Jan-Feb 2001 Atlantic Coast Watch Newsletter

8/9/2019 Jan-Feb 2001 Atlantic Coast Watch Newsletter

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/jan-feb-2001-atlantic-coast-watch-newsletter 1/8

Ozone Depletion Zaps Cod Stocks

Zoologist M ichael Lesser and colleagues at the University of New

Hampshire report in a recent issue of “ The Journal of Experimental Biology” thatincreasing ultraviolet-B radiation resulting from the thinning of the ozone layercould be killing cod larvae in the Gulf of M aine.

In the laboratory, 91% of cod larvae exposed to three different categories ofUV radiation perished. Among the remaining larvae many were severely stressed.Without UVB, the kind of UV radiation that causes sunburn and i s affected by ozonedepletion , only 60% died w ithin 12 days. Lesser noted that the levels of UVB tested

occur at 7 to 12 meters in Gulf of Maine waters. While cod spawning takes place inmuch deeper water, embryos float upw ard. He poin ted out that ocean features suchas vertical mixi ng and tu rbidity of the w ater could affect the exposure of larvae toradiation and that more field m easurements are needed to see whether UV radiationis affecting cod and other fish species in their natural environm ent.

The best guess has been that about 99% of juvenile cod are eaten bypredators before they can reproduce. Lesser argues that the survival rate could beeven low er if an increase in UVB is affecting them, and that, as a result, calculationson cod reproduction may need to be modified. URL: ww w.unh.edu

Smart Growth & The Bottom Line

Maryland is proud of its status as what Governor Parris N. Glendening

calls “one of the nation’s strongest economies.” “ Jobs are at an all tim e high,” hesaid in his 2001 State of the State speech. “ Unemp loym ent is at an all-tim e low. Wehave the highest family incom e in the nation . We have one of the lowest overallpoverty rates in the count ry.”

At the same time, with his widely known Sm art Growth and Rural Legacyinitiatives now w ell established and similar new programs in the pipeline,Glendening has shown national leadership in setting the state on a course tow ardsustainable development. Said Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Kennedy

Tow nsend to the state legislature: “The fact that w e’ve been able to strengthen oureconomy whil e improving our quality of life proves that we’re doing things right inMaryland.”

In a recent talk at the National Buildi ng M useum in Washington , DC,Planning Secretary Harriet Tregoning underscored the point, emphasizing thatthe state increasingly lands new business investments thanks not to tax incentivesbut to quali ty-of-life attractions. One corporation set up shop on the ChesapeakeBay shorefront and bought a fleet of sailboats as a way to attract the best possibleemployees.

This year Glendening unveiled a new, five year, $145 million program tomove the state even farther down the green track. Called GreenPrint , the initiative isdesigned to secure better protection for the 6.2-mill ion-acre state’s patchwork of

(Continued, p. 7)

JANUARY - FEBRUARY 2001

News For Coastal Advocates

z

Ozone Zaps Cod

Smart Growth’s Upside

Sayings

Beach Nourishment

Publications

Grenadines Reefs

Homestead Ruling

Streams on the Mend

Chil led Manatees

Selecting Seafood

Upcoming Events

z

Recurring:

People; Awards; Species &Habitats; Report Cards; Funding;Products; Job Openings

Atlantic CoastWatch

1

1

2

3

4

4

5

6

6

7

8

Atlantic CoastWatch is a bimonthlynonprofit new sletter for those

interested in the environmentallysound development of the coastline

from the Gulf of M aine to theEastern Caribbean. Available at

www.atlanticcoastwatch.org



Sayings

To the Edito r:

Regarding your November-December 2000 article about the ChesapeakeBay Foundat ion’s new headquarters center: One of our goals in build ing the Phili pMerrill Environm ental Center was to build a green building w ithin the existing

codes and land use guidelines withou t needing any variances. We succeeded. So itwould be accurate to say that the Chesapeake Bay Foundation w orked hard to builda model of environmentally sensitive practice without any waivers or building andzoning code exemptions.

Michael ShultzChesapeake Bay Foundation

We erred in saying that the Foundation had “ worked hard to w in” such waivers with regard to the building itself. The Washington Post reported, on the other hand, that a special exemption was needed to reduce the number of adjacent parking spaces to fewer than required by the code.—Ed.

