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Attorney general visits the Patuxent
Pollution probed
Friday, July 16, 2010
 Click here to enlarge this photo Staff photo by DARWIN WEIGEL
Maryland Attorney General Doug Gansler (D) talks with Marshall Coffman, president of the Apple Green Civic Association in Dunkirk, about a water treatment system designed for the subdivision Tuesday during a discussion at the Calvert Marine Museum in Solomons.
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Surrounded by a batch of representatives from various interest groups and community organizations, Maryland Attorney General Doug Gansler had one question during his "metaphoric audit" of the Patuxent River on Tuesday.
"If you were king of the Patuxent for the day, what would you do to fix it?" he asked. "Maybe not back to Captain [John] Smith's time, but perhaps to Bernie Fowler's childhood."
Gansler, who is currently unopposed in his 2010 re-election bid, had no shortage of prospective river royalty ready to offer suggestions on how to best clean up the long-beleaguered Patuxent, the largest river contained entirely within Maryland.
Since 2007, Gansler has annually performed "audits" on four state rivers, gathering information from those closest to the tributaries in hopes of reaching pollution solutions and increasing environmental law enforcement.
The environment, Gansler said, is his highest priority, just above public safety and consumer protection, because "I think we can make the biggest difference with the environment." Gansler's office works to identify the biggest cases and worst polluters alongside the Maryland Department of the Environment, which has about 20 lawyers working 500 civil enforcement cases every year, he said.
Already somewhat familiar with the Patuxent River from time spent at his father's recently sold home in the Medley's Neck area of Leonardtown, Gansler heard from a hodgepodge of "environmental leaders" in the members lounge of the Calvert Marine Museum in Solomons, a couple hours after completing a brief tour of the lower Patuxent on the William B. Tennison, the museum's century-old bugeye.
Throughout the day, which began with a morning meeting in Prince Frederick with local elected officials, Gansler maintained a steady thesis.
"People polluted the river, so people have to clean it up," he said aboard the 1899 vessel, which traveled to the Gov. Thomas Johnson Memorial Bridge before returning to the museum.
Wastewater treatment plants were a recurring issue Gansler heard about from officials, Patuxent Riverkeeper Fred Tutman and local leaders.
Marshall Coffman, president of the Apple Green Civic Association, and Richard Klein, a consultant hired by the Dunkirk community, both raised concerns over the planned Shoppes at Apple Green and its accompanying drip-irrigation facility, which if built would be the fourth of its kind in Maryland and the third in Calvert County. Their worries stemmed from repeated violations at the county's two current drip-irrigation facilities — one serving the Calvert Gateway shopping center in Dunkirk and another at the Marley Run subdivision in Huntingtown. The latter, where last month an MDE inspector found effluent ponding on the surface of the irrigation fields, a violation of the facility's discharge permit, is slated for $2.2 million in upgrades that will give it the same wastewater treatment system as the Calvert Gateway facility, which also has past violations, Klein said.
Gansler cued his staff to look into the problem, which he said seemed correctable. But he did say later that there is a lack of "political will or political courage" to fix failing wastewater treatment plants because legislators are more concerned with traffic, schools and crime — issues that are more visible and immediately prescient to their constituents.
Illegal poaching of oyster harvests has also been an issue, and Gansler heard about it from two different perspectives. Tommy Zinn, president of the Calvert County Watermen's Association, said poachers using "illegal gear at illegal times" make up about 5 percent of local watermen but that there are not enough state officers patrolling the waters to handle reports of poaching.
"Strong enforcement won't hurt honest watermen but it will certainly serve as a deterrent to poachers," said Len Zuza, president of the nonprofit Southern Maryland Oyster Cultivation Society, which grows oysters for their environmental benefits.
Gansler suggested watermen work with their local state's attorney's office to dedicate a prosecutor to environmental cases so that poachers are penalized if they are caught.
Sandwiched between Gansler's boat trip and the environmental roundtable was a quick tour of the museum, completed with a photo-op in front of its megalodon skeleton, and a personal visit with Fowler, the former state senator and longtime river advocate. The two spoke about the lack of enforcement of state stormwater management regulations and overharvesting of menhaden, the "chief diet" of larger rockfish, bluefish and trout, Fowler said.
"Couldn't do the Patuxent River without Senator Fowler," Gansler later said to close out a town hall meeting which zero citizens attended.
Fowler, who recently celebrated victory in a 2009 lawsuit which settled after the Environmental Protection Agency assumed legal responsibility for cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay, came away encouraged.
"[Gansler] is interested, he's really connected with the Patuxent River and the Chesapeake Bay and I do not think he will be a silent supporter," Fowler said. "I think he will be very active."
If his daylong inspection of the Patuxent is any indication, the attorney general may prove Fowler correct.
"This river has been studied and over-studied and it's time to take some action," Gansler said as the Tennison left harbor for "the best part of the day, when we're actually out on the river."
