Anne Arundel County officials also said their plan could cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
“We’re certainly sensitive to the magnitude of the work that needs to be done,” Aoisa said. “It’s a big lift.”
Maryland Environmental Secretary Robert Summers said the extra time was granted in deference to the state’s ambitious strategies, which he admitted would take more time than officials had hoped.
But the cost of not fixing the Chesapeake Bay would be much greater than the price tag to save it, he said.
“It’s really much more expensive for us to continue to ignore these problems,” Summers said. “Maryland is still out in front of the other states in terms of our implementation efforts. … If you look at the map, we own most of the Bay. We’ve got the most at stake, and the most to lose.”
Even with the delay, Maryland’s plans call for some of the most aggressive actions of all the states involved in the EPA’s pollution diet, said Nicholas DiPasquale, director of the EPA’s Chesapeake Bay program office.
“We were certainly aware of the more aggressive deadline that Maryland has established,” DiPasquale said. “But I think [the delay is] a recognition that a lot of coordination has to take place, especially with local governments.”
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