Chesapeake Bay Foundation and EPA settle lawsuit over bay cleanup

The Chesapeake Bay Foundation announced Tuesday a settlement with the Environmental Protection Agency to improve bay waters by pressing state and local governments to crack down on polluters. Foundation President William C. Baker "said the agreement settles a lawsuit brought in the waning days of the Bush administration accusing the federal government of neglecting its legal responsibility to restore the bay," Tim Wheeler of The Baltimore Sun reports. "This agreement is a game-changer," he said. "This agreement is going to lead to pollution reductions, and if it doesn't we'll be back in court."

Wheeler writes, "The settlement requires the EPA to issue a stringent pollution 'budget' for the Chesapeake by the end of the year and to hold Maryland and the other five bay states accountable for reducing pollution enough to meet the new limits. The agency will review all new or renewed permits held by sewage plants and factories to ensure discharges are not fouling streams and rivers leading to the bay."

Not all were impressed. "I for one will withhold my excitement until the EPA actually follows through on its threats," Howard Ernst, a political science professor at the U.S. Naval Academy and a critic both of the government's bay cleanup and the foundation, told Wheeler. "Until they prove they are willing to deny permits to polluters, this is all bark and no bite, and it is all too familiar." (Read more)