Chesapeake Bay Program
Improved Strategies Needed to Better Guide Restoration Efforts Gao ID: GAO-06-614T July 13, 2006The Chesapeake Bay Program (Bay Program) was created in 1983 when Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, the District of Columbia, the Chesapeake Bay Commission, and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) agreed to establish a partnership to restore the Chesapeake Bay. The partnership's most recent agreement, Chesapeake 2000, sets out an agenda and five broad goals to guide the restoration effort through 2010. This testimony summarizes the findings of an October 2005 GAO report (GAO-06-96) on (1) the extent to which appropriate measures for assessing restoration progress have been established, (2) the extent to which current reporting mechanisms clearly and accurately describe the bay's overall health, (3) how much funding was provided for the effort for fiscal years 1995 through 2004, and (4) how effectively the effort is being coordinated and managed.
The Bay Program had developed over 100 measures to assess progress toward meeting certain restoration commitments and providing information to guide management decisions. However, the program had not yet developed an integrated approach that would allow it to translate these individual measures into an assessment of overall progress toward achieving the five broad restoration goals outlined in Chesapeake 2000. For example, while the Bay Program had appropriate measures to track crab, oyster, and rockfish populations, it did not have an approach for integrating the results of these measures to assess progress toward the agreement's goal of protecting and restoring the bay's living resources. In response to GAO's recommendation, the Bay Program adopted an initial integrated approach in January 2006. The State of the Chesapeake Bay reports did not provide effective and credible information on the current health status of the bay. Because these reports focused on individual trends for certain living resources and pollutants, it was not easy for the public to determine what these data collectively said about the overall health status of the bay. The credibility of these reports had been undermined because the program had commingled actual monitoring data with results of program actions and a predictive model, and the latter two tended to downplay the deteriorated conditions of the bay. Moreover, the Bay Program's reports were prepared by the same program staff who were responsible for managing the restoration effort, which led to reports that projected a rosier picture of the bay's health than may have been warranted. In response to GAO's recommendation, the program has developed a new reporting format and plans to have the new report independently assessed. From fiscal years 1995 through 2004, the restoration effort received about $3.7 billion in direct funding from 11 key federal agencies; the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia; and the District of Columbia. These funds were used for activities that supported water quality protection and restoration, sound land use, vital habitat protection and restoration, living resources protection and restoration, and stewardship and community engagement. During this period, the restoration effort also received an additional $1.9 billion in funding from other federal and state programs for activities that indirectly contributed to the restoration effort. The Bay Program did not have a comprehensive, coordinated implementation strategy to help target limited resources to those activities that would best achieve the goals outlined in Chesapeake 2000. Although the program had adopted 10 key commitments to focus the partners' efforts and had developed numerous planning documents, some of these documents were inconsistent with each other or were perceived as unachievable by program partners. In response to GAO's recommendation, the Bay Program is currently developing a Web-based system to unify its various planning documents and has adopted a funding priority framework. These actions, while important, fall short of the strategy recommended by GAO.
GAO-06-614T, Chesapeake Bay Program: Improved Strategies Needed to Better Guide Restoration Efforts
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Testimony:
Before the Subcommittee on Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies
Committee on Appropriations, House of Representatives:
United States Government Accountability Office:
GAO:
For Release on Delivery Expected at 10:00 a.m. EDT:
Thursday, July 13, 2006:
Chesapeake Bay Program:
Improved Strategies Needed to Better Guide Restoration Efforts:
Statement of Anu K. Mittal, Director Natural Resources and Environment:
GAO-06-614T:
GAO Highlights:
Highlights of GAO-06-614T, a testimony before the Subcommittee on
Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies, Committee on
Appropriations, House of Representatives
Why GAO Did This Study:
The Chesapeake Bay Program (Bay Program) was created in 1983 when
Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, the District of Columbia, the
Chesapeake Bay Commission, and the Environmental Protection Agency
(EPA) agreed to establish a partnership to restore the Chesapeake Bay.
The partnership‘s most recent agreement, Chesapeake 2000, sets out an
agenda and five broad goals to guide the restoration effort through
2010. This testimony summarizes the findings of an October 2005 GAO
report (GAO-06-96) on (1) the extent to which appropriate measures for
assessing restoration progress have been established, (2) the extent to
which current reporting mechanisms clearly and accurately describe the
bay's overall health, (3) how much funding was provided for the effort
for fiscal years 1995 through 2004, and (4) how effectively the effort
is being coordinated and managed.
