Bay pollution has decreased slightly according to the Chesapeake Bay Foundation's 2014 State of the Bay Report released Monday morning, but declines in fisheries kept the estuary's overall grade at a D+, the same as 2012's report.
CBF reported dissolved oxygen, water clarity, oysters, and underwater grasses improved between 2012 and 2014. However, other parameters like nitrogen, toxics, shad, resource lands, forested buffers, and wetlands were unchanged in the biennial report compiled by CBF scientists.
Declines were seen in scores for phosphorus pollution, rockfish and blue crab fisheries.
"While we can celebrate water quality improvements, we must also acknowledge that many local rivers, streams, and the Chesapeake Bay are still polluted. They remain a system dangerously out of balance," said CBF President William C. Baker.
The 2014 score of 32 is still far short of the goal of 70, which would represent a saved bay on CBF's scale. A perfect score of 100 represents the unspoiled Chesapeake ecosystem described by Captain John Smith in the 1600s — extensive forests and wetlands, clear water, abundant fish and oysters, and lush growths of submerged vegetation. A 2013 Capital investigation found more than $15 billion has been spent in Maryland to clean the bay over the past 30 years with modest results.
Baker said the Clean Water Blueprint, a framework for bay cleanup built on tough federal pollution reduction standards and the new Chesapeake Bay Agreement, is in place and working, but threats to that progress remain."The states must pick up the pace of reducing pollution, especially from farms and urban areas," Baker said.
"We know that budgets are tight in all the major Chesapeake Bay states; however pollution has cost thousands of jobs and continues to put human health at risk," Baker said. But he noted the recent CBF bay economic report that found meeting the pollution reduction standards will bring economic benefits to the region, up to $22 billion annually if the plan is fully implemented.
In Maryland, Gov-elect Larry Hogan will take office Jan. 21 facing a $1.2 billion, two-year budget shortfall. On top of cuts necessary to meet that challenge, he already has said he will try to remove the stormwater tax aimed at reducing urban runoff pollution and fight the start of a phosphorus pollution plan to reduce poultry pollution on the Eastern Shore.
Those are two areas the CBF report said must be protected
Maryland must accelerate pollution reductions not cut them, the report urged. State leaders must ensure implementation of phosphorus pollution from agriculture; reduce urban and suburban storm runoff by strengthening state permits, maintaining the dedicated funding established by stormwater legislation, and stricter enforcement; and set more ambitious goals and increase efforts to plant trees in both agricultural and urban lands.
"To date, Maryland has been on track to meet the goals it set," said CBF Maryland Executive Director Alison Prost. "In order to continue to make progress, Maryland's newly elected officials will need to stand up for clean water and its citizens must hold them accountable."
"This is indeed the moment in time for the bay," Baker said. "Our children and grandchildren can inherit a restored Chesapeake Bay, but only if we continue the hard work and investments that will lead to success."