To the Edito r:

In your November-December issue I was disappointed to see your charac-terization of the defeat of Question 2 in Maine as a negative result in term s ofnatural resource conservation. To the cont rary, the defeat of Question 2 ensuresthat 10,000 small woodland owners in M aine who currently have land enrolled inthe Tree Growth Tax current use program can continue to m anage their land asproductive working forests and not be encouraged to sell off to developers—theonly economic choice they w ould have had if Question 2 had passed. The support-ers of Question 2 w ere the most extreme environmental groups in Maine, whilethose groups who take a more responsible way of looking at land conservationwere very crit ical of Question 2.

Jeff Romano, Executive DirectorSmall Woodland Ow ners Association of M aine

Question 2, reported the Portl and Press-Herald, was a “ citizen-initi ated

referendum ” prohibiting the cutting of trees faster than they grow on land enrolled in the state’s tree grow th program, and requi ring state permi ts for clear-cutting in those lands. Of $1.4 milli on raised to fight Question 2, said the paper, $1.2 milli on “ came from paper companies, their trade groups, and other major landowners.” Aspokesman for the Forest Ecology Netw ork, sponsor o f the question , accused the industry of using small landholders as front men to help prom ote their own interests. The Nat ural Resources Council of M aine , a moderate group, sup- ported the measure along w ith m any other environmental organizations. One well known environmental group, M aine Audubon , opposed it.—Ed.

With Appreciation

156 donations from individual readers of our publication, and grants from

small fami ly foundations, totaling $43,350.55, were recorded on our books duringthe year 2000. Comparable figures were $30,643 from 115 readers in 1999 and$8,465 from 58 readers in 1998, the first year w e solicited such support. We aredelighted indeed w ith the fast-grow ing response to our appeals, and would like toexpress our w arm thanks to these donors w hose 2000 contributions w ere notacknow ledged in previ ous issues:

2

Atlantic CoastWatch

Vol. 5, No. 1

A project of the Sustainable

Development Institute, which seeksto heighten the environm ental qualityof economic development efforts, in

coastal and in forest regions, bycommunicating inform ation aboutbetter poli cies and practices. SDI isclassified as a 501(c)(3) organization,exempt from federal income tax.

Board of D irectors

Robert J. Geniesse, Chairm anRoger D. Stone, PresidentHart Fessenden, TreasurerHassanali M ehran, SecretaryEdith A. CecilDavid P. Hunt

Freeborn G. Jewett, Jr.Gay P. Lord

Advisers

Willi am H. Draper IIIJoan Martin-Brown

Scientific A dvisory Council

Gary HartshornStephen P. Leatherm anJerry R. SchubelChristopher Uhl

Staff

Roger D. Stone, Director & PresidentShaw Thacher, Proj ect ManagerRobert C. Nicholas III, Cont r. EditorLaura W. Roper, CorrespondentLinda Rodrigues, Assistant

2001 Major Donors

The Fair Play Foundation

Sponsored Project s

Trees for DC9th Annual Environmental FilmFestival in the Nation’s Capital

March 15 - 25, 2001

J.T. Smi thGeorge G. Montgom ery Jr.Enid C.B. OkunCelia F. CrawfordRichard W. Angle Jr.

Jam es F. CalvertEric OstergaardThe Wilmot-Wheeler FoundationMr. and Mr s. Robert R. Worth



Beach Nourishment and M arine Life

by David Godfrey, Executive Director, Caribbean Conservation Corporation (CCC)

CCC has often w ritten about the negative consequences associated w ithcoastal armoring and has spent considerable time and resources trying to stop thespread of armoring on sea turtle nesting beaches. CCC has often encouraged local,state and federal agencies to use beach nourishm ent as an alternative to sea walls.

Of the two approaches, the placement o f additi onal sand on the beach isthe lesser of tw o evils—and may at times even create turtl e nesting habitat whereerosion and development have combined to eliminate all suitable habitat for turtles.However, sand nour ishment is not w ithout its ow n set of damaging im pacts. Theseare large-scale coastal dredge and fil l projects. Sand and other hard substrates,typically from o ffshore “ borrow” areas, are sucked up by large vacuum-w ieldingdredges and dum ped on the shore. The dredges often suck up and kill unsuspect-ing tur tles resting on the bottom of the sea. Bulldozers spread the dredgedmaterial along the beach and shoreline, attempting to m imic the natural contour ofthe shore.