What GAO Found:
The Bay Program had developed over 100 measures to assess progress
toward meeting certain restoration commitments and providing
information to guide management decisions. However, the program had not
yet developed an integrated approach that would allow it to translate
these individual measures into an assessment of overall progress toward
achieving the five broad restoration goals outlined in Chesapeake 2000.
For example, while the Bay Program had appropriate measures to track
crab, oyster, and rockfish populations, it did not have an approach for
integrating the results of these measures to assess progress toward the
agreement‘s goal of protecting and restoring the bay‘s living
resources. In response to GAO‘s recommendation, the Bay Program adopted
an initial integrated approach in January 2006.
The State of the Chesapeake Bay reports did not provide effective and
credible information on the current health status of the bay. Because
these reports focused on individual trends for certain living resources
and pollutants, it was not easy for the public to determine what these
data collectively said about the overall health status of the bay. The
credibility of these reports had been undermined because the program
had commingled actual monitoring data with results of program actions
and a predictive model, and the latter two tended to downplay the
deteriorated conditions of the bay. Moreover, the Bay Program‘s reports
were prepared by the same program staff who were responsible for
managing the restoration effort, which led to reports that projected a
rosier picture of the bay‘s health than may have been warranted. In
response to GAO‘s recommendation, the program has developed a new
reporting format and plans to have the new report independently
assessed.
From fiscal years 1995 through 2004, the restoration effort received
about $3.7 billion in direct funding from 11 key federal agencies; the
states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia; and the District of
Columbia. These funds were used for activities that supported water
quality protection and restoration, sound land use, vital habitat
protection and restoration, living resources protection and
restoration, and stewardship and community engagement. During this
period, the restoration effort also received an additional $1.9 billion
in funding from other federal and state programs for activities that
indirectly contributed to the restoration effort.
The Bay Program did not have a comprehensive, coordinated
implementation strategy to help target limited resources to those
activities that would best achieve the goals outlined in Chesapeake
2000. Although the program had adopted 10 key commitments to focus the
partners‘ efforts and had developed numerous planning documents, some
of these documents were inconsistent with each other or were perceived
as unachievable by program partners. In response to GAO‘s
recommendation, the Bay Program is currently developing a Web-based
system to unify its various planning documents and has adopted a
funding priority framework. These actions, while important, fall short
of the strategy recommended by GAO.
What GAO Recommends:
GAO made three recommendations in October 2005 to ensure that EPA‘s
Chesapeake Bay Program Office completes its efforts to develop and
implement an integrated assessment approach, revises its reporting
approach to improve the effectiveness and credibility of its reports,
and develops a comprehensive, coordinated implementation strategy that
takes into account available resources. GAO is not making any new
recommendations in this statement.
[Hyperlink, http://www.gao.gov/cgi-bin/getrpt?GAO-06-614T].
To view the full product, including the scope
and methodology, click on the link above.
For more information, contact Anu K. Mittal at (202) 512-3841 or
mittala@gao.gov.
[End of Section]
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:
I am pleased to be here today to participate in your oversight hearing
of the Chesapeake Bay restoration effort. As you know, the Chesapeake
Bay is the nation's largest estuary and has been recognized by Congress
as a national treasure. In response to the deteriorating conditions of
the bay, in 1983, the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia;
the District of Columbia; the Chesapeake Bay Commission;[Footnote 1]
and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) first partnered to
protect and restore the bay by establishing the Chesapeake Bay Program
(Bay Program). Subsequent agreements in 1987, 1992, and 2000 reaffirmed
the partners' commitment to bay restoration, and in their most recent
agreement, Chesapeake 2000, which was signed in June 2000, they
established 102 commitments organized under five broad restoration
goals to be achieved by 2010.
