Activists to rally for Bay cleanup
Environmental activists say they expect hundreds for a Chesapeake Bay cleanup rally Tuesday (9/28) evening at the National Aquarium in Baltimore.
With federal and state officials mulling potentially costly and controversial new strategies for accelerating the bay restoration effort, activists hope to demonstrate public support for an aggressive cleanup schedule. Speakers include city officials, heads of the National Aquarium and Maryland Science Center, the Waterfront Partnership, a business and civic group, as well as leaders of several environmental groups, including the Maryland Commission on Environmental Justice.
About 250 people have responded online that they intend to attend, said Tommy Landers, policy advocate for Environment Maryland, one of the groups sponsoring the rally, which begins at 6 p.m.
And if saving the bay isn't reason alone enough to turn out, there'll be a reception afterward at 7 p.m., featuring free food from Lebanese Taverna. The grub is provided courtesy of the Baltimore Water Alliance, the working name of the newly merged umbrella group for the Baltimore Harbor, Jones Falls, Herring Run and Gwynns Falls watershed associations, plus the Baltimore Harbor Waterkeeper.
To RSVP, or for directions and parking, go here.
(Rally in Annapolis in June pressing for stronger bay restoration efforts, Baltimore Sun photo by Jed Kirschbaum)
Comments
Save the Bay folks can never offer any public health threat the Bay as it stands today poses. Yes, oysters and seafood obviously has declined due to human incursions. That's an economic concern, a valid concern. Outweighing the concern is the weatlh created by development in counties and cities bordering on the Bay and bordering on rivers and streams that end up flowing into the bay. Costs and benefits of development are never objectively balanced by the politicians of either party in Maryland. Instead we have mindless and wasteful spending on cleaning up the Bay for ill-defined reasons.
Posted by: SMF | September 28, 2010 4:50 PM
I think they should start a program that goes into the city schools. I drive in from the county every day and watch people throwing trash into the street or sweeping the trash into the drains. The trash on the city streets is not coming from the cars. It's coming from the people on the sidewalks. I see it every day. Then it gets washed into the Inner Harbor. Try to teach the kids how wrong this is because the parents are teaching them the wrong things. They're polluting their own food source.
Posted by: Teresa | September 28, 2010 4:58 PM
With regards to health concerns, here is an article on vibrio, a bacteria that can cause serious illnesses in people who swim in warm, salty waters with open cuts, or eat raw, contaminated shellfish:
http://cbf.typepad.com/bay_daily/2010/08/an-unusually-hot-summer-is-creating-conditions-for-greater-public-risk-of-infections-from-vibrio-a-bacteria-that-can-cause-s.html
Posted by: Patrick | September 28, 2010 8:25 PM