If beaches are replenished dur ing nesting season, viable nests can be

buried over when surveys fail to locate every nest before sand is pumped onshore.When nests are moved, hatching success is often low er in the relocated nests—thereby causing a “ take” of otherwise healthy hatchlings. The dredge materialdumped on the beach is often far different from the “ natural” beach, which altersnesting behavior and skews sex ratios in hatchlings.

As we are seeing w ith projects proposed for the east central coast ofFlorida, important nearshore reefs can be completely buried over during thenourishment project. Studies by Llew Ehrhart and his students at the University

of Cent ral Florida show that some nearshore reefs provide extremely impor tantdevelopm ental habitat for juvenile turt les. In fact, some near the Archie CarrNational Wildlife Refuge near Melbourne appear to be am ong the most im portant inthe wor ld. The recurrent burying of these habitats is certain to have cumulativeharmf ul im pacts to sea turt les, as well as numerous fish species.

As with all other large dredge and fill operations, a federal Environm entalImpact Statement (EIS) should alw ays be required before these proj ects arepermi tted. The EIS process is where cumulati ve environm ental impacts must befully exp lored and alternative, less harmful project designs should be considered.Unfor tunately, regulators don’ t always require an EIS.

In October 2000, CCC, Environmental Def ense and the Nat ural Re-sources Defense Council urged the US Army Corps of Engineers to halt thelarge beach nour ishment projects being proposed along Flori da’s east coast. Eachgroup requested that a comprehensive EIS be conducted for each dredging projectand that adequate assessments be made of the cum ulative im pacts to nearshoremarine ecosystems.

CCC’s goal is not to elim inate beach nourishm ent as an alternative to seawalls. Rather, if these projects are to be employed in the never-ending and costlybattle to main tain the shifting shore, they must be carried out in the least destruc-tive fashion possible.

Appeal

Tax-deductible contributions to the Sustainable Development

Institute, earm arked for Atlantic CoastWatch, are urgently needed. They

may be sent to 312 1 South St. NW, Washington, DC, 200 07.

People

Plant biologist Jeffrey R. Seemannhas been named dean of the Collegeof the Environment and Life Sciencesat the University of Rhode Island.A Nevada native, Seemann previouslyheld positions at the University ofNevada and at the Lamont-DohertyEarth Observatory, ColumbiaUniversity.

The Brandyw ine Conservancy inChadds Ford, PA has filled two staffpositions. Tom Brightman, who hasstudied both environmental scienceand landscape design, will helpmanage the organization’s conserva-tion easements. Kristen Naimoli willplan and write conservation ease-ments. After completing scientificstudies, she had worked for severalother conservation organizations.Tel. (610) 388-2700

Frederick H. Berry, a prominenticthyologist, fisheries biolog ist andtrop ical botanist wit h a deep specialinterest in the welfare of marineturtl es, died in Charleston, SC.

The Potom ac lost an equally zealousguardian when Elizabeth S.

Hartwell died in December. Knownas the “eagle lady,” Hartwell foughtmany development proposals and wasinstrum ental in establishing the 2000-

acre Mason Neck National Wildlif eRefuge on the ri ver’s Virginia shore.

The Am erican Oceans Campaign

named film producer Keith Addis asboard chair. Other board leaderselected include Am erican FarmlandTrust general counsel Simon

Sidamon-Eristoff (Vice Chair ) andMassachusetts businessman andyachtsman George Lew is (Trea-surer).URL: ww w.americanoceans.org

Awards

NOAA has named policy analyst Amy

Mathews-Amos, vice president ofM arine Conservation Biology

Institute and head of its offi ce inWashing ton, DC, as an “ Environm en-tal Hero.” She was cited for her“outstanding contributions” toresearch shaping the National

M arine Sanctuaries Program .

3



Species & Habitats

In January a giant leatherback turtlenested on a beach in the Indian RiverLagoon on Flori da’s east coast, whereno leatherback sight ing had previouslybeen recorded. The animal dug a holeand tried but failed to lay eggs. Arescue team gathered up the tur tleand released it i n deeper waters thatare more familiar to this criticallyendangered species. They found on ita tag from a beach on the Caribbeancoast of Costa Rica, where it hadnested in 1994. URL:www.cccturtle.org

