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The efforts of the many partners of the Chesapeake Bay Program to restore the nation’s largest estuary continue to yield promising results. The partnership’s annual science-based snapshot, Bay Barometer: Health and Restoration in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed 2017-2018, reports encouraging signs of resilience throughout the ecosystem and continues to build upon our high standards of science and data by tracking new indicators of environmental health.

For the first time, the Chesapeake Bay Program is tracking the impacts of a changing climate throughout our watershed. This year’s Bay Barometer includes observations on air temperature, stream temperature and sea-level rise to help us better understand how these shifting environmental conditions can influence our ability to restore and protect the Bay.

Decades of data show air and stream temperatures across the watershed are growing warmer. For example, at least one third of stream monitoring sites throughout the region show a statistically significant increase of approximately two degrees Fahrenheit since 1960. Additionally, monitoring stations in the Bay that have been tracking data since 1960 report a rise in sea-level of one-eighth to approximately one-sixth of an inch each year.

The resiliency of the Chesapeake Bay watershed is revealed by 19 indicators of environmental health, restoration and stewardship in the Bay Barometer. Experts observed positive trends in many of the indicators that were updated in 2017 and 2018, including:

• Underwater Grasses (Submerged Aquatic Vegetation, or SAV): For the first time since monitoring began over 30 years ago, underwater grass abundance exceeded 100,000 acres, reaching 104,843 acres to meet 57 percent of the outcome to achieve and sustain 185,000 acres of underwater grasses in the Bay – including 130,000 acres by 2025.
• Fish Passage: Over 100 percent of the outcome to restore historical fish migration routes by opening 1,000 additional stream miles to fish passage has been achieved.
• Protected Lands: Approximately 1,364,000 acres of land throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed has been permanently protected from development since 2010, achieving 68 percent of the goal to protect an additional two million acres of land by 2025.
• Water Quality Standards Achieved: Preliminary data indicate that 42 percent of the Chesapeake Bay and its tidal tributaries met water quality standards between 2015 and 2017, the highest amount ever recorded since tracking began over 30 years ago.

The Chesapeake Bay Program announced today that water quality in the Chesapeake Bay met its highest standard for water quality since monitoring began in 1985, besting its previous record reported in 2017. According to preliminary data, an estimated 42 percent of the Chesapeake Bay and its tidal tributaries met clean water standards for clarity (measured by observing underwater grass abundance), dissolved oxygen, and chlorophyll-a between 2015 and 2017. This five percent increase from the previous assessment period is due in large part to reductions in chlorophyll-a (a measure of algae growth) and increases in underwater grass abundance and dissolved oxygen in the open waters of the Bay.

New research conducted by Chesapeake Bay Program experts, and published in Science of the Total Environment, described the “positive and statistically significant trends” observed in the water quality of the Bay—an important indicator of environmental health. This suggests that the water quality of the Bay is improving due to the decades-long effort to reduce nutrient pollution and is more resilient to the impacts of extreme weather (such as Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee). However, water quality remains far below 100 percent attainment, with 58 percent of tidal waters still considered impaired.

Water quality is influenced by nutrient and sediment loads from the watershed and vary each year due to land use and river flow. Between October 2016 and September 2017, river flow to the Bay measured a below-average of 47.7 billion gallons per day. During this same period, approximately 240 million pounds of nitrogen, 12.7 million pounds of phosphorus and 4.3 billion pounds of sediment reached the Bay: a 0.4 percent, seven percent and 14 percent decrease from the previous assessment period, respectively.

While the amount of nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment entering the Bay from the watershed can change dramatically from year to year, the fact that nutrient and sediment loads decreased between 2016 and 2017 even as river flow increased could be a positive sign toward controlling pollution. However, the impacts from the record amounts of rainfall across the entire watershed in 2018 are still being realized and will be reflected in the data being collected now. These weather patterns not only contributed to high river flows and heavy flooding, but also brought a larger amount of fresh water into the Bay, leading to fewer jellyfish, a lingering “dead zone” and finfish moving to new areas. It remains to be seen how this will impact the water quality of the Bay in the future.

Monitoring data collected from River Input Monitoring stations on the nine major rivers in the Chesapeake Bay watershed provide long-term trends for nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment entering the Bay and its tidal tributaries. A recent U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) analysis of long-term trends (1985-2017) in pollution loads found that nitrogen loads improved at the majority of the stations. However, long-term trends in phosphorus loads indicate improving conditions at only three stations and degrading conditions at another five, while long-term trends in sediment loads show improving conditions at three stations and degrading conditions at two.

In early April, the Chesapeake Bay Program will release the 2017-18 Bay Barometer: Health and Restoration in the Chesapeake Bay Watershed, which will further explain how the entire Chesapeake Bay ecosystem and its watershed are responding to the partnership’s collective protection and restoration efforts.

The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today announced more than $13.1 million in grants to support the restoration and conservation of the Chesapeake Bay watershed in six U.S. states and the District of Columbia. The 49 grants will generate nearly $21.9 million in matching contributions for a total conservation impact of nearly $35 million.

