Virginia Waterman's Association

Virginia Watermen are in Support of Lee Anne Washington's Efforts

2009-06-12T00:23:00Z

Lee Anne Washington discovered discrepancies in statements made by leading officals at VMRC in Robert Hollowell's lawsuit against VMRC concerning crab dredging. Ms. Washington asked The Honorable Harvey B. Morgan, chairman of House Agriculture Chesapeake and Natural Resources Committee, to investigate VMRC’s handling of the crab dredging issue – including an investigation of the roles of Commissioner Bowman, Deputy Commissioner Travelstead, and Public Relations Director Bull.
Although the waterman's association was not involved in the lawsuit it must be noted that the association was supportive of Mr. Hollowell and Ms. Washington in that suit and are supportive of Ms. Washington in her quest for an investigation.
Below is that letter to Delegate Morgan.
By the way Ms. Washington successfully represented Mr. Hollowell. VMRC did not have the authority to permanately close (eliminate) in winter crab dredging fishery and must address the crab dredging fishery annually as it does other fisheries.
Ms. Washington is correct in her letter when she states that VMRC has lost the confidence of Virginia's commercial waterman.
AGAIN THE WATERMEN STAND IN SUPPORT OF MS. WASHINGTON!

May 25, 2009

The Honorable Harvey B. Morgan, Chairman

House Agriculture Chesapeake and Natural Resources Committee

P.O. Box 949
Gloucester, VA 23061

Re: Virginia Marine Resources Commission (“VMRC”)

Crab Dredging

Dear Delegate Morgan,

The Virginia General Assembly has entrusted the VMRC with a sacred public trust: the duty of preserving and protecting one of our Country‘s greatest natural resources – the Chesapeake Bay. In so doing, the VMRC has been given the power to “promulgate regulations, including those for taking seafood, necessary to promote the general welfare of the seafood industry and to conserve and promote the seafood and marine resources of the Commonwealth.” (See Exhibit 1, Va. Code § 28.2-201.)

It is with great consternation that I bring to the attention of the House Agriculture, Chesapeake, and Natural Resources Committee certain contradictory statements that the VMRC has made to the United States Department of Commerce, the Virginia General Assembly, the Circuit Court of Norfolk, and the general public. Below, I provide recorded instances of diametrically opposed statements made by the VMRC concerning its intent with regard to crab dredging in Virginia.

Put simply, the VMRC has lost the confidence of Virginia’s 2,900 commercial watermen, their families, and their friends. The VMRC cannot maintain the public’s confidence or effectively fulfill its mission if it continues to change its message from audience to audience and from desired result to desired result.

The following examples of statements made by the VMRC lead to one of two devastating conclusions: Either the VMRC is incompetently run and the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing or the VMRC has engaged in a concerted effort to mislead the aforementioned authorities. Neither conclusion is acceptable.

EXAMPLES

IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER

OF VMRC’S CONTRDICTORY STATEMENTS

CONCERNING CRAB DREDGING IN VIRGINIA WATERS

I. March 2008: Notice of Public Comment for April 22, 2008 VMRC Meeting

In preparation for its April 22, 2008 meeting (the “Meeting”), the VMRC published the legally required notice (the Notice). Paragraph 2 of the Notice states in pertinent part: “Under the authority established by Section 28.2-707 of the Code of Virginia, the Commission will also consider proposals to shorten or eliminate the winter dredge fishery season. . .” (Emphasis added) (See Exhibit 2, Notice).

The VMRC is constrained in what it can consider at any given meeting by the Notice. At the Meeting, the VMRC had two choices – either shorten the winter dredge fishery season or “eliminate” it.

Note Bene: The VMRC is not precise in its use of the term “season.” In some contexts it means December 1 through March 31 in any given year – i.e. the 2007 crab dredge season, the 2008 crab dredge season, etc. In other contexts, such as in the Notice and the subsequent regulation, the term is used to denote a specific method, among several methods, of harvesting crabs during any given year – i.e., the crab pot season, the peeler pot season, the crab dredge season.

II. April 2008: The VMRC Enacts the Eliminating Regulation

At the Meeting I, and dozens of Virginia’s Commercial Watermen, requested that the VMRC table its consideration of “eliminating the winter crab dredge fishery season” until the next meeting to give us sufficient additional time to consider the legal ramifications of the proposed regulation and prepare a response.

The VMRC denied our request and enacted Chapter 4VAC20-1140-10 et Seq., a regulation that did not in anyway “shorten” the winter dredge fishery season – it “eliminated” it. That regulation is referred to hereafter as the “Eliminating Regulation”.

The Eliminating Regulation makes the bold statement that it is “unlawful, for any person, to use a dredge, for catching crabs, from the waters of the Commonwealth” and repeals 18 regulations pertaining to crab dredging. (See Exhibit 3, Chapter 4VAC20-1140-10.)

May 2008: Robert Hollowell Files an Appeal of the Eliminating Regulation

Robert Hollowell, a commercial waterman who has earned a living by harvesting fish and shellfish from the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries since 1965, has been harvesting crabs by dredging for them during the winter months for over 29 years. He timely filed a petition for appeal to the Norfolk Circuit Court challenging the legality of the VMRC’s passage of the Eliminating Regulation. The petition does not state the grounds of the appeal, only which regulation is being appealed. (See Exhibit 4, Notice of Appeal.)