Maine lobstermen, with almost doublethe number of traps in the water sincethe early 1980s, produced recordcatches all along the coast last year.One downeast buying station sur-veyed by Sandra Dinsmore in theIsland Institut e’s Working Water- fron t/Inter-Island News reported anincrease from 61,000 pounds in 1990to 352,000 pounds last year. Amidcoast manager logged 840,000pounds in 2000 vs. 506,503 pounds in1997. “ Mind-boggling” and “ baffling”are among the reactions to suchstatistics. Explanations range fromthe decline of codfish, which feed onlobster larvae, to the g rowing seaurchin catch w hich enables kelp togrow m ore profusely and providebetter lobster habitat. For all the

short-term good news, industrystudies show fewer lobster larvaesettling on the ocean floor to m ature.Predictions of a drastic drop in a fewyears come from many sources.URLs: ww w.st.nmfs.gov;www.islandinstitute.org

For an 8,000 square foo t deck exten-sion onto a Jamaica Bay wetlands, anauto dealer with t ies to organizedcrime was fined $774,000 for v iolatingthree New York statutes: the TidalProtection Act; the Protection of

Waters Act and Navigation Law. Ofthe fine, $310,000 was dedicated to theBaykeeper program for projectsprotecting Jamaica Bay.

Seals, once abundant in New YorkHarbor bu t scarce in recent years, arereturning. According to the NY-NJHarborkeeper, a pod recentlyestablished winter residence onSwinburne Island near the VerrazanoNarrow s Bridge. Increased num bers

Publications

z A handsom e 40-page booklet entitled A Fishway for Your Stream: Provid ingFish Passage Around Dams in the Northeast has been co-publi shed by theConnecticut River Watershed Council and the Rivers & Trails Program of theNat ional Park Service. Removing o r breaching dams should remain the toppriority for restoring m igratory fish. But a fishway is a viable second-best alterna-tive, say author s Tom M aloney (CRWC) and Steve Gephard and John Monroe(NPS). In plain English they tell you step-by-step how to do it. Along the way youlearn a lot about m igratory fish ecology. E-mail crw [email protected]

z In The Great Gulf: Fishermen, Scientists, and the Struggle to Revive the World’s Greatest Fishery (Island Press 2000), Vermont-based nature writer DavidDobbs gamely repor ts back from m any wobbly sea voyages in search of elusivetruth about fish stocks in the badly-depleted Gulf of Maine. In careful accounts heshows respect for both camps, as well as for the pioneer work done early in the 20th

Century by zoolog ist Henry Bryant Bigelow, “ the most influential figure inAmerican oceanography.” Dobbs guesses that somehow “ we will restrain ou rfishing enough to let these fecund waters recover,” but worries about whether inthe process “ we w ill leave intact any working relationship between the people of

our coastal tow ns and our ocean, something m ore vital and profoundly culturalthan aesthetic o r recreational connections.”

z In Tantallon, Nova Scotia GPI Atlantic, a nonprofi t research group, hasbravely set out to develop “ an index of well-being and sustainable development”called the Genuine Progress Index. It “ consists of 22 social, econom ic, and envi-ronm ental components that can give a more accurate, comprehensive, and hum anepicture of w ell-being than current m easures based on econom ic grow th statistics.”As the organization itself strugg les for sustainability, it levies charges for member-ship, its newsletter, and in-depth reports. But the initi al issues of the newsletter,covering such matters as the true costs of smoking and of g reenhouse emissions,are freely available. URL: www.gpiatlantic.org

z For those interested in building environm entally sensitive homes, reducing

resource use, and saving m oney, help is at hand. Green Building: A Primer f orBuilders, Consumers, and Realtors, published by Building Environmental

Technology and Science (BEST) covers the basics ranging from energy andwater efficiency, indoor health, and the economics of sustainable design. AuthorBion How ard has evolved his publication, now in its fifth printing, over the courseof 25 years’ experience as a builder and environmental scientist.URL: www .energybuilder.com

z Alistair MacLeod of Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia, has published only16 short stories over the past 33 years. Now assembled as Island: The Com plete

Stories of Alistair M acLeod (Norton 2001), the collection won a highly enthusi-astic, full page writeup in the New York Times Book Review. Reviewer John

Sutherland emphasized the clarity and eloquence of the author’s tightly w oventales of fishermen, loggers, and other residents of his region.

New Damage to Grenadines Reefs

The Clifton coast guard base being constructed with in the GrenadinesPalm/Union Island Fisheries Conservation Area is destroy ing m angroves andseagrass and threatens the destruction of coral reefs in the locality. The pro ject,being undertaken by the government o f St. Vincent and the Grenadines, is receivingUS Government assistance. It has alarmed local environm entalists and is seen asbeing contrary to that country ’s 1996 fisheries act.

