Activists: Maryland environmentally friendly
Carroll County Times
From the wide-open spaces of the Chesapeake Bay and mountains of Western Maryland to the traffic congestion and urban sprawl of Baltimore and the Washington, D.C., suburbs, Maryland residents present a diverse mix of environmental interests.
About 300,000 of the state’s 5.6 million residents are dues-paying members of environmental groups, said Cindy Schwartz, executive director of the League of Conservation Voters.
“Maryland is a very environmentally friendly state,” said Schwartz, whose group acts as a watchdog on legislators, monitoring their voting records on environmental issues.
She said the proximity of the Chesapeake Bay gives many Marylanders a tangible motivation to support environmental causes. Cracking open crabs or spending summers on the Eastern Shore are ingrained in the state’s culture, she said, and residents are quick to protect their traditions when they’re threatened.
“Anger is always the greatest motivator for activism,” she said.
Polling from Schwartz’s organization and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation shows that protecting the bay and fighting global warming consistently rank high among Maryland residents’ top political priorities, she said.
Dru Schmidt-Perkins, executive director of the advocacy group 1000 Friends of Maryland, said Marylanders’ environmental passions are viewed with a great deal of envy by activists in other states.
The state government was a leader on environmental issues for years, with each governor building on the previous one’s accomplishments, Schmidt-Perkins said.
After a brief lull during the early years of former Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr.’s administration, she said, Maryland’s environmental community has become a particularly effective voice in Annapolis the last several years.
She pointed to an increased dedication by legislators to protect funding for Program Open Space, a program used to protect park and recreation land, which had been regularly raided to fund other programs in the past.
Schmidt-Perkins also highlighted legislators’ willingness to raise money during the recent special session for environmental initiatives like the Chesapeake Bay 2010 Trust Fund, previously known as the Green Fund, despite the state’s projected $1.5 billion budget deficit.
Anne Merwin, from the Potomac Conservancy, an organization dedicated to protecting the Potomac and its tributaries, said Maryland tends to be environmentally friendly, but also has a tendency to coast along on its reputation.
The state passed several laws in the 1970s and ’80s that were groundbreaking for their time, but they need to be updated and improved, she said.
She cited the state’s Critical Areas Act and forest conservation laws as two examples of laws that should be revisited.
“I think Maryland does very well, but it could do better,” Merwin said.