III. June 13, 2008: VMRC Letter to Department of Commerce

In a letter dated June 13, 2008, Steve Bowman -- the VMRC Commissioner -- wrote to Harold C. Mears -- the Office Director for the State, Federal, and Constituent Program Office of the United States Department of Commerce -- to provide additional documentation in support of the Virginia and Maryland request for declaration of a blue crab fishery resource disaster.

Consistent with the Notice and the Eliminating Regulation, Commissioner Bowman explains to Mr. Mears that “[t]wo main components of the Virginia plan to reduce the harvest of female crabs that are associated with lost income, to fishermen, are the establishment of an early season closure in 2008 and the elimination of the 100-year old winter dredge fishery.” He further explains that “[i]n April the VMRC eliminated this long standing fishery.” And finally, Commissioner Bowman states that “It was very difficult for the Commission, in Virginia, to eliminate the crab dredge fishery.” (Emphasis added.) (See Exhibit 5, June 13, 2008 Letter from Bowman to Mears).

June 23, 2008: Hollowell Files His Petition for Appeal

Robert Hollowell asserts in his petition for appeal that “[u]nder the statute [Va. Code § 28.2-707], the Commission has the authority to extend, limit, or close a season in its entirety, but not the authority to eliminate the crab dredging fishery altogether which is the de facto result of the Eliminating Regulation.” (Exhibit 6, Petition for Appeal, p.9 of 13).

IV. November 2008: Annual Report to Governor and General Assembly Regarding Blue Crab Fisheries Management Plan

With apparent knowledge of the mounting controversy concerning whether VMRC has the authority to “eliminate” the crab dredge fishery, Commissioner Bowman in his report to the Governor and General Assembly is careful to confine his report of the Commission’s action to the statutory limit of just one season. In one section of the report, Commissioner Bowman reports that “ [t]he Commission Suspended the 2008/2009 winter dredge fishery season.” In another section, he explains that “[t]he Commission has also planned, and will fund, a work program, designed to assist some of the 53 crab dredge fishermen who were impacted by the closure of the 2008/2009 winter crab dredge season.”

Nowhere in the Report does Commissioner Bowman inform the Governor and the General Assembly that “[i]n April the VMRC eliminated this long standing fishery” or explain that “[t]wo main components of the Virginia plan to reduce the harvest of female crabs that are associated with lost income, to fishermen, are the establishment of an early season closure in 2008 and the elimination of the 100-year old winter dredge fishery” or express the sentiment that “[i]t was very difficult for the Commission, in Virginia, to eliminate the crab dredge fishery” -- as he had previously done in his letter to the United States Department of Commerce. Instead, he leaves it to the reader to ferret out this information from Attachment II. (See Exhibit 7, p. 27 of 79.)

IV. December 2008: Representations to Circuit Court of Norfolk

Then, contrary to everything that the VMRC had publicly stated to that point, it repeatedly “[d]enies that the challenged regulation eliminates crab dredging in Virginia waters” in its Answer to Hollowell’s Petition for Appeal. (See Exhibit 8, VMRC Answer, numbered paragraphs 1, 2, 19, 21, 23, 34, 35, 36, 39, 41, 42, 54, 57, and 60.)

V. March 26, 2009: Representations to General Public

Finally, in complete contradiction to the previously filed Answer, John Bull, Director of Public Relations for the VMRC, stated in an interview on March 26, 2009 with the Northern Neck News -- a local weekly newspaper which services the five counties of the Northern Neck -- that the $10 million dollars in federal funds appropriated for crab fisheries disaster relief was “a ‘bridge program’ to help crab dredgers get through a few years until they can find another way to make a living in the winter months. ‘We don’t expect to reinstate the crab dredging season.’” (Emphasis added.) (See Exhibit 9.)

VI. April 2009: Court Sets Aside Criminal Provisions of Regulation and Requires Revision of Regulation to Pertain only to December 1, 2008 – March 31, 2009 Crab Dredging Season. (See Exhibit 10.)

______________________

The examples presented here beg the following questions, among others:

1) If the VMRC does not plan to “reinstate” the crab dredging season, how does that differ from “eliminating” it?

2) Has the VMRC committed a fraud against the United States Department of Commerce or the Norfolk Circuit Court?

3) Is the VMRC so bereft of integrity that it cannot admit when it has overstepped its authority –choosing to obfuscate the truth, instead?

As the Secretary and General Counsel of the Virginia State Waterman’s Association, I respectfully request a thorough investigation of the VMRC’s handling of the crab dredging issue – including an investigation of the roles of Commissioner Bowman, Deputy Commissioner Travelstead, and Public Relations Director Bull in:

1) making representations to the United States Department of Commerce;

2) making representations to the Norfolk Circuit Court; and

3) making representations to the general public.

Finally, I note that it has been 35 years since a JLARC study has been done on the Virginia Marine Resources Commission and it’s about time for another one.

