A Dark Day for the Bay

Last year around this time, I happily deleted the headline, "A Dark Day for the Bay," which I was preparing to use for a blog post in the event that the U.S. Supreme Court decided to hear the appeal of the American Farm Bureau Federation and other plaintiffs in their challenge to the Chesapeake Bay cleanup effort known as the Bay TMDL. Ultimately, the Court denied that appeal. I once again considered dusting off this ominous headline last fall when Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) successfully added a provision known as a "rider" to a budget bill, which would have blocked the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from taking any "backstop actions" to ensure the TMDL remained on track. Ultimately, that effort also failed. The Trump White House is now hoping the third time is a charm with the budget proposal released on March 16, which zeroes out funding for the Chesapeake Bay Program.