My testimony today is based on GAO's October 2005 report on the
Chesapeake Bay restoration effort and addresses (1) the extent to which
the Bay Program has established appropriate measures for assessing
restoration progress, (2) the extent to which the reporting mechanisms
the Bay Program uses clearly and accurately describe the bay's overall
health, (3) how much funding was provided by federal and state partners
for restoring the Chesapeake Bay for fiscal years 1995 through 2004 and
for what purposes, and (4) how effectively the restoration effort is
being coordinated and managed.[Footnote 2]
In summary, we found the following:
* The Bay Program had established over 100 measures to assess trends in
various living resources such as oysters and crabs, and pollutants such
as nitrogen and phosphorus. However, the program had not yet developed
an approach that would allow it to integrate all of these measures and
thereby assess the progress made by the overall restoration effort in
achieving the five goals outlined in Chesapeake 2000. We recommended
that the Chesapeake Bay Program Office develop such an approach that
would allow the program to combine its individual measures into a few
broader-scale measures that could then be used to assess key ecosystem
attributes and present an overall assessment of this complex ecosystem
restoration project. In response to our recommendation, the Bay Program
has developed an initial approach, but more work is still needed before
a fully integrated approach for assessing restoration progress can be
implemented.
* The Bay Program's primary mechanism for reporting on the health
status of the bay--the State of the Chesapeake Bay report--did not
provide an effective or credible assessment of the bay's current health
status. These reports were not effective because, like the program's
measures, they focused on individual species and pollutants instead of
providing an overall assessment of the bay's health. Often these
reports showed diverging trends for certain aspects of the ecosystem,
making it difficult for the public and other stakeholders to determine
what the current condition of the bay really was. These reports were
also not credible because they (1) commingled data on the bay's health
with program actions and modeling results, which tended to downplay the
deteriorated conditions of the bay and (2) were not subject to an
independent review process. As a result, we believe that the Bay
Program reports projected a rosier picture of the health of the bay
than may have been warranted. In response to our recommendation to
clarify how it reports on the health of the bay and management actions
to restore the bay, the Bay Program has developed a new reporting
format that separately describes the bay's current health and the
progress made in implementing management actions. In addition, the Bay
Program plans to have its Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee
provide an independent assessment of the new reports.[Footnote 3] This
assessment is scheduled to be completed by late summer.
* About $3.7 billion in direct funding was provided for the restoration
effort by 11 key federal agencies; the states of Maryland,
Pennsylvania, and Virginia; and the District of Columbia from fiscal
years 1995 through 2004.[Footnote 4] An additional $1.9 billion was
provided for activities that had an indirect impact on bay restoration.
* The Bay Program did not have a comprehensive, coordinated
implementation strategy that would allow it to strategically target
limited resources to the most effective restoration activities.
Recognizing that it could not manage all 102 commitments outlined in
Chesapeake 2000, the Bay Program had focused its efforts on 10 keystone
commitments. Although the Bay Program had developed numerous planning
documents, some of the documents were inconsistent with each other and
some of the plans were perceived to be unachievable by stakeholders.
Moreover, the program invested scarce resources in developing and
updating certain plans, even though it knew that it did not have the
resources to implement them. While we recognize that the Bay Program
often has no assurance about the level of funds that may be available
beyond the short term, this large and difficult restoration project
cannot be effectively managed and coordinated without a realistic
strategy that unifies all of its planning documents and targets its
limited resources to the most effective restoration activities. In
response to our recommendation to develop a comprehensive, coordinated
implementation strategy, the Bay Program is developing a Web-based
approach that will unify its various planning documents and adopted a
funding priority framework. However, the program has not yet developed
a comprehensive implementation strategy that reflects what can
realistically be accomplished given available resources. We continue to
believe that such a strategy is needed for the program to move forward
in a more strategic and well-coordinated manner.
Background:
The Chesapeake Bay is the largest of the nation's estuaries, measuring
nearly 200 miles long and 35 miles wide at its widest point. Roughly
half of the bay's water comes from the Atlantic Ocean, and the other
half is freshwater that drains from the land and enters the bay through
the many rivers and streams in its watershed basin. As shown in figure
1, the bay's watershed covers 64,000 square miles and spans parts of
six states--Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and
West Virginia--and the District of Columbia.
Figure 1: Chesapeake Bay Watershed:
[See PDF for image]
Sources: Chesapeake Bay Program Office and GAO.
[End of figure]
Over time, the bay's ecosystem has deteriorated. The bay's "dead
zones"--where too little oxygen is available to support fish and
shellfish--have increased, and many species of fish and shellfish have
experienced major declines in population. The decline in the bay's
living resources has been cause for a great deal of public and
political attention.