Thank you for your time and attention to this matter. If you have any questions or I can be of any assistance to you or your committee, please feel free to contact me – I’ll be glad to do what I can.

Sincerely,

Lee Anne Washington

Secretary & General Counsel

Virginia State Waterman’s Association

Virginia Watermen Association Go to Richmond

2009-02-14T00:48:00Z

Thank a Watermen

2009-02-13T20:19:00Z

Crab Feast or Famine Documentary trailer

2009-02-13T20:13:00Z

Crab Disaster Relief Plan

2009-02-10T12:49:00Z

Times are changing for Virginia's Watermen. .

Crab Disaster Plan

It is no fault of the waterman that in 2008 the crab fishery was declared a disaster.

Lost of aquatic grasses, lost of our oyster reefs, predation, and pollution from both point and non-point sources are what have caused the waterman to be the scapegoat.

As much as I would like to see Virginia's watermen continue in the traditional fishing methods that they grew up with it is inevitable that the waterman has got to adjust if he plans to survive.

Although I do not agree with everything in the plan I do see where it allows new opportunities. I especially see this for the younger waterman who knows what hard work is and is willing to take that dedicated work ethic to the next level.

As for us older watermen, we are a dying breed. As we leave so does a cultural resource along with years of applied knowledge and experience.

Not only is it important to encourage the younger ones but we still have to work to help bring this BAY back. People need to hear our stories of how clean the water was when we grew up. Politicians and VMRC must be held accountable.

We all are seeing the oyster trying to make a come back. There is strike everywhere but on the bottom. We need to get these oyster bars worked. Bring the shells back up to the top and you need to call your delegate, senator, and congressman and tell them.

When we grew up you didn't have to go to a man-made reef to catch a fish All you had to do was go to the edge of any oyster bar.

The Virginia State Waterman's Association is going to continue its fight to preserve a heritage and our resource but we are also going to move forward. By doing so hopefully we can help watermen move into new fisheries, find better marketing, and continue to run a family businesses that a father can pass to his son.

Fish and crabs are starving for oxygen in depleted waters

2008-08-30T12:35:00Z

By Scott Harper
The Virginian-Pilot
© August 30, 2008

PORTSMOUTH

Ferry riders this week saw firsthand the unpleasant summer phenomenon known as a "crab jubilee."

At the two ferry landings on the Portsmouth waterfront, blue crabs were fleeing from an oxygen-starved Elizabeth River, clinging to pilings and below docks in search of life-sustaining oxygen.

Floating next to them were the not-so-lucky - dead fish, dozens of them, including adult striped bass, baby flounders, croakers and white perch.

Officials at the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality said Friday they have been flooded with calls in recent days about fish kills and scurrying crabs in local waters.

The events seem to be concentrated in Portsmouth and Norfolk, in the shallow and enclosed reaches of the Elizabeth River and lower James River, said Wick Harlan, a state environmental specialist monitoring the trend.

Harlan said the culprit seems to be an old one - algae blooms, which are dying off and gobbling up oxygen as they sink to the bottom of affected waterways.

The blooms have been occurring for decades in much of the Chesapeake Bay during late summer, the result of nutrient pollution and high water temperatures. During rains, nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus wash into waterways from city streets, storm drains, development sites, lawns and gardens, parking lots and farm fields.

In proper amounts, nutrients are good for an ecosystem. But when they overwhelm a water body, as they do now throughout the Bay system, algae grows quickly and can cause "dead zones" lacking in oxygen.

Algae blooms last summer were some of the heaviest and most widespread on record in Hampton Roads, but few fish kills were reported. This year, by contrast, the blooms have not been as extensive but are resulting in more kills and more crab jubilees, Harlan said.

State officials found "extremely low" oxygen levels at the High Street ferry landing in Portsmouth on Thursday, Harlan said, following calls from concerned business owners and downtown residents who live near the port.

Betsy Cartier, who runs the Starboards coffee kiosk next to the landing, said she has never seen conditions so bad in her five years on the water.

It started Thursday morning, she said, when scores of sea gulls were picking at dead fish. By Friday afternoon, the smell was "just horrendous," Cartier said.

"Everybody comes off the ferry and wants to know what's going on," she said.

She said she talked to boaters on Friday coming up the Intracoastal Waterway who told her of seeing thousands of dead fish and even snakes on the Southern Branch of the Elizabeth River.

Knitting Mill Creek in Norfolk, near Old Dominion University and the Colley Avenue business corridor, experienced some of the most intensive fish kills this week related to scant oxygen, officials said.

Investigators documented "very high counts" in the creek of a particular kind of algae causing most of the trouble, a species known as Cochlodinium, Harlan said.

The cells of this species can become so large that they might clog fish gills, exacerbating the effects of poor water quality and little oxygen, experts explained.

Cochlodinium arrived in Virginia in 1992 and has been showing up in late July and August ever since, sometimes with gusto and sometimes hardly at all.

Harlan chuckled when asked how long the conditions will continue this summer.

"It's very unpredictable," he said, "and depends a lot on the weather and winds."

