State, federal and military officials huddled at the Naval Academy in Annapolis on Wednesday to see how the Pentagon — one of the largest landowners in the Chesapeake Bay watershed — might do more on the region's sprawling bases to control pollution and restore the troubled estuary.
But they steered clear — for now — from talking about what it would cost and how a war-strapped Defense Department might pay for it.
Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson said President Barack Obama had called on civilian and military agencies alike to lead by example in drawing up a new federal strategy for restoring the bay. The federal government controls 5.3 percent of all the land in the six-state region. In Maryland, the military has 77,900 acres — a third of it along the bay shoreline.
Navy Secretary Ray Mabus, speaking on behalf of all the armed services, pledged to work with local, state and federal officials to upgrade sewage treatment plants, reduce polluted runoff on the bases' vast parking lots and control shoreline erosion at all 68 military installations in the six-state region.
"What we do on each of them matters and makes a difference," Mabus said, calling the restoration of the Chesapeake a "national imperative."
The services already have begun to overhaul old wastewater plants and reduce runoff with green building practices, the Navy secretary said. He noted that pollution-soaking permeable pavers had recently been installed on a parking lot at the Washington Navy Yard and said they are destined for use on all bases.
Mabus demurred, however, when asked whether the military would drop its resistance to paying fees levied by state and local governments to help pay for pollution control efforts around the bases. He also wouldn't say how much the Navy was prepared to spend on bay restoration, calling that "a work in progress."
The federal government, led by the military, has balked at a new storm-water pollution fee the District of Columbia levied last year on all landowners, based on how much pavement and rooftop they have. Alan Heymann, spokesman for the D.C. Water and Sewer Authority, noted the federal government controls more than 20 percent of land in the District and estimated the federal tab could be $3 million a year.
"We can't pay taxes," Mabus said, pointing out that the federal government is exempt by law from any taxation. But he said federal officials are negotiating with local and state officials over alternative funding schemes.
In Maryland, for instance, the Pentagon struck such a deal four years ago after initially refusing to pay the "flush fee" levied by the state on all property owners to help pay for upgrading wastewater treatment plants and septic systems. The military branches have $41 million worth of treatment plant upgrades in the works, according to Dawn Stoltzfus of the state Department of the Environment, and are spending another $54 million on runoff controls — far more than the $900,000 a year they would have paid into the fund.
Gov. Martin O'Malley said he hoped the state could help base commanders who gathered for the afternoon workshop to identify bay restoration opportunities on their lands, plan pollution control projects and even lobby for federal funding for them.
"I know all of our budgets are stressed. I know we're fighting a war," O'Malley said. But even so, he said, all share a common goal "to turn over a better future to our kids."
For her part, EPA's Jackson announced that her agency is launching a "Green Streets — Green Jobs" initiative. In cooperation with Maryland and the Chesapeake Bay Trust, EPA will offer $250,000 in grants in the coming year to local governments and community groups in the Anacostia River watershed to reduce polluted runoff in the District of Columbia and Maryland.