Responding to public outcry, on December 9, 1983, representatives of
Maryland, Virginia, and Pennsylvania; the District of Columbia; the
EPA; and the Chesapeake Bay Commission signed the first Chesapeake Bay
agreement. Their agreement established the Chesapeake Executive Council
and resulted in the Chesapeake Bay Program--a partnership that directs
and conducts the restoration of the bay. Subsequent agreements in 1987
and again in 1992 reaffirmed the signatories' commitment to restore the
bay. The partners signed the most current agreement, Chesapeake 2000,
on June 28, 2000. Chesapeake 2000--identified by the Bay Program as its
strategic plan--sets out an agenda and goals to guide the restoration
efforts through 2010 and beyond. In Chesapeake 2000, the signatories
agreed to 102 commitments--including management actions, such as
assessing the trends of particular species, as well as actions that
directly affect the health of the bay. These commitments are organized
under the following five broad restoration goals:
* Protecting and restoring living resources--14 commitments to restore,
enhance, and protect the finfish, shellfish and other living resources,
their habitats and ecological relationships to sustain all fisheries
and provide for a balanced ecosystem;
* Protecting and restoring vital habitats--18 commitments to preserve,
protect, and restore those habitats and natural areas that are vital to
the survival and diversity of the living resources of the bay and its
rivers;
* Protecting and restoring water quality--19 commitments to achieve and
maintain the water quality necessary to support the aquatic living
resources of the bay and its tributaries and to protect human health;
* Sound land use--28 commitments to develop, promote, and achieve sound
land use practices that protect and restore watershed resources and
water quality, maintain reduced pollutant loadings for the bay and its
tributaries, and restore and preserve aquatic living resources; and:
* Stewardship and community engagement--23 commitments to promote
individual stewardship and assist individuals, community-based
organizations, businesses, local governments and schools to undertake
initiatives to achieve the goals and commitments of the agreement.
As the only federal signatory to the Chesapeake Bay agreements, EPA is
responsible for spearheading the federal effort within the Bay Program
through its Chesapeake Bay Program Office. Among other things, the
Chesapeake Bay Program Office is to develop and make available
information about the environmental quality and living resources of the
Chesapeake Bay ecosystem; help the signatories to the Chesapeake Bay
agreement develop and implement specific plans to carry out their
responsibilities; and coordinate EPA's actions with those of other
appropriate entities to develop strategies to improve the water quality
and living resources in the Chesapeake Bay ecosystem.
The Bay Program's Measures Had Not Been Integrated to Assess Overall
Restoration Progress:
The Bay Program had established 101 measures to assess progress on
individual aspects of the Bay. For example, the Bay Program had
developed measures for determining trends in individual fish and
shellfish populations, such as crabs, oysters, and rockfish. The Bay
Program had also developed other measures to provide the information it
needs to make management decisions. For example, to help inform its
decisions regarding the effects of airborne nitrogen compounds and
chemical contaminants in the bay ecosystem and to help establish
reduction goals for these contaminants, the Bay Program had a measure
to estimate vehicle emissions and compare them to vehicle miles
traveled.
While the Bay Program had established these 101 measures, it had not
developed an approach that would allow it to translate these individual
measures into an overall assessment of the progress made in achieving
the five broad restoration goals. For example, although the Bay Program
had developed measures for determining trends in individual fish and
shellfish populations, it had not yet devised a way to integrate those
measures to assess the overall progress made in achieving its Living
Resource Protection and Restoration goal. According to an expert panel
of nationally recognized ecosystem assessment and restoration experts
convened by GAO, in a complex ecosystem restoration project like the
Chesapeake Bay, overall progress should be assessed by using an
integrated approach. This approach should combine measures that provide
information on individual species or pollutants into a few broader-
scale measures that can be used to assess key ecosystem attributes,
such as biological conditions.
The signatories to the Chesapeake Bay agreement have discussed the need
for an integrated approach over the past several years. However,
according to an official from the Chesapeake Bay Program Office, until
recently they did not believe that the program could develop an
approach that was scientifically defensible, given their limited
resources. The program began an effort in November 2004 to develop,
among other things, a framework for organizing the program's measures
and a structure for how the redesign work should be accomplished. In
our report, we recommended that the Chesapeake Bay Program Office
complete its efforts to develop and implement such an integrated
approach. In January 2006, the Bay Program formally adopted an initial
integrated approach for assessing both bay health and management
actions taken to restore the bay. However, according to a Bay Program
official, more work is needed before a fully integrated approach for
assessing restoration progress can be implemented.