Scott Harper, (757) 446-2340, scott.harper@pilotonline.com

Senator Stuart a Real Bay Advocate - We need more like him

2008-08-16T10:58:00Z

NEWS FOR RELEASE: On Receipt [August 15, 2008]

Non-Partisan, Public-Private Task Force

STATE SEN. RICHARD STUART IS FORMING GROUP TO RESTORE CHESAPEAKE BAY

State Sen. Richard H. Stuart (R., 28th District) is launching a public-private Virginia task force of various local, state and federal officials, environmental and conservation groups and interested individuals for an all-out attack on Chesapeake Bay pollution aimed at restoring the estuary’s health.

Named the Chesapeake Bay Restoration Task Force, Stuart announced the effort on Thursday (Aug. 14) at an organizational meeting of the new Virginia State Waterman’s Association at the Virginia Watermen’s Museum in Yorktown.

His objective, Stuart said, is to hold educational workshops in the Bay region and to develop legislation and other approaches to fix the Bay’s problems. He said he hopes to expand the effort with similar task forces elsewhere in the Bay watershed, especially in Maryland and Pennsylvania.

“This is absolutely a non-partisan group,” Stuart said. “We are not seeking individuals with political agendas. The only agenda members of this task force will have is to fix the Chesapeake Bay.”

Stuart grew up in Westmoreland County and as a youth worked as a waterman on the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries.

“The condition into which we have let the Bay and its tributaries lapse is nothing less than criminal,” he said. “Having grown up on the water and crabbed and fished all my life, I’m afraid now to let my children swim in the Potomac River. This precious watershed must be restored.”

As the task force’s organizer, Stuart already has brought on board Congressman Rob Wittman (R., 1st District); State Sens. Ralph Northam (D., 6th District) and Ryan T. McDougle (R., 4th District), members of the Senate Committee on Agriculture, Conservation and Natural Resources; House of Delegates Speaker William J. Howell (R., 28th District); Del. Albert C. Pollard, Jr. (D, 99th District); Del. Harvey B. Morgan (R., 98th District), chairman of the House Committee on Agriculture, Chesapeake and Natural Resources; and R. Michael McKenney (D), a member of the Virginia State Water Control Board and Northumberland County commonwealth’s attorney.

Stuart said he also will seek to enlist the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, the Virginia Farm Bureau, The Chesapeake Bay Foundation, The League of Conservation Voters, The Virginia State Waterman’s Association, and others who exhibit a clear dedication to restoring the Bay.

Volunteers are being sought, Stuart said, to work with the task force in organizing and carrying out the regional educational workshops.

● ● ●

Supplying 'the pump' of groundwater

2008-08-14T11:00:00Z

By Liza Field

08/14/2008

,"The underground water table gets its supply from only one source: the moisture which falls on the surface of the land." — Jay N. Darling

Got rain?

Paying $4 per gallon for milk and gas drew our attention this year. It seemed to create a funnel for the reality finally to sink into our awareness — that resources on a finite earth are limited.

It also diverted our attention from a more submerged shortage — of water. This is regrettable, since water is one resource we could renew, if we tried. And though we don't stand gazing at its price each week at "the pump," water is far more valuable than fossil fuel.

We valued it here in the mid-Atlantic, last summer, as water supplies began to look finite. Their finitude constituted a relatively new idea for eastern states, historically sodden with rain, groundwater, springs, creeks and full rivers. Water shortages had always been the problem of people "out west," appallingly draining their ancient aquifer and arguing over rivers.

So for decades, while western states lived under strict rules for surface and groundwater use, governments in the east continued handing out water-withdrawal permits to any industry that asked. Meanwhile, we continued to develop, pave and grow — our only limits appearing to be the horizontal landscape, not the vertical situation beneath our feet.

In recent years, smartgrowth advocates have warned that mid-Atlantic water shortages would result from unchecked development, a drier climate, the revamped logging siege in our Eastern mountains, and the rapid transition of woods and farms into developed sprawl.

Officials in Maryland and Pennsylvania helped lead the way in legislating standards for sending pollution-laden urban storm-water into detention ponds, rather than shunting it down gutters, creeks and rivers, into the Chesapeake Bay. But often, the slowed down, somewhat cleaner water ultimately gets sent downstream rather than into the ground.

This brings up a vital point. Expecting government single-handedly to restore the water table is as unproductive as expecting it to solve the energy crisis. Ordinary citizens are the ones who must create a "water reserve" for the future.

How? After all, average residents can no more hoard rain than we can stockpile gasoline down in the root-cellar. — Or can't we?

Luckily, nature has been storing rain underground for eons. That's why the American settlers found abundant springs, creeks and groundwater sitting just a few feet below the surface for their spade-dug wells. Across the continent, in those days, orchards, crops and wildlife could survive long periods without rain. Plant roots could reach the groundwater, and wildlife could find abundant creeks and springs. Why?

When rain falls into meadow grasses, woods or humus-buried mountainsides, it gets absorbed by what permaculturists call "a sponge." Tall weeds, fallen logs, leaf-litter, pine-straw, rotting apples, nut-shells, sticks, moss and lichens — all the "mess" we've been taught to rake off the land's surface — help slow down any rain run-off, meanwhile absorbing it for slow release into the ground.