(Continued, p. 5)

4



of fi nback whales have also beenfound feeding just outside the harbor;a dead one 63 feet long was recentlyfound near the Statue of Liberty. Ithad been struck by a ship . Perhapsreflecting these developm ents, theNew York City Council recentlytook the surprising step of passing ananti-whaling resolution.

Report Cards

The 2001 issue of the Extrem e Weather Sourcebook , a publication of theAmerican Meteorological Society,again lists Florida as the top-rankingUS state in terms of the costs ofdamage from m ajor weather eventssuch as hurricanes, floods, andtornadoes. The figure for 1999 was$1.665 billion. North Carolina rankedfourth ($715 million), Pennsylvania

fifth ($702 mi llion), New York eighth($426 milli on), and Connecticut nin th($366,000).

Countering m any negative stockassessments issued recently, theNat ional M arine Fisheries Service,had good things to say about threenorthwest Atlantic species. Seascallop recruitm ent—survivorship ofeggs to young adulthood—has beenstrong enough to justify increasedcomm ercial harvesting. The spawn-ing population of a Gulf of M aineflatfish called the American plaice hascontinued its rise along w ith stocks ofmany other no rtheast groundfi shspecies. And t here has even beendramatic growth in the badly depletednumbers of haddock in the Gulf ofMaine. National Fisherman reportedthese findings, presented at a recentmeeting of the New England

Fishery M anagement Council.URL: spo.nw r.noaa.gov

Citing the testimony of over 200citizens collected dur ing 10 hearings,Audubon, Save the Sound and the

Regional Plan Association stressthe need to create the Long IslandSound Reserve System in their report“ Listen to the Sound 2000: A Citizen’sAgenda.” According to Robert Yaro,executive director of the Regional

Plan A ssociation, “ Long IslandSound has the least accessibleshoreline in the United States. Ourgoal wil l be to create well m anaged,attractive public access opportun itieswhere the people who live in the

Batt le Ends at Homestead, War Goes On

In the waning days of the Clinton Administration, the Air Force gladdenedenvironmentalist hearts by thum bing dow n the long-standing proposal to turn theform er Homestead Air Force Base in south Flori da into a full -fledged comm ercialairport spanning the property ’s entire 1,600 acres. The ruling perm its more limited

mixed-use development on part of the site, which lies between the Biscayne BayNational Park to the east and the Everglades to the west.

The battle over Hom estead has raged since 1992, when Hurricane Andrewravaged the base. On one side were M iami -Dade County officials and a develop-ment corporation, Homestead Air Base D evelopers, Inc. (HABDI), claim ing thatthe area’s airport capacity was nearing exhaustion and that a Hom estead expansionwould deliver relief and jobs. A broad coalition of environm ental and citizengroups, fearing grave damage to the tw o national parks as well as air and noisepollu tion, favored the limited mixed-use alternative.

The new ruling w as heralded as a “ victory” for the environmentalists and a“ blow” for M iami-Dade officials. Early in February, however, came signals that thewar is far from over. Locally, the county’s mayor, Alex Penelas, made it clear that

he wou ld join HABDI in a lawsuit. Says Lacey Hoover Chase, the principalproponent of the alternative development scheme: “ There’s still a huge push fromthe county to try to get this overturned.”

Nor i s it certain that the federal decision cannot be reversed. ” It’s amazingabout th is,” says Alan Farago of the Sierra Club Miami Group. “George W.

Bush talks about the impor tance of delegating m ore authority to local jurisdictions.Here’s a perfect example of what could happen w ithou t the protection that federalauthori ties can prov ide. The Air Force made a decision that was clearly based onthe merits of the case. But there is noth ing to prevent the Bush Adm inistrationfrom revisiting the issue.”

What is know n as the Colli er-Hoover plan calls for the Air Force to conti nueusing part of the site as a reserve base. The balance of 717 acres would feature

office, residential, and industrial areas, golf courses, hotels, restaurants and anaquarium. All construction would conform to high environm ental standards, with awetlands landscape as its centerpiece. Chase claims that her pro ject is every bit ascapable of generating jobs as the comm ercial airport proposal, and is vastlysuperior in terms of job quality and quality-of-life considerations.