The Bay Program's Reports Did Not Effectively Communicate the Status of
the Bay's Health:
The Bay Program's primary mechanism for reporting on the health status
of the bay--the State of the Chesapeake Bay report--was intended to
provide the citizens of the bay region with a snapshot of the bay's
health. However, our review found that the State of the Chesapeake Bay
report did not effectively communicate the current health status of the
bay because it mirrored the shortcomings in the program's measures by
focusing on the status of individual species or pollutants instead of
providing information on a core set of ecosystem characteristics. For
example, the 2002 and 2004 State of the Chesapeake Bay reports provided
data on oysters, crab, rockfish, and bay grasses, but the reports did
not provide an overall assessment of the current status of living
resources in the bay or the health of the bay. Instead, data were
reported for each species individually. The 2004 State of the
Chesapeake Bay report included a graphic that depicts oyster harvest
levels at historic lows, with a mostly decreasing trend over time, and
a rockfish graphic that shows a generally increasing population trend
over time. However, the report did not provide contextual information
that explained how these measures are interrelated or what the
diverging trends meant about the overall health of the bay. Our experts
agreed that the 2004 report was visually pleasing but lacked a clear,
overall picture of the bay's health and told us that the public would
probably not be able to easily and accurately assess the current
condition of the bay from the information reported.
We also found that the credibility of the State of the Chesapeake Bay
reports had been undermined by two key factors. First, the Bay Program
had commingled data from three sources when reporting on the health of
the bay. Specifically, the reports mixed actual monitoring information
on the bay's health status with results from a predictive model and the
results of specific management actions. The latter two results did
little to inform readers about the current health status of the bay and
tended to downplay the bay's actual condition. Second, the Bay Program
had not established an independent review process to ensure that its
reports were accurate and credible. The officials who managed and were
responsible for the restoration effort also analyzed, interpreted, and
reported the data to the public. We believe this lack of independence
in reporting led to the Bay Program's projecting a rosier view of the
health of the bay than may have been warranted. Our expert panelists
believe that an independent review panel--to either review the bay's
health reports before issuance or to analyze and report on the health
status independently of the Bay Program--would significantly improve
the credibility of the program's reports. We recommended that the
Chesapeake Bay Program Office revise its reporting approach to improve
the effectiveness and credibility of its reports. In response to our
recommendation, the Bay Program developed a new reporting format that
was released for public review and comment in March 2006. The new
report, entitled Chesapeake Bay 2005 Health and Restoration Assessment,
is divided into two parts: part one is an assessment of ecosystem
health and part two is an assessment of progress made in implementing
management actions. The new report appears to have a more effective
communications framework and clearly distinguishes between the health
of the bay and the management actions being taken. In addition, the Bay
Program plans to have its Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee
independently review the new report and the process used to develop it.
This review is planned for completion by late summer.
Federal Agencies and States Provided Billions of Dollars in Both Direct
and Indirect Funding for Restoration Activities:
Eleven key federal agencies; the states of Maryland, Pennsylvania, and
Virginia; and the District of Columbia provided almost $3.7 billion in
direct funding from fiscal years 1995 through 2004 to restore the bay.
Federal agencies provided a total of approximately $972 million in
direct funding, while the states and the District of Columbia provided
approximately $2.7 billion in direct funding for the restoration effort
over the 10-year period. Of the federal agencies, the Department of
Defense's Army Corps of Engineers provided the greatest amount of
direct funding--$293.5 million. Of the states, Maryland provided the
greatest amount of direct funding--more than $1.8 billion--which is
over $1.1 billion more than any other state. Typically, the states
provided about 75 percent of the direct funding for restoration, and
the funding has generally increased over the 10-year period. As figure
2 shows, the largest percentage of direct funding--approximately 47
percent--went to water quality protection and restoration.
Figure 2: Percentage of the Total Direct Funding Provided for
Addressing Each of the Five Chesapeake 2000 Goals, Fiscal Years 1995
through 2004:
[See PDF for image]
Source: GAO analysis of agency data, in constant 2004 dollars.
