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Letters: Annapolis needs a reslience and sustainability manager; and more from readers

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Resilience and sustainability

Taxpayers are losing in the environmental permitting process. The enormous waste was documented in scientific research published in 2017 entitled, “A Framework for Building Efficient Permitting Processes.”

While Anne Arundel County, Maryland Department of the Environment and the Army Corps of Engineers leadership have made changes to regulatory review by injecting environmentally informed oversight into the review process, we have not in Annapolis.

The good news is that Mayor Gavin Buckley has given the City Council a chance to rectify this problem in upcoming proposed legislation co-sponsored by four City Council members: Ross Arnett, Rhonda Pindell Charles, Mark Rodriguez and Rob Savidge. They propose a deputy city manager for resilience and sustainability overseeing policy and process across multiple departments.

The legislation does not add to the budget because pre-existing staff will strategically move to pertinent departments to gain efficiency and effectiveness. The bonus is that cost savings will surely be gleaned in ending a pervasive problematic review process, which opposes scientifically proven practices upheld by the Chesapeake Bay Program, Maryland Department of Natural Resources, MDE, and Army Corps.

The legislation has become necessary despite an outside organization being contracted to help the city facilitate the state-mandated pollution diet because the costly permitting process remains unchanged.

In the meantime, community nonprofit environmental organizations are trying to help but are consistently delayed in city permitting. These nonprofits bring free project management and over $4 million dollars funded through DNR grant awards, which are entirely sourced from a state tax on rental cars, saving Marylanders from another tax burden.

Given the monetary value, design/build quality of proven methodologies, and resiliency against the 100 year storm; we hope you’ll encourage your council representative to support the legislation for a Deputy City Manager for Resilience and Sustainability. It is past time for Annapolis to have safe waterways and be better prepared for larger storms and rising tides.

Alice Estrada and Betsy Love

Annapolis

Pick a side

The headline and the text of the editorial made me so sad, “To the Anne Arundel high school class of 2020, welcome to the world. Time to pick a side.” (The Capital, May 31). We are so in a mode of choosing sides on everything. Must we do that?

I understand that some of our leaders have, in the time of Covid 19, suggested wrong-headed plans of action or inaction; and the Class of 2020 does need to evaluate and even speak the truth to those leaders. We need to do that.

Choosing sides, though, has a there-can-be-no-meeting-of-the-minds feeling to it. It seems to me that speaking out, yes, looking for cooperation, setting suitable examples are all to be encouraged. Let us all be one on this.

If you felt the need to call individuals out on inappropriate decisions, fine. Just please, don’t ask our young people to divide as they take their places in the world.

GALE GILLESPIE

Severna Park

Not nontoxic

The Chesapeake Bay algae bloom is already doing serious harm and a sign of abysmal water quality (The Capital, May 31). On the South River, wading birds such as blue heron face starvation and have fled the murky waters.

The weather is not the cause of the prolonged and widespread bloom. It’s overuse of chemical fertilizers, destruction of wetlands, coddling of European grasses we call lawns and our dependence on industrial agriculture.

Cleaning up the mess is far beyond the capacity of environmental groups. It will require a shift in our collective imagination of what it means to be a citizen of the Earth. A good start would be a transition to more sustainable local food economy and fertilizer free American landscapes. The alternative is to be plagued by poor water quality, disease, and vanishing fisheries and wildlife. When the Prorocentrum algae die off, oxygen will be consumed.

Other toxic species of algae will proliferate leaving behind uninhabitable dead zones. The bullet we apparently “dodged” is coming this summer to a waterway near you, with each of our fingerprints on the trigger.

JOHN STONE

Annapolis