Chase is confident that her views wil l prevail. “ We did win it,” she says.“ We really did. It won’t be an airport. The way we won was by putting reality infron t of the people. This was not about jobs. What they wanted to do was put anairpor t the size of JFK right betw een two national parks. Everybody got i t andunderstood. We got overwhelming com munity support. We have the plan formixed use developm ent, and we’re hoping that the county w ill accept the federaldecision, get the land, and open it up.”

Grenadines Reefs, Continued from p. 4

A survey of the site, completed before work began, indicated a healthystretch of mangrove (now largely rem oved), a fairly w ide seagrass bed, unusualnum bers of juvenile fish, and healthy and developed elkhorn coral. Dredging, tocomm ence in the near future, threatens not only the imm ediate area of the reef, buta line of healthy and pristine reef down current from the site. Local citizen KurtCordice, calling the project “ a heavy blow to the marine protection movementhere,” received no answer to a letter of complaint to t he Prim e Minister. [email protected]

5



watershed, and who are paying fo r itscleanup, can gain access to theSound.” With nearly 80% of theSound’s wetlands altered, and only10% of the shoreline no t developed,David Miller, executive director ofthe Nat ional Audubon Society ofNew York, said the “ idea is a broadconcept that allows for the coordina-

tion of coastal land protection efforts,whether you are creating new parks,restoring existing habitats and/orproviding incentives for stewardshipof pri vate lands.” URL: ww w.rpa.org

Despite some of the strongestsedimentation control regulations inthe country, a four year study byUniversity of North Carolina-Chapel Hill reported in the RaleighNews-Observer, finds county enforce-ment far more effective than that bythe state Department of Nat ural

Resources. URL:www.newsobserver.com

Funding

$8 million has been allocated by theNat ional M arine Fisheries Service

to fish habitat restoration in 2001.Under it s Community Based Restora-tion Program, NMFS expects up to $35million w ill be raised through partner-ships, in-kind services and coopera-tive funding fo r national and regionalorganizations that want to restore

marine, estuarine and anadromousfish habitat. This represents anincrease of $6 milli on from year 2000.URL: ww w.nmfs.noaa.gov/habitat/ restoration/community

Comprehensive information aboutfunding opportunities for coastal andnatural resource managementprojects is available at the NOAACoastal Services Center w ebsite. URL:www.csc.noaa.gov.

For sources of federal funding fo r

marine conservation biology, theM arine Conservation Biology

Institute maintains a site with linksto all the principal federal agencies.URL: ww w.mcbi.org

Products

NY /NJ Clean Ocean and Shore

Trust (COAST), a project o f the NewYork Academy of Sciences, has

Streams and Rivers on the M end

Not even the coast’s grungiest waterways remain fr iendless. Examples ofattention lavished on ugly -duckling Atlantic area rivers include new EPA plans toremove dioxin in Rhode Island’s Woonasquatucket, progress in cleaning up

Virginia’s heavily pollu ted Elizabeth, and the formation of a new group dedicated tohelping clean up ailing streams in Carroll County, Maryland. The details:

z The EPA recently announced a $2.6 mill ion cleanup plan, slated to beginthis summ er, to remove 2,500 cubic yards of dioxin -contaminated sediments andbank soils in the Woonasquatucket, near North Providence. The project qualifiesfor support from the federal Superfund hazardous waste cleanup program. It is “ animportant step towards the community ’s goal of making the WoonasquatucketRiver fi shable and swim mable again,” said Senator Lincoln Chaffee.

z The Elizabeth, flanked by Norfolk, Portsmouth, Chesapeake, and VirginiaBeach, once one of America’s most pollut ed waterways, is visibly healthier todaythan it w as 10 years ago, reports The Virginian-Pilot . Federal, state and localanti-pollution regulations were helpful. So were actions by local governments,private sector enterprises, and individuals to diminish the flow of pollu tants. Thegrassroots Elizabeth River Project , started over a kit chen table in Virginia Beachin 1991, has been in the forefront o f the crusade. Its 18-point watershed action plandeveloped after four years of research and discussion, began to be imp lemented in1996. Since then 60 acres of wetlands and wildl ife habitat have been restored, 40 of145 wrecks removed, and four high ly toxi c “ hot spots,” such as form er timbercreosoting plants, identified. While the overall water quality of the river is surpris-ingly acceptable, scientists indi cate that hot spots in the contaminated sedimentare 18 times more polluted than Baltim ore Harbor.

