ALMOST TWO decades have passed since government leaders in the Chesapeake Bay region joined in a crusade to clean up the ailing estuary. In those heady days, when Maryland Sen. Charles McC. Mathias won the first installment of federal funds to help finance the task, it seemed the job might almost be done by now.
Yet the depressing reality is we can celebrate only that overall bay degradation hasn't gotten worse. Some aspects have improved, some have deteriorated.
According to the ratings system assigned by the Chesapeake Bay Foundation in its annual assessments, the bay's health scored 23 out of a possible 100 when the cleanup campaign kicked off in 1983. The goal is to reach 40 by 2010. But this year's score was 27, down from a couple years ago when it was 28.
Scientists know what needs to be done to make far more significant improvements. There just hasn't been enough political will or wallet among the regional cleanup partners -- including Maryland, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C. -- to make it happen.
Such delay is inexcusable. The longer they wait, the harder it gets.
Maryland Gov. Parris N. Glendening, who has been the most enthusiastic of the bay's backers in recent years, is trying to kick-start the process before he leaves office in January.
Frustrated by the foot-dragging of his regional partners, Mr. Glendening pledged that Maryland would move on its own to sharply reduce at least its share of the polluting nitrogen and phosphorus washing into the bay.
The burden falls on Governor-elect Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. to make good on this promise.
In his campaign, he pledged to aggressively seek federal help in upgrading Maryland's sewage treatment plants, the easiest, surest step toward major improvement. And his connections with the Bush administration as well as the Republican leaders of Congress should be useful.
Further, Mr. Ehrlich, who drew overwhelming support from rural communities, is well-positioned to recruit farmers as foot-soldiers in the cleanup crusade by making it financially attractive for them to take steps to minimize harmful soil runoff.
What's more, after eight years in Congress, he may be able to secure greater cooperation from his Virginia and Pennsylvania counterparts, Mark R. Warner and Ed Rendell, who are sympathetic to the bay cause but look to Maryland for leadership.
Meanwhile, Maryland drivers can do their part by trading in vehicles, such as SUVs and trucks, that are larger than they need and that contribute mightily to air pollution, which also finds its way into the bay.