Dont support the bay

[worknon10s]

Took the family into Smith Island today. There is a big sign that says please support our heritage and DONT support the Chesapeake Bay foundation. I had a double take and so did my wife.

Any idea what this is about,just curious.

[tispho]

Maybe there are people that don't care about the bay, and rather not have their tax money going towards saving the bay?

[POUNCE]

I can speak only from my personal experience with the organization. While on the surface, the CBF was good intentioned, it has become politcal organization and a tool for someone's agenda. Its no longer an honest broker and has lost its objectivity.

[worknon10s]

the people of simth island make their living from the bay so the above statment doesnt make sense

[wino]

A few years ago the CBF wanted to change the size of soft crabs from 3 inches to 5 inches and it caused a big hoop de doo down there since soft crabs are a big part of their income. That sign has been there for at least 5 years.

[J.P. Williams]

Gentlemen--

Sorry. I have to get on a soap box about this. FWIW, the sign is on a privately-owned shanty across the channel from Ewell, and the owner has the right to keep it there, but it doesn't necessarily reflect the feelings of all Smith Islanders.

Since the spring of 1979, CBF has operated a residential environmental education center in Tylerton, Smith Island. We've invested over $1 million in the facility (three houses, a dock, a 35-foot Coast Guard-inspected workboat, and a fleet of canoes) and currently employ four islanders as educators and captains, working with other CBF educators who have come to the island from elsewhere.

Since the opening of the facility, we've provided three-day field trips to over 50,000 school students, teachers, and other adults from Maryland (including Smith Island), Virginia, & Pennsylvania. Our people--and our students--are very much a part of the Tylerton community. We also helped the ladies of Tylerton get their crab picking cooperative set up and approved by the state health dept. Our education program provides the kind of experiences--fishing, crabbing, exploring the islands and marshes, studying water quality--that bonds young people to the Chesapeake and teaches them many ways that they can participate in restoring its health.

Show me anyone else who has invested--and keeps investing--that much $ and effort in Smith Island. We believe in those people. We want to make sure those three towns (Ewell, Rhodes Point, and Tylerton) stay viable. The guy with the sign in the minority.

Best regards,
Capt. John Page Williams
CBF Senior Naturalist

[Dae]

Capt Williams,

You seem to be aware of this issue, so instead of telling us what CBF has done on Smith Island, tell us why this guy is mad.

Thanks,

- Dae

[mdfish]

I talked to a number of guides and former md residents and not to many of them had kind words for the group. Didn't they buy Fox Island as well after the moritorium on geese, helped by the group, shut down the hunting for Fox island. I seem to remember grublings of larger boats mooring there with large parties paid for by the group. I recall complaints similar to ones of red cross when they ousted the head whom had a high income level for a non profit. People I spoke to knew they put a lot of money into education but also seemed to spend a lot of money on what would seem to be private use.

[J.P. Williams]

Dae, the Smith Island controversies came over fisheries management--oysters in the early '90's and crab management in the years around 2000. We were trying to walk a very fine line between preserving threatened stocks of oysters and crabs on the one hand and the need to keep the economies of Smith Island & Tangier (where we also have an education center)--and other water-dependent communities--viable. Most folks on both islands now recognize that we're trying to help them.

As to Fox Island, the old Rod & Gun Club donated it to us in the fall of 1975 ('way before the goose moratorium), and we've operated it too as an education center for schools ever since, running three-day trips there. We do run a couple of adult groups there too each year, plus half-a-dozen summer teacher training groups, but most are kids w/ their teachers. Fishing is very much part of the curriculum. We shut the place down in the winter, but a few of our staff members hunt out there in season.

If you want to know more about what we do, in education, in advocacy, and in restoration, it's no secret. Visit Chesapeake Bay Foundation - Save the Bay: Homepage. A lot of our efforts today center in reducing the flows of nitrogen, phosphorus, and sediment pollution to the Bay from all sources (especially agriculture), reducing the dead zones in the Bay & its rivers, and restoring oysters. A lot of anglers support our work. I hope you will too.

Best, JPW

[Scott McGuire]

I'd support the Bay Foundation more if they took a stronger stance on oyster management. CBF's support of the harvest of the Bay's Keystone species to sustain the industry is a non-starter for me. It has become abundantly clear that the Oyster fishery does more harm than good. Cultural resource or not... the bay deserves better.