According to VACo’s Immediate Past President, Penny Gross, restoration of the Chesapeake Bay will require “implementation over multiple decades, with local governments in lead roles. There is no ‘one size fits all,’ but local governments will require robust and reliable financial assistance from state and federal sources.”
Gross made these comments as a keynote speaker the Chesapeake Bay Environmental Finance Forum, which took place on April 25-26 at the University of Maryland’s College Park campus.
Over this two-day event financial leaders, environmental experts and elected officials from states within the Chesapeake Bay watershed participated in work sessions that were designed to assist with the development of a “restoration finance action plan” that will be submitted this summer to the Bay state governors and the Mayor of Washington, D.C.
The Forum was sponsored by the Environmental Finance Center (EFC) at the University of Maryland, which is working to become a major source of information for jurisdictions that are working to improve water quality in their localities. Additional information about EFC is available at this link: http://www.efc.umd.edu.