Chesapeake Bay restoration is headed in right direction

Chesapeake Watershed Forum draws participants from throughout region October 1, 2011 By John McVey - Journal staff writer (jmcvey@journal-news.net) , journal-news.net SHEPHERDSTOWN - Jeff Corbin does not like to talk about the Chesapeake Bay restoration - he wants to talk about the Chesapeake Bay watershed restoration. "If we clean up the rivers, creeks and streams in the watershed, downstream will take care of itself," he told guests of the sixth annual Chesapeake Watershed Forum that is being held this weekend at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's National Conservation Training Center near Shepherdstown. Corbin is the senior advisor to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's administrator. Friday, he discussed the current status of the Chesapeake Bay total maximum daily load and the six watershed states' Phase II watershed implementation plans. The forum was hosted by the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, drawing about 350 attendees for a wide range of seminars. Participants came from throughout the watershed region. Under a presidential executive order, the EPA has issued new, strict limits on the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus pollution and sediment that can get into the bay via its tributaries, such as the Potomac River, with the goal of cleaning up the bay. The greater, eight-county Eastern Panhandle is in the Potomac watershed. "Now is the time," Corbin said. "Every level of government is determined to restore our waters." He said that things are headed in the right direction. Since the mid-1980s, when the Chesapeake watershed states agreed to voluntarily cut pollution in the bay, the amount of nitrogen and phosphorus has been reduced. The amount of nitrogen in the bay has been reduced by 24 percent since 1985, Corbin showed, and phosphorus has been reduced by 25 percent. The overall targets set out by the EPA in its "pollution diet" for the bay are to reduce nitrogen by another 27 percent and phosphorus by an additional 24 percent by 2025, he said. These reductions would restore the bay to 1950s levels of pollution. The reductions are divided into two-year milestones that states' have to meet through 2025, he said. The seven watershed jurisdictions are generally on track or ahead of schedule to meet their 2009-2011 milestones, he added. Corbin cited recent developments in the watershed states that will go toward meeting the EPA's mandates. In West Virginia, which only contributes 3 to 4 percent of the total pollution, he pointed out legislation has been passed that sets aside excess lottery revenues to fund upgrades and improvements to wastewater treatment plants in the Eastern Panhandle. Senate Bill 245, shepherded through the Legislature by state Sen. Herb Snyder, D-Jefferson, will fund about 40 percent of treatment plant construction. Jim Edward, deputy director of the Chesapeake Bay program office, EPA Region 3, also spoke Friday, and he talked about some of the goals set out in the executive order. For instance, two of the milestones are to restore 30,000 acres of wetlands in the bay watershed.