z The Friends of Carroll County St reams is a newly form ing groupdedicated to cleaning up waterways near Baltim ore. Last September, the MarylandDepartment of Natural Resources and the EPA released a study o f the state’ssmall and medium sized streams, finding t hat almost half of them were in poorhealth and the rest show signs of ecosystem stress. Development’s creation o f

impervious surfaces was found to be the biggest cause of stream degradation. Asreported by the Baltimore Sun , a group of 100 Carroll County residents volun teeredlast November to help plant tr ees as riparian bu ffers along Littl e Pipe Creek. Theenthusiasm generated led to the larger effort to undertake restoration and educa-tion to help streams throughout the county. URLs: www.elizabethri ver.org;www.sunspot.com

Manatees Frozen Out in Florida

The slow -swim ming manatee, an endangered species, suffers particularlyfrom contacts with the expanding number of powerboats in Florida waters. Thisyear unusually cold w eather in Florida has also contributed to the rising death toll

of these odd looking but lovable mamm als. According to Tom Pitchford of theFlorida Fish and Wildlife Com mission, 15 of the 43 manatees killed in Januarydied from p rolonged cold weather.

Manatees, wh ich may have been the source of sailors’ reports of m er-maids, have trouble survi ving in water colder than 68 degrees. They developwhiteness around the face, flippers and tail, similar to frostbite in hum ans. Theytend to congregate in warm springs in the w inter, where an increasingly popularhuman pastime is to swim with them. Many of the friendly 1,200 pound beastsenjoy having their backs rubbed but some are scared away to colder waters by theinteraction. A record to tal of 3,276 manatees were counted in Florida in January.

(Continued p . 7)

6



establi shed the searchable VORTEXdatabase seeking to include “ allindividuals working in New York andNew Jersey on environm ental issues.People in governm ent, corporations,academia and environm ental organi-zations w ill all be included. Registra-tion via the VORTEX on line fo rm .URL: www .nynjcoast.org

Prompted by the Naval Environm entalLeadership Program , the US Navy

may soon be swabbing withM icrobest, Inc.’s BiocleansingFloorWash and its IndustrialBiocleanser. A navy study comparingthese benign natural soil bacteriabased cleaners with m ore hazardouschemicals stated, “ bio-based cleanersremove m ore grease and oilresidues...can help the navy reducethe use of hazardous chemicals,increase worker safety, reduce

costs...and they are environmentallypreferable.” URL: www .microbest.net

Job Openings

Partnership for Parks seeks aBronx River Outreach Coord inator.Fax: (718) 430-4658

New Jersey’s Alliance for a Living

Ocean is accepting app licants for anoperations manager, and is hiringinterns. Tel. (609) 492-0222. URL:

www.livingocean.org

Dive in to Earth Day sponsored by theCoral Reef Alliance (Coral) seeksvolunteers for underwater cleanupand restoration between Apri l 15-25.URL: divein.coralreefaliance.org

Research Associates are needed atBigelow Laboratory for OceanSciences, West Boothbay Harbor, ME,in Chemical, Biological Oceanography,and Atm ospheric Chemistry. E-mail:[email protected]

The Marine Sciences Research Center(MSRC) of The State U niversity ofNY at Stony Brook has severalfaculty positions available.E-mail: MSRCfacult [email protected]

M assachusetts Division of M arine

Fisheries in Gloucester is looking foran Aquatic Biologist. URL:www.state.ma.us/hrd/ceo/_15876.html

Smart Growt h , Continued from p. 1

2 milli on acres that have not yet succumbed to sprawl . GreenPrint aim s to pre-serve as many as possible of the 1.5 milli on of these acres that remain unprotectedfrom developm ent and to connect already preserved areas, maximizing the ecologi-

cal potential of the state’s landscape. The program, said the governor, “ wi ll enhancethe prosperity of our w atermen; it will strengthen our tourism industry; and it w illguarantee the qualit y of l ife that m akes Maryland so special.”