So while one's neat-mown, sun-beaten lawn may be parched dry as a wicker-basket on summer afternoons, a nearby woodland walk can reveal a shaded landscape still moist, under the leaf-mat, from rain three weeks prior.

This is one reason smart growth advocates link increased land development to future water shortages. Besides more residential demand for water, the rain-repellent traits of developed landscapes keep groundwater from being recharged.

Curbing development seems essential to restoring our region's groundwater. But what about the vast spread of already-developed landscapes that we can't exactly undo?

Ordinary residents — once informed — can transform things. We may not be public officials or developers, but if we live somewhere, work, walk, go to school or vote somewhere — if we have any influence at all over a small patch of earth — we can help store up the priceless resource of rain.

Permeable paving blocks, rain arrels and gray water lines are great investments for "groundwater-banking." But at almost no cost, homeowners, landlords, schools, churches, hospitals and businesses can transform their landscape from high-maintenance lawn (which can shunt off stormwater like a thatched roof) to a landscape of water-catching mulch, compost, gardens, shrubs, ferns, wildflowers and shade-trees.

Such a landscape not only absorbs rain, it can help retard the immediate evaporation of water from the ground.

A rain-absorbing, less mower-dependent landscape also cuts emissions — as well as costs at that ever-interesting gas pump. And who knows? If saving gallons of rainwater can also save a few gallons of gas, groundwater banking ideas might begin to percolate more deeply into our awareness, the local neighborhood, the region and perhaps the entire, thirsty continent.

Liza Field is a hiker and conservationist. She teaches English and philosophy in the Virginia Governor's School and Wytheville community College. Distributed by Bay Journal News Service.

VMRC "The Exterminator" They are Killing Us

2008-08-01T12:12:00Z

Putting watermen out of business

August 1, 2008

I'm captain of the fishing vessel Sea Rambler, treasurer of the Coastal Virginia Watermen's Association and a Merchant Marine officer. Currently I am flat broke! This year alone I have seen the end of the Chesapeake Bay watermen.

There are no jobs to be found other than part-time or minimum-wage. To keep fishing, I have to pay $4.50 to $5 a gallon for fuel. That adds up to $700 a week in the boat, $150 in my truck and $30 for oil. I cannot afford to leave the dock!

Year after year, month after month, I and others like me come to the Virginia Marine Resources Commission to defend our livelihoods, only to be pushed around and slowly by law put out of business.

With no outside help, we've endured. Now I just don't see that happening anymore. It used to be one or two watermen here and there, but now there are 10- to 20-some watermen leaving the bay.

Loss of the crab-dredge fishery was a hard blow, with five months of no work; also with rumors of the VMRC taking away my crab pot and peeler licenses, and now restricting charter boat licenses, this is adding more insult to injury. Our careers are facing annihilation.

So I beg the VMRC to stop this madness. The condition of the bay is not our fault. Start looking elsewhere before pointing the finger at us.

Lee R. Smith

Hampton

Call To Action - Campaign Needs Immediate ACTION

2008-07-12T12:50:00Z

Letters, faxes, and emails need to be sent ASAP!

Regulations on Commercial Waterman and NOT MAKING THE POLLUTERS live by their regulations. If there is ever going to be any justice then we have got to take a stand!

Virginia Must Not Roll Back Protection for the Chesapeake Bay!

Virginia’s rivers and the Chesapeake Bay are in critical condition. The Commonwealth just released its assessment of Virginia waterways (the “dirty waters list”) and found that over 10,600 miles of rivers and nearly the entire Chesapeake Bay do not meet state water quality requirements. This includes nearly 2,500 miles of the Shenandoah-Potomac River system—a basin whose fisheries and economy has recently been plagued by spring and summer fish kills—from its headwaters in the Shenandoah Valley to the lower tidal reaches of the Potomac.

Given the degraded state of these waterways, we are concerned that the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) has proposed authorizing pollution discharges into the Shenandoah-Potomac in excess of the “pollution caps” already determined by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to be protective of water quality in the Bay downstream. Specifically, the proposal would allow Merck Pharmaceuticals and the Frederick-Winchester Service Authority to increase their pollution limits for nitrogen and phosphorus—the two main pollutants that have sickened the Bay—by an additional 42,000 pounds of nitrogen pollution and 7,000 pounds of phosphorus pollution per year.

DEQ’s plan to authorize this additional pollution, and then address the excesses above the pollution caps in a future Bay clean-up plan, is inappropriate and provides little relief for those that rely on the Shenandoah-Potomac and the Bay. The EPA and the Commonwealth have already established achievable, scientifically-based pollution caps based on unprecedented study of the Bay region. Virginia must hold the line on pollution caps now—not forgo protecting our water quality until some future date!

Take Action

Submit a public comment urging DEQ and the State Water Control Board to deny amendments to the Water Quality Management Planning Regulation that would authorize increased nitrogen and phosphorus pollution allocations to Merck and the Frederick-Winchester Service Authority. Please let these state officials know how important clean water is to you, your livelihood, and your quality of life. Additional details about this proposal can be found at the state’s web-site: http://www.townhall.state.va.us/L/viewstage.cfm?stageid=4461&display=general.