The grants were awarded through the Chesapeake Bay Stewardship Fund (CBSF), a partnership between NFWF and the EPA’s Innovative Nutrient and Sediment Reduction Grants Program (INSR Program) and Small Watershed Grants Program (SWG Program). Additional support is provided by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, the U.S. Forest Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Altria Group Restoring America’s Resources partnership and CSX. 

Grant recipients were announced at the Cork Factory Hotel in downtown Lancaster in conjunction with the NFWF–hosted, biennial Chesapeake Ag Forum, a conference that brings together the best practitioners and partners advancing agricultural conservation practices across the Chesapeake Bay watershed. 

“The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania plays a significant role in the health of the Chesapeake Bay watershed,” said Senator Bob Casey. “But more importantly, actions taken in Pennsylvania to improve the Bay begin with efforts to restore clean water to the Conestoga, the Susquehanna, and the thousands of miles of rivers and streams right here in the Commonwealth. Financial resources, beginning with our Federal agency partners like the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, are critical to these ongoing collaborative local efforts.”

The projects supported by the 49 grants announced today will support methods to improve waterways, restore habitat and strengthen iconic species in Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia and the District of Columbia. The funds will engage farmers and agricultural producers, homeowners, churches, businesses and municipalities in on-the-ground restoration that supports quality of life in their communities, improving local waterways and, ultimately, the health of the Bay.

“EPA is pleased to support innovative and sustainable approaches to improving the health of our rivers and streams,” said EPA Regional Administrator Cosmo Servidio. “These investments in partnerships with states and local organizations encourage community stewardship of resources that will help preserve and enhance healthy waterways throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed.” 

The INSR Program awarded more than $7.3 million to eight projects, with recipients providing more than $10.4 million in match. The program provides grants to accelerate the implementation of water quality improvements specifically through the collaborative and coordinated efforts of sustainable, regional-scale partnerships with a shared focus on water quality restoration and protection in local waterways and the Chesapeake Bay.

“The grants announced today will empower communities and businesses throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed to become better stewards of natural resources,” said Jeff Trandahl, executive director and CEO of NFWF. “In many cases, these grants fund voluntary efforts to decrease sedimentation and runoff from farms and businesses, which boosts water quality throughout the 64,000-square-mile watershed and advances long-running efforts to improve the overall health of the Chesapeake Bay.”  

The SWG Program awarded more than $5.7 million to 41 projects, with recipients providing nearly $11.4 million in match. The program provides grants to organizations and municipal governments that are working to improve the condition of their local watershed through on-the-ground restoration, habitat conservation and community involvement. Grant recipients expect to reduce pollution through infrastructures including greener landscapes and community outreach initiatives that promote native landscaping and improved practices for managing runoff.

This year’s Chesapeake Bay Stewardship Fund grant recipients include:

• ​Lancaster Farmland Trust ($198,463) will reduce pollution flowing from Salisbury Township farms to the Chesapeake Bay by catalyzing increased adoption of farm conservation practices through connecting the economic value of conservation to farm resilience and other methods including creating learning farms.
• Capital Resource Conservation and Development Area Council, Inc. ($194,431) will support the adoption of rotational grazing and cover cropping on many livestock farms and work closely with six to 10 farms to support their transition to managed grazing.
• Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay ($1,000,000) will support dairy farmers in meeting their sediment and nutrient reduction needs through a collaborative public-private partnership between the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, Turkey Hill Dairy, and the Maryland and Virginia Milk Producers Cooperative Association. 

A complete list of the Chesapeake Bay Stewardship Fund 2018 grants winners is available here.

Since 2006, the INSR Program has provided more than $84.7 million to 176 projects that reduce the amount of nitrogen, phosphorus and sediment in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Since 1999, the SWG Program has provided more than $57 million to support 845 projects in the region to protect and restore the natural resources of the Bay watershed.

For more information about the Chesapeake Bay Stewardship Fund or to download the 2018 Chesapeake Bay Stewardship Fund Grant Slate, visit http://www.nfwf.org/chesapeake.

About the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation
Chartered by Congress in 1984, the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) protects and restores the nation's fish, wildlife, plants and habitats. Working with federal, corporate and individual partners, NFWF has funded more than 4,500 organizations and committed more than $4.8 billion to conservation projects. Learn more at www.nfwf.org.

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The Chesapeake Bay Program is pleased to announce its partners are making progress toward the environmental education goals of the 2014 Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement. Sixteen years after the Chesapeake Executive Council formally recognized the importance of environmental education to the partnership, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Washington, D.C., agreed to help their students graduate with the knowledge and skills needed to protect and restore their local watersheds. Since 2015, school districts within these jurisdictions have reported a slight rise in their preparedness to put environmental education programs in place, as well as an increase in the number of schools that are operating sustainably and a steady level of curriculum-embedded opportunities for students to learn outside.

According to the results of a 2017 Chesapeake Bay Program survey, almost one-quarter of responding school districts in the watershed-portion of Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Washington, D.C., consider themselves well-prepared to deliver high-quality environmental literacy programming to their students. More than one-third of responding school districts indicate their students are engaged in field experiences and outdoor learning through an inquiry-based approach toward education known as the Meaningful Watershed Educational Experience (MWEE). More than 600 public and charter schools in these jurisdictions are certified sustainable.

