
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, September 14, 1993                   TAG: 9309140198
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C5   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: BALTIMORE                                LENGTH: Medium

CHESAPEAKE BAY CLEANUP MAKES MOVE UPSTREAM

The role of the average citizen in restoring the Chesapeake Bay will become more important as the cleanup effort focuses on rivers and streams, delegates to a conference were told Monday.

"Homeowners are going to have to be brought in as active partners," said William Matuszeski, head of the Environmental Protection Agency's Chesapeake Bay program.

Residents near the bay need to take a hard look at the use of pesticides and fertilizers on their lawns and gardens, he said.

Roberta Dennis of Virginia's Piedmont Environmental Council proposed "a really big tax" on pesticides and fertilizers sold for home use. The money could be used to pay for programs intended to reduce pollution of water flowing into the bay, Dennis said.

Virginia state Sen. Joseph Gartlan said the need for more citizen involvement comes at a time when the popular support for the program to restore the Chesapeake may be declining.

"The widespread popular support that we've always thought was out there for cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay frequently becomes thin and weak . . . when personal interests are involved," Gartlan said.

The pleas for more citizen involvement were made at a conference on rivers of the Chesapeake sponsored by the Chesapeake Bay Alliance. The alliance is an umbrella group composed of private organizations active in protecting the bay.

The conference was held at a time when state and federal governments are beginning to shift the focus away from the bay and its big tributaries to the network of hundreds of rivers and creeks that drain the Chesapeake Bay watershed.

Louise E. Sage, president of the alliance, said at least 65 percent of such nutrients as phosphorous and nitrogen that contributed to the decline of the bay are washed off the land by rain. Thousands of small streams are the connection that carry pollution from the land to the bay, he said.

Gartlan said local governments must be enlisted as partners in regulating growth to reduce pollution.

This year is the 10th anniversary of the signing of the initial Chesapeake Bay Agreement by the states, the District of Columbia and the federal government.

"We've done a lot of very, very important work," said Torrey Brown, Maryland natural resources secretary.

"The bay is very much better off than . . . when we started," he said. "But we're not finished."

Brown said the shift in strategy to controlling pollution throughout the watershed sets the course for another decade of hard work.

by CNB