An article in the
Baltimore Sun indicates that Governor Ehrlich is more concerned with big business than he is with clean water. Shocking, I know.
The Ehrlich administration is proposing new water-quality standards that would allow the state to classify some Maryland waterways as too polluted to justify the expense of cleaning them up.
He said it would be foolish for the state to shut down industries and other sources of pollution in an attempt to make urban streams, commercial navigation channels and other waterways clean enough for fishing or swimming.
"We need to properly classify our waters on the basis of science and good management, instead of emotion and ideology," Eskin said.
"Emotion and ideology"? Yeah... those silly people who want to save the bay and have clean water are just so emotional.
But the proposal - which is similar to rules used by Ohio, Alabama and other states - is drawing protests from environmentalists, who say it would weaken vital protections for the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries.
"We're going to be like Ohio? Great. Isn't that where the Cuyahoga River caught on fire a few years back?" said Rena Steinzor, director of the University of Maryland's environmental law clinic. "We shouldn't care what Ohio or other states do because we've got the Chesapeake Bay, which is a multibillion-dollar asset and a jewel that must be protected."
Some environmentalists say the proposal's wording is so vague that it could allow the state to write off not only the Chesapeake Bay's shipping lanes, but also many streams that run through urban areas or farmland.
"There is the potential that well over half the streams in Maryland could find themselves in this category and exempt from clean water protections," said Eileen McLellan, executive director of the Chester River Association, an advocacy group on the Eastern Shore.
A spokesman for a national environmental group agreed. "It's basically saying we don't have to clean up the waters because they're already sewers," said Eddie Scher of the Waterkeeper Alliance in Tarrytown, N.Y.
Pardon me for being ideological and emotional, but isn't it JUST like a Republican to put the interests of big business before the environment? Perhaps they found a verse in the Bible that alludes that polluting God's planet is okay.