Despite this news, the Chesapeake Bay Program has identified three challenges that could hinder progress toward our environmental education goals. First, competing priorities and changes in leadership at the state and local level can create inconsistent support for environmental literacy. Second, teachers frequently lack the training and confidence to implement MWEEs. Third, school staff often perceive the act of seeking sustainable school recognition as daunting in light of their other responsibilities.

As a partnership that brings together government agencies, academic institutions and nonprofit organizations from across the watershed, the Chesapeake Bay Program is uniquely positioned to address these challenges. Earlier this year, the Principals’ Staff Committee committed to biennially convening high-level leaders in both education and the environment to discuss progress toward the partnership’s environmental education goals. In August, Chesapeake Executive Council Chair and Maryland Governor Larry Hogan called on his fellow watershed states to use the data and information collected by the Chesapeake Bay Program to develop strategies to equitably direct their resources toward ensuring all students have access to outdoor learning experiences and a sustainable school environment. The Chesapeake Bay Program will distribute its third environmental education survey to school districts in 2019.

At the annual meeting of the Chesapeake Executive Council, representatives from the six Chesapeake Bay watershed states, the District of Columbia, the Chesapeake Bay Commission and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) signed a directive in support of increasing technical assistance to the farmers of the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

“Maryland is fortunate to be home to countless natural assets, but for us none is more important than the Chesapeake Bay,” said Maryland Governor Larry Hogan. “Today’s meeting is a critical opportunity to review some of our successes, acknowledge our challenges and forge a path forward together with our regional partners that will help us to accomplish even more. I believe very strongly that if we embrace a spirit of bipartisan cooperation, together we can find real, common sense solutions to protect the Bay and preserve this national treasure for future generations.”

The Chesapeake Executive Council, established 35 years ago, is responsible for guiding the policy agenda for the Chesapeake Bay Program and setting conservation and restoration goals. Members include the governors of Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia, the Mayor of the District of Columbia, the Chair of the Chesapeake Bay Commission and the Administrator of the EPA on behalf of the federal government.

“Through the Chesapeake Bay Program, we are making significant progress reducing pollution and improving the health of the Bay, as demonstrated by the current record acreage of underwater grasses,” said acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler. “Today, we signed a directive to assist farmers in conservation efforts, so we can work together to meet our pollution reduction goals and continue to improve the water quality of local streams and the Bay.”

The directive recognizes the crucial role that farmers play in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, while acknowledging the need for increased technical assistance to help the agricultural sector in meeting their pollutant reduction goals. The EPA recently released its evaluations of the progress each of the six watershed states and the District of Columbia are making toward meeting their pollutant reductions goals under the Chesapeake Bay Total Maximum Daily Load (Bay TMDL). While considerable progress has been made in reducing the pollution flowing into the Chesapeake Bay since the Bay TMDL was first put into place, the agriculture sector is identified as one in which additional work is needed. The Bay TMDL calls for all pollution control measures needed to fully restore the Bay and its tidal rivers to be in place by 2025.

“Our farmers are strong stewards of the land and their contributions to improving water quality have been immense,” said Senator Frank Wagner, Chairman of the Chesapeake Bay Commission. “But to achieve clean water throughout the Bay watershed, we need to do even more. The directive signed by the Executive Committee today helps ensure farmers will have the assistance they need to finish the job. Last year, the Chesapeake Bay Commission issued a report focused on the technical assistance farmers need to improve both water quality and their bottom-line. The Executive Committee of the Chesapeake Bay Program – the political leadership of the watershed - have now adopted the report’s core recommendations. The farmers are willing to do the job. It’s our job to get them the help they need.”

In June 2014, the Executive Council signed the Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreement, with the vision of fostering an environmentally and economically sustainable watershed with clean water, abundant life, conserved lands and access to the water, a vibrant cultural heritage, and a diversity of engaged citizens and stakeholders. As part of the Watershed Agreement, Chesapeake Bay Program partners adopted for the first time a goal to increase the number and diversity of people who support and carry out conservation and restoration work. At today’s meeting, Governor Hogan announced that the Bay Program is setting new goals for increasing diversity by 2025. These include increasing both the percentage of people of color in the Chesapeake Bay Program to 25 percent and the percentage of people of color in leadership positions to 15 percent.

“This renewed commitment to enhancing diversity and inclusivity will help us build cleaner, healthier waterways for the entire region,” said District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser. “To restore our shared waterways and build a more resilient Washington, DC, the District is proud to commit to more rigorous pollution reduction goals that account for the impact of climate change on water quality.”

The Executive Council elected Maryland Governor Larry Hogan as Chair for a second term and heard from the Chesapeake Bay Program’s three Advisory Committees, who represent citizens, local governments and the scientific and technical interests from across the watershed.

“The Chesapeake Bay ecosystem thrives on diversity and so does the strength of our collective restoration efforts, said Paula Jasinski, chair of the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Citizens Advisory Committee. “The Citizens Advisory Committee applauds this new goal to bring new voices to the table as we work towards providing clean air and clean water for everyone in the watershed.”