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Chesapeake Bay area leaders have officially committed to a new deadline for improving the health of the nation鈥檚 largest estuary: 2040.
罢丑别听聽approved Tuesday by the state and federal policymakers on the Chesapeake Executive Council is a revised version of their 2014 agreement, which came with a 2025 deadline that bay states realized three years ago they were not going to meet. Tuesday鈥檚 vote at the National Aquarium in Baltimore ends months of debate over a new plan,聽which many environmental advocates have criticized as too slow and not ambitious enough.
The agreement includes goals on subjects from oyster restoration and wetland acreage to curtailing runoff.聽While the states reached some of their 2014 goals this year, they failed to reduce pollution levels by the pledged amount. Tuesday鈥檚 approval adds more time to the clock.
There has been some progress.聽Since 2009, pollution control practices in the various states are estimated to have reduced nitrogen runoff by 15.3%, phosphorus runoff by 21.8% and sediment runoff by 7.6%.
鈥淲e鈥檙e proud of that,鈥� Maryland Gov. Wes Moore (D) said Tuesday, 鈥渁nd there鈥檚 more work to do.鈥�
Despite some gains, conditions in the bay and its tributaries have not improved markedly, as states dealt with increasing development and climate change. The most recent data indicates that just over 29% of bay waters聽, compared to 26.5% in the late 鈥�80s.
The executive council on Tuesday also gave a key Bay Program committee the go-ahead to study the inclusion of Native American tribes in the pact, as chiefs of several Virginia tribes watched from the front row. The Indigenous Conservation Council, representing Virginia鈥檚 federally recognized tribes,聽聽to be聽included but were told by Bay Program officials that they needed executive council approval first. Tuesday鈥檚 vote starts a study that is to be finished by July 1, 2026.
Moore said Tuesday that the bay cleanup effort would not be complete 鈥渨ithout making sure that our tribal lands and our tribal peoples are deeply ingrained with any future vision that we have.鈥�
While bay leaders touted the 鈥渁mbitious but achievable鈥� 2040 goals approved Tuesday, environmental advocates argued that 鈥� although improvements were made to the agreement after an聽聽period this summer 鈥� the final outcome remained imperfect.
Kristin Reilly, director of the Choose Clean Water Coalition, which represents more than 300 environmental nonprofits in the Chesapeake watershed, was particularly disappointed in the land conservation goal and the goal for public access sites. The plan calls for 100 new sites 鈥減roviding access to natural lands and waters鈥� by 2040, compared to the previous goal of adding 300 water access sites by 2025.
鈥淲e expect fully that we鈥檙e going to hit those targets before 2040,鈥� Reilly said. 鈥淲e are ready to have those conversations about what the next target should look like.
鈥淚t鈥檚 not like: We hit this in 2030, 2035. We鈥檙e done,鈥� she said. 鈥淟et鈥檚 set another bar before 2040.鈥�
During the public comment period, nonprofit groups and even some bay scientists expressed consternation that some of the goals had been set too low, or even revised downward 鈥� making them easier for the bay states to achieve. And they fretted about the draft agreement鈥檚 inconsistent deadlines. Some goals were due by 2030, others by 2035 or 2040.
They expressed concern, too, that the draft document was nearly silent on pollution limits that states are legally required to achieve under the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Load, or TMDL standards, set during President Barack Obama鈥檚 (D) administration.
There were also semantic issues: The words 鈥渃limate change鈥� were replaced by vague references to 鈥渃hanging environmental conditions,鈥� and the word 鈥渄iversity鈥� was scrubbed from the report.
In response, bay leaders made some changes, setting checkpoints along the way to the uniform 2040 deadline, and explicitly referencing their obligations under the Chesapeake Bay TMDL. But other things remained unchanged.
Maryland also pushed unsuccessfully this year for a聽聽instead of 2040. Maryland Natural Resources Secretary Josh Kurtz said in an interview Tuesday that other states were hesitant because of the new data coming from computer modeling in the years ahead, but Maryland believed it could have achieved many of the goals 10 years from now, not 15.
鈥淚t鈥檚 also important for the public to see that there is urgency,鈥� Kurtz said. 鈥淚 understand that it鈥檚 hard for there to be urgency when you鈥檝e been doing something for 40 years, but I think when you are undoing a hundred-plus years of damage, it鈥檚 going to take a little bit of time.鈥�
Maryland found support from Virginia, which voted in favor of the 2035 deadline 鈥� for all but the pollution targets.
鈥淚 was ready to accelerate this whole pace,鈥� Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) said Tuesday. 鈥淚 think we鈥檝e settled on a very good framework, a framework that sets 2040 as the next huge milestone date, and yet provides intermediate checkpoints along the way.鈥�
The Chesapeake Bay Foundation had also pushed for a 2035.
鈥淭he main thing is we just wanted a deadline that was near-term, you know? Something that we could really push on,鈥� said Hilary Harp Falk, president and CEO of the foundation. 鈥淏ut we did get mid-term accountability, which I think is a major improvement.鈥�
David Fotouhi, deputy administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, which is also a signatory to the bay agreement, said Tuesday that the EPA, under President Donald Trump (R) is 鈥渇ully committed to restoring the Chesapeake watershed.鈥�
After Trump鈥檚 first term, when he tried several times to eliminate funding for the EPA鈥檚 Chesapeake Bay Program office, questions swirled about what a second Trump term might bring. But Trump did not attack the bay program in his first budget proposal, though other environmental agencies involved in bay work took big budget hits, and many lost employees in Trump鈥檚 effort to shrink the federal workforce.
鈥淲e will provide funding, technical expertise and data to support our state and local partners,鈥� Fotouhi said on Tuesday. 鈥淲e will support and coordinate partnership efforts, consistent with our authorities in the Clean Water Act, in Section 117. We will encourage innovation in land and water management, and we will ensure accountability and transparency, so that taxpayers know their tax dollars are making a tangible difference.鈥�
Tuesday鈥檚 meeting drew a nearly full slate of governors, compared to prior years when many sent designees. Besides Moore and Youngkin, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro (D), Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer (D) and Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser (D) were in attendance.
Moore, who had served as chair of the executive council since late 2023, passed the gavel to Shapiro, who was also recently chosen to lead the U.S.-Canada partnership for the Great Lakes. The Chesapeake Bay Foundation said in a news release that it marked the first time in 鈥渕ore than two decades鈥� that a Pennsylvania governor has led the partnership.
鈥淚t鈥檚 important for me, as a Pennsylvanian, to be part of this conversation,鈥� Shapiro said Tuesday. 鈥淔or a long time, Pennsylvania took a back seat when it came to cleaning up the bay, and now we are helping lead that discussion.鈥�
Moore gifted Shapiro with a fishing hat, and invited him for a Chesapeake fishing trip targeting invasive blue catfish. Shapiro, in turn, presented Moore with a blue crab-themed baseball cap.
Maryland is one of the states that has either achieved, or is on track to achieve, its pollution reduction commitments; Pennsylvania, with its higher density of farms, has fallen short on nitrogen and phosphorous reduction goals. As of 2024, it had cut nitrogen pollution to 104.5 million pounds, shy of the target of 77 million, and phosphorous to 3.6 million pounds, compared to a goal of 2.8 million pounds.
Collectively, the bay states had only achieved 59% of their nitrogen goal by 2024, compared to 92% of the phosphorus goal. The states, however, did achieve their goal to reduce sediment pollution.