[End of figure]
Ten of the key federal agencies, Pennsylvania, and the District of
Columbia provided about $1.9 billion in additional funding from fiscal
years 1995 through 2004 for activities that indirectly affected bay
restoration. These activities were conducted as part of broader agency
efforts and/or would continue without the restoration effort. Federal
agencies provided approximately $935 million in indirect funding, while
Pennsylvania and the District of Columbia together provided
approximately $991 million in indirect funding for the restoration
effort over the 10-year period.[Footnote 5] Of the federal agencies,
the U.S. Department of Agriculture provided the greatest amount of
indirect funding--$496.5 million--primarily through the Natural
Resources Conservation Service. Of the states, Pennsylvania provided
the greatest amount of indirect funding--$863.8 million. As with direct
funding, indirect funding for the restoration effort had also generally
increased over fiscal years 1995 through 2004. As figure 3 shows, the
largest percentage of indirect funding--approximately 44 percent--went
to water quality protection and restoration.
Figure 3: Percentage of the Total Indirect Funding Provided for
Addressing Each of the Five Chesapeake 2000 Goals, Fiscal Years 1995
through 2004:
[See PDF for image]
Source: GAO analysis of agency data, in constant 2004 dollars.
[End of figure]
Despite the almost $3.7 billion in direct funding and more than $1.9
billion in indirect funding that has been provided for activities to
restore the bay, the Chesapeake Bay Commission estimated in a January
2003 report that the restoration effort faced a funding gap of nearly
$13 billion to achieve the goals outlined in Chesapeake 2000 by 2010.
Subsequently, in an October 2004 report, the Chesapeake Bay Watershed
Blue Ribbon Finance Panel estimated that the restoration effort is
grossly underfunded and recommended that a regional financing authority
be created with an initial capitalization of $15 billion, of which $12
billion would come from the federal government.[Footnote 6]
The Bay Program Has Not Always Effectively Coordinated and Managed the
Restoration Effort:
Chesapeake 2000 and prior agreements have provided the overall
direction for the restoration effort over the past two decades.
Although Chesapeake 2000 provides the current vision and overall
strategic goals for the restoration effort, along with short-and long-
term commitments, we found that the Bay Program lacked a comprehensive,
coordinated implementation strategy that could provide a road map for
accomplishing the goals outlined in the agreement.
In 2003, the Bay Program recognized that it could not effectively
manage all 102 commitments outlined in Chesapeake 2000 and adopted 10
keystone commitments as a management strategy to focus the partners'
efforts. To achieve these 10 keystone commitments, the Bay Program had
developed numerous planning documents. However, we found that these
planning documents were not always consistent with each other. For
example, the program developed a strategy for restoring 25,000 acres of
wetlands by 2010. Subsequently, each state within the bay watershed and
the District of Columbia developed tributary strategies that described
actions for restoring over 200,000 acres of wetlands--far exceeding the
25,000 acres that the Bay Program had developed strategies for
restoring. While we recognize that partners should have the freedom to
develop higher targets than established by the Bay Program, we are
concerned that having such varying targets could cause confusion, not
only for the partners, but for other stakeholders about what actions
are really needed to restore the bay, and such varying targets appear
to contradict the effort's guiding strategy of taking a cooperative
approach to achieving the restoration goals.
We also found that the Bay Program had devoted a significant amount of
their limited resources to developing strategies that were either not
being used by the Bay Program or were believed to be unachievable
within the 2010 time frame. For example, the program invested
significant resources to develop a detailed toxics work plan for
achieving the toxics commitments in Chesapeake 2000. Even though the
Bay Program had not been able to implement this work plan because
personnel and funding had been unavailable, program officials told us
that the plan was being revised. It is unclear to us why the program is
investing additional resources to revise a plan for which the necessary
implementation resources are not available, and which is not one of the
10 keystone commitments. According to a Bay Program official,
strategies are often developed without knowing what level of resources
will be available to implement them. While the program knows how much
each partner has agreed to provide for the upcoming year, the amount of
funding that partners will provide in the future is not always known.
Without knowing what funding will be available, the Bay Program is
limited in its ability to target and direct funding toward those
restoration activities that will be the most cost effective and
beneficial.