Comments can be submitted until July 25, 2008 to Mr. John Kennedy via

Mail:

Department of Environmental Quality

629 East Main Street

P.O. Box 1105

Richmond, VA 23218

E-mail:

jmkennedy@deq.virginia.gov

Fax:

(804) 698-4116

Crab Dredge - Petition for Appeal

2008-07-06T21:08:00Z

On June 23, 2008 Lee Anne Washington hand delivered a Petition for Appeal concerning VMRC's overstepping their regulatory authority. You can see that petition by Clicking Petition for Appeal.

Bad Summer Forecast for Bay

2008-06-19T09:42:00Z

By LAWRENCE LATANE III

TIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITER

A new report sounds more bad news for the Chesapeake Bay and the people who work and play on its waters.

"Simply put, we're predicting that it's not going to be a good summer out there for rockfish, crabs and oysters that call the bay home," said William Dennison of the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science, which released its forecast yesterday.

The center is basing its prediction on the heavy winter and spring rainfalls that loaded the bay's biggest tributary with the sixth-highest amounts of nitrogen pollution since monitoring began in 1985.

In the past, polluted water from the Susquehanna River has magnified the size of the bay's oxygen-deprived "dead zone" in the deep waters of the bay's channel. The river drains a giant portion of Maryland, Pennsylvania and New York.

Nitrogen washed from fertilized farm fields and suburban lawns along the river feeds aquatic algae blooms, which use up the water's oxygen when they die. The bay's dead zone has become a summer staple on the estuary, sometimes stretching more than 100 miles from Annapolis, Md., to the mouth of Virginia's Rappahannock River.

The center is not predicting how far the dead zone will extend this year. Dennison said it will likely reach the state line, at least.

The forecast also foresees "low to moderate" algae blooms in the tidal Potomac River this summer. The Potomac's polluted waters have been a frequent target for red tides -- a type of algae bloom known for its color -- especially near the resort town of Colonial Beach.

It also predicts the recurrence of "mahogany tides" caused by a different algae species north of the Potomac. In past summers, algae blooms in the Potomac and the upper bay have closed beaches because of the threat of respiratory and gastric distress caused by toxic algae species.

Yesterday's forecast marked the fourth year in a row that the center has produced the report. Although its accuracy has varied, its dead-zone prediction has been on target. "That's been our poster child for accurate forecasting," Dennison said.

The prediction underscores the need for Virginia and its bay-state neighbors to control the sources of pollution that are choking the bay, said Mike Gerel, the Virginia scientist for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation environmental group.

The states have been working since the 1980s to restore the bay, with limited success.

"We've got more dirty waters [according to a state report released last week], there are catch reductions needed for blue crabs, watermen are struggling and there are fish kills in the Shenandoah and the James," Gerel said. "This just adds to the list of things that aren't getting better."
Contact Lawrence Latané III at (804) 333-3461 or llatane@timesdispatch.com.

It is a Disgrace

2008-06-16T22:35:00Z

By Scott Harper
The Virginian-Pilot
© June 16, 2008

RICHMOND

Eight-five percent of Virginia’s waterways are polluted with one or more contaminants, according to a six-year assessment released Monday the Department of Environmental Quality.

The report, which state officials said is the largest and most comprehensive assessment they’ve ever done, is required by the federal Environmental Protection Agency.

The areas of impaired or polluted rivers and streams have grown by 1,600 miles of waterways, increasing from 9,002 miles in 2006 to 10,604 miles in 2008, the report states.

The leading cause of pollution in rivers and streams is high levels of E. coli bacteria.

“Agricultural practices appear to be one of the primary sources contributing to the bacteria standards violation,” the report states. “However, urban runoff, leaking sanitary sewers, urban storm sewers, failing septic tanks, domestic animals and even wildlife can also be significant contributing sources.”

In addition, the Chesapeake Bay continues to fail more than ten pollution tests and will not be cleaned up by a 2010 deadline, state officials said Monday.

Officials say a clean up plan, called a TMDL, already is in the works as officials trying to clamp down on new nutrient pollution, PCBs and other contaminants.

For more information, come back to PilotOnline.com later today and read Tuesday's Virginian-Pilot.

you need the waterman to rebuild the oyster reefs

2008-06-11T09:55:00Z

Oysters and watermen in the Chesapeake Bay haven't had good news in a very long time. The once abundant shellfish population is at historic lows, thanks to disease and habitat degradation. Crabs are disappearing. So are certain sea grasses. Pollution in the Bay - nitrogen and phosphorus - is making parts of it inhospitable for months at a time.

Now, thanks to a new analysis by The Washington Post that echoes earlier reporting in this newspaper, the Bay's boosters know that all these years of effort to restore oysters to the Chesapeake, all the money spent - $58 million, by the paper's reckoning - hasn't bought any improvement.

In fact, things are actually worse for the Bay's oysters.

"We're at 1 percent or less (of the oyster's historic population). That's collapsed. We're still fishing. It's kind of like if we were still whaling on the East Coast," David Schulte, an oyster expert with the Army Corps of Engineers, told The Post. "I mean, the population may never recover. It may not recover now anyway."

