Healing Our Waters: A Community Forum on Restoring the Chesapeake Bay
The Chesapeake Bay is a treasure of nature, the largest estuary in the nation, but its health has been in decline for many years. Now, a new initiative is in place requiring the Bay states and the federal government to restore the Bay and its tidal tributaries.
Join us for “Healing Our Waters: A Community Forum on Restoring the Chesapeake Bay” on Wednesday, Sept. 15, 2010, 7:00 to 8:30pm at the Sandy Bottom Nature Park, Visitors Center Conference Room, 1255 Big Bethel Road in Hampton (directions below).
Our forum will examine the causes of declining fish and other marine populations, decline of vital underwater grasses, and repeated and increasing dead zones in the Bay. We will also examine the solutions, as the principal causes of pollution are from agricultural, urban and suburban runoff and sewage treatment plants. The resulting excesses of nitrogen, phosphorous and sediment must be limited and agreed to by the states and the EPA. A watershed implementation plan (WIP) to control these pollutants has been set, and all river basins will have a limit, under a total maximum daily load (TMDL), as a recipe for the Bay’s recovery. Four panelists, each with decades of experience, will discuss the federal, state, and regional perspectives on the clean up effort. At the conclusion of the program, we will provide information on how citizens may participate in an important public comment period, extending until the end of December 2010. We cannot allow the recovery of the Bay to stagnate any longer. We need your help to heal the Bay. Please join us.
Jeff Corbin – Senior Advisor, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Region 3
Ted Henifin – General Manager, Hampton Roads Sanitation District
Jack Frye – Director, Soil & Water Conservation Division, VA Department of Conservation and Recreation
Dr. Carl Hershner – Director, Center for Coastal Resources Management, Virginia Institute of Marine Science
The forum is free and open to the public. Question will be entertained. Refreshments provided.
Click here to download (pdf), print and share our beautiful flier for the forum.
Directions: From I 64, take exit 261A, go ¼ mile to Big Bethel Road, turn right onto Big Bethel Road, go ¼ mile and turn left into Sandy Bottom Nature Park. A Farm Fresh store will be on your right. Follow the park road to the nature center.
Directions from website: http://www.hampton.va.us/sandybottom/about.html
Presented by the York River Group of the Sierra Club. For more information, contact Tyla Matteson, Chair, 804-275-6476, tmatteson1@mindspring.com and Ann Moore, Secretary, 722-9785, anadonaodovna@gmail.com.
Make a donation to the Virginia Chapter Sierra Club today!
I am glad this meeting will be held at the city of Hampton, just to remain that this local government has a 36% default for pollutant removal requirement before addressing water quality issues.
My point it is not only focus with this city in particular but with all the seven jurisdictions that are directly involved with the Chesapeake Bay health.
Over the 92 segments studied for the past 40 years, only 26 of them barely meet the standards for a healthy growth of submerged aquatic vegetation. This fact is not only because of the overwhelming exploitation of the natural resources of the bay, but also because of the local regulations, which their reinforcement is too submissive in addressing these issues.
On the other hand, some of the local governments that really try to improve the quality of the bay do not have the support from the state government, which is the one who has set those regulations in the first place, and allowing some influent citizens to overwrite such regulations.
Anyhow, I am not trying to create a polemic argument, but to stand out some issues that concern me. I hope and wish to hear goods ideas from this meeting.
Thank you.