Common Contracts

Introduction

April 11th, 2019

• Filed
  April 11th, 2019

Chesapeake Bay restoration has been a priority for the State of Maryland, its citizens and Chesapeake Bay watershed jurisdictions since 1983 when the Chesapeake Bay Program (CBP) was founded, and the first watershed restoration agreement was signed. By the mid-1990s, Chesapeake Bay’s water quality standards were still not being met and it was designated as impaired under the federal Clean Water Act (CWA) framework. In 2000, an updated agreement signed by leaders across the watershed including state governors, the Mayor of the District of Columbia, the EPA Administrator, and the Chair of the Chesapeake Bay Commission, committed to “correct the nutrient and sediment-related problems in the Chesapeake Bay and its tidal tributaries”6 sufficient to remove it from the federal list of impaired waters by 2010. It was also agreed that if these voluntary commitments were not sufficient to restore the Bay by 2010, the CBP partnership would pursue the regulatory CWA approach and develop a Total Ma