The Chesapeake Bay Program Office recognizes that some of the plans are
inconsistent and unachievable. The office told us that it was
determining how to reconcile the program's various plans and stated
that these plans were developed to identify what actions will be needed
to achieve the commitments of Chesapeake 2000 and were not developed
considering available resources. The office also recognizes that there
is a fundamental gap between what needs to be done to achieve some of
the commitments and what can be achieved within the current resources
available. According to Chesapeake Bay Program Office officials, the
development of an overall implementation plan that takes into account
available resources had been discussed, but that the partners could not
agree on such a plan. We recommended that the Chesapeake Bay Program
Office develop a comprehensive, coordinated implementation strategy
that takes into account available resources.
In response to our recommendations, the Bay Program has taken several
actions. The Chesapeake Bay Program Office is currently developing a
Web-based system to link and organize the program's various planning
documents. In addition, program partners adopted a funding priorities
framework in October 2005 that designates three broad funding
priorities--agriculture, wastewater treatment, and developed and
developing lands--for accelerating the implementation of the states'
tributary strategies. While these actions are important, they fall
short of the comprehensive, coordinated implementation strategy we
recommended. The program still needs to reconcile the inconsistencies
of the program's various planning documents and clearly link the 10
keystone commitments with the funding priority framework adopted by
program partners. We continue to believe that the development of a
comprehensive, coordinated implementation strategy that lays out what
the program plans to accomplish and that is directly linked to the
funding that is available would allow the program to move forward in a
more strategic and well-coordinated manner.
In closing, Mr. Chairman, it is well recognized that restoring the
Chesapeake Bay is a massive, difficult, and complex undertaking. While
the Bay Program has made significant strides, our October 2005 report
documented how the success of the program has been undermined by the
lack of (1) an integrated approach to measure overall progress; (2)
independent and credible reporting mechanisms; and (3) coordinated
implementation strategies. These deficiencies have resulted in a
situation in which the Bay Program could not present a clear and
accurate picture of what the restoration effort had achieved, could not
effectively articulate what strategies would best further the broad
restoration goals, and could not identify how limited resources should
be prioritized. We are encouraged that the Bay Program is taking
actions to address our recommendations because, without these actions,
we do not believe the Bay Program will be able to change the status quo
and move the restoration effort forward in the most cost-effective
manner.
Mr. Chairman, this concludes my prepared statement. I would be happy to
respond to any questions that you or Members of the Subcommittee may
have.
Contacts and Acknowledgments:
For further information about this testimony, please contact Anu Mittal
at (202) 512-3841. Other individuals making significant contributions
to this testimony were Sherry McDonald, Assistant Director; Bart
Fischer; and James Krustapentus.
FOOTNOTES
[1] The Chesapeake Bay Commission is a tristate legislative assembly
representing Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia.
[2] GAO, Chesapeake Bay Program: Improved Strategies Are Needed to
Better Assess, Report, and Manage Restoration Progress, GAO-06-96
(Washington, D.C.: Oct. 28, 2005).
[3] The Scientific and Technical Advisory Committee is one of the Bay
Program's seven committees that form the organizational and planning
structure for the restoration effort. The committee provides scientific
and technical guidance to the Bay Program on measures to restore and
protect the Chesapeake Bay.
[4] Key federal agencies include the U.S. Department of Agriculture's
Farm Service Agency, Forest Service, and Natural Resources Conservation
Service; Department of Commerce's National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration; Department of Defense's Army, Army Corps of Engineers,
and Navy/Marine Corps; Department of the Interior's Fish and Wildlife
Service, U.S. Geological Survey, and National Park Service; and EPA.
For purposes of our report and this testimony, we defined direct funds
as those that are provided exclusively for bay restoration activities
(e.g., increasing the oyster population) or those that would no longer
be made available in the absence of the restoration effort.
[5] In addition to the funding provided for the restoration of the bay,
EPA provided more than $1 billion to Maryland, Virginia, and
Pennsylvania through its Clean Water State Revolving Fund program
during fiscal years 1995 through 2004. The funds provide low-cost loans
or other financial assistance for a wide range of water quality
infrastructure projects and other activities, such as implementing
agricultural best management practices.
[6] The Chesapeake Bay Watershed Blue Ribbon Finance Panel was
established to identify funding sources sufficient to implement
basinwide cleanup plans so that the bay and tidal tributaries would be
restored sufficiently by 2010 to remove them from the list of impaired
waters under the Clean Water Act. The panel was composed of 15 leaders
from the private sector, government, and the environmental community.
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