Though Glendening has executive authority to launch GreenPrint , statelegislators must approve the proposed budget, which exceeds established spend-ing caps. Baltimore Sun columnist Tom Horton, for one, has firm views on thematter. In a recent colum n he said he favors “ treating suburbs like comm ercialforests, clear cutting them period ically.” Until that idea takes better hold, he said,he sees an urgent need for GreenPrint to com e fully onstream. Current protectionefforts save some 21,000 acres per year, he added. If Mary land is to approach theChesapeake Bay restoration goal o f protecting 20% of the state’s land by 2010, some750,000 acres, or an average of 75,000 acres a year, must be safeguarded.URLs: ww w.state.md.us/gov; ww w.dnr.state.md.us/greenways/greenprint

Selecting Your Seafood

On the heels of the recent, controversial “ Give the Swordfish a Break”campaign spearheaded by environm ental groups and prom inent restaurateurscomes a new effort by Environmental Def ense and the Chefs’ Collaborative toguide consumers toward seafoods that are caught or farmed in environm entallysound ways. Environm ental Defense lists these “ best” and “ wor st” choices:

Best

AnchoviesAtlantic herringBluefish

CatfishCrab—blue, Dungeness, or stoneCrawfishMackerel—Spanish and AtlanticMahimahiMussels—farmedPacific halibutOysters—farmedSardinesShrimp/prawns—Northern M aine and

trap-caught Spot prawnsStriped bass (farmed and w ild)TilapiaWild salmon from Alaska URL: www.environmentaldefense.org

Manatees, Continued from p. 6

According to the Boston Globe boating rights g roups are protesting proposedfederal restrictions near areas where manatees gather. The US Fish and Wildlife

Service had orig inally p roposed 150 sites to be manatee sanctuaries or restrictedspeed zones. That list is now dow n to 10 or 15 of the most popular manateehangouts. Florida Governor Jeb Bush has angered conservation ists by agreeingto license more boats slips in Sarasota even though the county has not completeda required plan to protect manatees. URLs: ww w.flo ridam arine.org,www.savethemanatee.org

7

Worst

American lobsterAtlantic codAtlantic halibut

Chilean seabass/Patagonian tooth fishFarmed salmonGrouperMonkfishOrange roughyPacific rockfishSharkShrimp/prawns (farmed and most wi ld)SkateSnapperSwordfish



Upcoming Events

March 2-3 . 11 th Annual Long Island Sound Summ it , “ State of the Sound: Priorities for the Future.” Conference, at the NYBotanical Garden, Bronx, NY. E-mail: [email protected]

March 21-23 . The Berkshire Institut e at Greylock conference on “ Building Sustainable Communities: Regional and Water-shed Approaches” in North Adams, MA. Tel. 603-756-3534 or e-mail m [email protected]

M arch 29 . Water Resources Research Institute sponsors the Watersheds to Estuaries: Basin M anagement in t he

21 st Century conference in Raleigh, NC. Tel. 919-515-2815.

M arch 29 -April 1 . Society for Underw ater Technology’s 5th Underwater Science Symposium, sponsored by theSouthampton Oceanography Center. URL: www.sut.org.uk

M arch 31 . 6t h International Wildlife Law Conference, “ The Seas and International Law.” To be held at the American

University’s Washington College of Law, Washing ton, DC. E-mail: ASILWild [email protected]. URL: ww w.eelink.net/~asilw ildli fe

April 9 -11 . International Conf erence on M arine Invasions, by M IT and the Louisiana Sea Grant College Programs.

To be held in New Orleans, LA. URL: ww w.massbay.mit.edu/exoticspecies/conf2

April 15-22 . Dive in to Earth Day sponsored by the Coral Reef Alliance (Coral). Tel. 510-848-0110.URL: divein.coralreefalliance.org

M ay 20-23 . Nat ional Watershed Conference: Small Watershed Programs, to be held in Richm ond, VA. Tel. 703-455-6886.E-Mail: [email protected]

M ay 21-23 . Shad 20 01: Conference on the Stat us and Conservation of Shads Worldwide , sponsored by the Hudson

River Foundat ion. To be held at the National Aquarium i n Baltimo re, MD. Contact John Waldm an at 212-924-8290 or KarinLimburg at 315-470-6741

Atlantic CoastWatch

Sustainable Development Institute

3121 South St., NWWashington, D.C. 20007

Tel: (202) 338-1017

E-mail: [email protected]

URL: www.susdev.org

www.atlanticcoastwatch.org

The 9 th Annual Environment al Film Festival in the N ation’s Capital, M arch 15-25Feature, documentary, archival, anim ated, and children’s film s are all included in the program.

Most events are free, and many include discussions with film makers or other experts.Plus, two special pre-festival events, March 12 & 13

www.dcenvironmentalfilmfest.org

Documents

Jan-Feb 2001 Atlantic Coast Watch Newsletter