The hope, what there is of it, for now lies outside the Bay, in its tributaries. But if scientists like Schulte can get it right, such efforts may hold promise for the rest of the watershed.

The Lynnhaven, for example, has a recovering oyster population, one that has taken to living on riprap and concrete artificial reefs as if born to them. As the population recovers there, it helps seed other oyster colonies in the Lynnhaven watershed.

There has been similar good news in the Great Wicomico, according to Schulte and Rom Lipcius, a professor at Virginia Institute of Marine Science, and an advocate for such artificial reef habitats. Both Schulte and Lipcius, with their eyes on oyster successes, say they're optimistic about Chesapeake oyster's long-term prospects in the Bay.

Their solution isn't particularly complicated: Provide the habitat and the shellfish will come back. That's different from past strategies, which largely focused on raising oysters suitable for commercial harvest.

Building reefs, Lipcius argues, could be as simple as setting concrete blocks underneath existing docks, where they provide new refuge for oysters and fish. Where docks don't exist, we could build artificial reefs that don't impede navigation.

The important part, said Schulte, is to build reefs tall enough to allow oysters to escape the silt and dirt of the Bay bottom.

Yet the state doesn’t allow the waterman to work all of Virginia’s oyster beds. By working these beds the waterman would bring the shells back up to the top and as clean shells. These shells would then have a chance of to have the larvae attach and rebuild the once abundant fishery. ks

The reefs can be built out of concrete, as in the Lynnhaven, or out of oyster shell, as in the Wicomico.

But they must be off-limits to harvest. Such sanctuaries, if properly built and protected, will help build healthy oyster populations elsewhere, including in places that can be harvested.

Expanding such programs, however, costs money, and requires an expertise and understanding of the Bay's immensely complicated ecosystem and hydrodynamics. It also requires spending money to seed even more oysters in places where they can make a difference.

With little to show for the $58 million already spent, money might be hard to come by. It shouldn't be. There is much evidence in the Great Wicomico and in the Lynnhaven of what works in oyster restoration. Those projects can provide a model for the future. After all, isn't it better to spend money on oyster restoration tactics that have worked than on ones that haven't?

Delegate Albert Pollard Addresses Water Quality and Sources of Pollution to Virginia Waterman's Association

2008-05-23T08:23:00Z

Pollard shared water quality considerations with Virginia watermen
Betsy Ficklin 21.MAY.08
Delegate Albert Pollard shared water quality considerations with Virginia watermen last Thursday evening when members of the Virginia Waterman’s Association met in Kilmarnock to determine what can be done to cause compel the government to reverse the worsening condition of the estuary and its economically important marine resources.

In recent weeks the Association has entertained the possibility of bring a class action suit against the Commonwealth of Virginia for failing to meet the requirements of the federal Clean Water Act.

With an eye on a possible litigation, the Virginia Waterman’s Association and the Twin River Waterman’s Association have consulted with White Stone attorney Lee Anne Washington, the daughter of a former Virginia Waterman’s Association president. Washington was present at Wednesday’s meeting, along with Chesapeake Bay Foundation representative Anne Jennings.

Jennings told the watermen that the Foundation had been in court that day with the Philip Morris and that a satisfactory settlement had at last been reached. No specifics were recited, but the Foundation had sued the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality two years earlier for failing to impose lower nitrogen limits on the Philip Morris Company’s wastewater discharge permit.

Pollard delivered a fast moving and highly detailed power point presentation to the Virginia watermen and their guests. When The Journal joined the session, the Delegate was driving home the uniqueness of the estuary and its watershed, noting that its land to water ration is five times greater than anyplace else on earth.

Pollard noted the human population numbers on a watershed that is also home to a billion chickens, 3.3 million cows and a reported 3 million hogs. He emphasized the narrow 18-mile width at the mouth of the bay, a consideration that serious impairs the estuary’s ability to cleanse itself.

Pollard additionally noted that four centuries ago the estuary’s oyster population was able to filter and effectively remove contaminants from the water in three-day intervals. With a seriously diminished oyster population, such cleansing would take almost a year.

The Delegate spoke about the natural and manmade sources of pollution and the marginal progress that already has been made. The conclusion was that too little has been done and time may be running out.

A court order requires bay watershed states to do what is needed by 2010 to remove the estuary from the nation’s dirty waters list. With time running out, bay watchers advise that things are going in the wrong direction, despite efforts to reduce this state’s point source nutrient discharges.

The nutrients credited with declining water quality are nitrogen and phosphorous and sewage plant discharges are but one of many sources of those pollutants that are known to significantly compromise the estuary’s marine habitats.

Agricultural activities account for a significant portion of the estuary’s nutrient loads. Pollard advised that half of the load attributed to agriculture comes directly from manure. With the sewage plant discharge improvements already in being introduced, he suggested that the next best place to make the greatest impact would be the agricultural industry.

Pollard wasn’t targeting Virginia’s farmers. What he proposed was making a concerted effort to waste no time in implementing a set of improvements that would eliminate as much as 88 percent of the estuary’s nutrient loads at a cost no greater than 17 percent of the bottom line for completely eliminating the unwanted nutrients.

According to Pollard’s conjecture, the 88 percent reduction in nutrients could be a tipping point that would allow the estuary and its marine environment to actually rejuvenate itself, delivering a sustainable outcome that wouldn’t bankrupt any of the stakeholders who occupy the fragile estuary’s massive watershed.

Betsy Ficklin

The Virginia Waterman is not the Culprit but the Victim

2008-05-13T10:15:00Z

Copied from Pilot Online

Whether Chesapeake Bay watermen win a federal disaster declaration, and the money that might flow from it, Maryland and Virginia still have an obligation to see them through the crab crisis the states helped cause and are now trying to solve.

The states have new rules designed to reduce the harvest of female crabs by 34 percent, and to give a crashing fishery the chance to recover from decades of nutrient pollution, toxics and overfishing.

When the states announced new limits on harvests earlier this year, and promised more to come, they were finally reacting to the latest symptom of a long-standing problem. Sadly, for the watermen and for everyone fond of their imperiled catch, the cause of the Bay's problems remain to be addressed with similar vigor.

The Chesapeake's woes are rooted in the fertilizer that farmers put on crops and suburban home-owners deposit on lawns; the outflow from inadequate sewage treatment and broken septic systems; the chemicals that run off roads and parking lots each time it rains; the detergents used to clean dishes and clothes. All that stuff, when it washes into waterways, disrupts the ecosystem of the Bay and the economy it supports.

Until permanent changes are made to the behavior of the watershed's human inhabitants, disruptions like the Bay has seen in the crab population and other species will be unavoidable. In the meantime, however, both states have an obligation to those suffering in the current crisis.

The governors have taken the extraordinary step of asking the Commerce Department for a federal disaster designation, a first step to get Congress to appropriate money for crabbers and the businesses that depend on them. But the Commerce Department could also decide the crisis was avoidable, or a cash-strapped Congress could do nothing.

The federal response doesn't satisfy the obligation Maryland and Virginia and - quite directly - their citizens, have to the watermen downstream from their lawns and businesses and farms. If the federal government won't provide aid, state governments must.

Whether they like it or not, the tremendous growth in the suburbs of both states has done serious harm to the Chesapeake Bay and, by extension, to the watermen. The least all those new citizens can do is help their neighbors in a time of need.

TO: SENATORS WEBB and WARNER: SUPPORT A FISHERY RESOURCE DISASTER!

2008-05-08T23:36:00Z

Send emails to Virginia's US Senators asking them to support the decision for a Fishery Resource Disaster here in the Commonwealth of Virginia!

Senator Webb's Contact Page

Please copy and paste the following in your email to Senator Webb or add your own:

The Honorable Tim Webb

Dear Senator Webb,
As you are aware, Governor Kaine has requested that US Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez perform a disaster assistance evaluation pertaining to Virginia’s Blue Crab fishery and ultimately declare a Fishery Resource Disaster.

I urge you to support Secretary Gutierrez in his decision. Any funds resulting from such a declaration would help to offset the financial losses suffered by the Virginia Watermen as new regulations, loss of habitat, and rising fuel costs greatly inhibit the watermen’s ability to earn a living.

Additionally, I would like for you to know that I support and Virginia waterman, the work of the Virginia Watermen's Association (http://virginiawaterman.org/), and a clean healthy Bay. Please help to preserve these cultural and natural resources that are vital to Virginia.

Sincerely

Senator Warner's Contact Page

Please copy and paste the following in your email to Senator Warner or add your own:

The Honorable John Warner

Dear Senator Warner,
As you are aware, Governor Kaine has requested that US Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez perform a disaster assistance evaluation pertaining to Virginia’s Blue Crab fishery and ultimately declare a Fishery Resource Disaster.

Sincerely

Virginia's Best Crabber

2008-05-03T10:47:00Z

This is one fish in one day.

Gov. Kaine's Press Release and Letter to Sec. Guttierez

2008-05-03T10:16:00Z

It is important to note that no mention of overfishing. The TRUTH WILL SET YOU FREE

On May 2, 2008 Governor Tim Kaine asked the secretary of commerce to declare Virginia's crab fishery a disaster.
Read the press release Press Release
Read the letter to Secretary Guttierez Read Letter

State of Disaster

2008-05-02T17:32:00Z

Excerpt from an email sent by

John M.R. Bull

Director of Public Relations

Virginia Marine Resources Commission

“Steve Bowman and I wanted to give a head’s up: Gov. Kaine just this morning formally requested that the federal government declare the blue crab fishery a disaster, thus making the watermen eligible for economic disaster relief.

The U.S. Secretary of Commerce would decide whether to issue such a disaster declaration. There is no telling on a time frame. If that happens, a congressional appropriation of unknown quantity of money would be up for a vote.

Maryland today will ask for the same disaster designation for their crab fishery.”

This is good news. My hopes are that this is the first step in recognizing that it is not just the blue crab that is in a state of disaster but the Chesapeake Bay as well.

I have a big wish list and one of those wishes is that the Federal and State will use the waterman and his knowledge in restoring the Bay. This is a win, win for all.