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Contact: Craig Lewis
Phone: 703-370 -9510
Email: www.npg.org

CHESAPEAKE BAY COMMISSION ON POPULATION GROWTH REQUESTED

GROWING NUMBERS OF PEOPLE OVERWHELM RESTORATION EFFORTS

Alexandria, VA, (12/7/07): Citing a projected increase of millions more people settling in the ecologically threatened Chesapeake Bay watershed in the next few decades, Negative Population Growth has called on regional Governors to join together to create a Chesapeake Bay Commission on Population Growth to set guidelines and restrictions on future development in the area.

In making the request, NPG President Donald Mann cited a recent federal report showing that 170,000 people a year are moving into the Chesapeake Bay watershed and that population growth is the greatest threat to the future of the Bay's ecosystem. Mann stated: "Unless we act soon to rein-in population growth the future of this great ecological treasure is doomed."

Mann cited recent press reports where scientists and environmentalists agreed that urban and suburban development in and around the Bay have created a situation where "we are going in the wrong direction" when it comes to preserving the Bay's treasures.

In asking the Governors to act immediately to use their executivecreate a Chesapeake Bay Commission on Population Growth, Mann declared "the hundreds of millions of dollars in federal, state and local funds being invested today in helping to fight pollution and control damaging run-off will only prove to be wasted money if millions more people are welcomed to settle in the area and exacerbate today's environmental problems even more."

Mann made it clear to the Governors that he applauds the efforts of the current Chesapeake Bay Commission, which focuses on environmental threats. However, he asserted that group needs to be augmented by a separate Commission on Population Growth with the singular purpose of concentrating its energies on the Bay's greatest enemy - millions more people living in its environs. As Mann said, "Simply put, we must give the Bay the breathing room it needs from continued development so it can have a chance to cleanse itself."

He noted that today's policies which destroy farmland, forests and wetlands that are essential to filtering pollutants before they reach the Bay and replacing them with roads, houses, office buildings, and strip malls cannot continue. In all, Mann declared, "The Chesapeake Bay is locked in a battle for its life with the unrelenting population growth within its watershed. We can't sacrifice the future of the Bay to greedy developers."

Accompanying the letter to the Governors were hundreds of Citizen Petitions from NPG members who reside in their states requesting a new Commission and reminding them that "a long-term population policy can help ensure that the Chesapeake Bay thrives for many decades into the future." The petitions are part of a major grassroots Chesapeake Bay Project recently launched by NPG that will be extended in the coming months to radio, schools and other activities to sound the alarm about unchecked population growth and its inherent dangers.

In addition to the letters to the Governors of Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Delaware and the Mayor of the District of Columbia, NPG also wrote to state legislators in those states who represent areas within the Chesapeake Bay watershed seeking their support for the new Commission.

Negative Population Growth is a national nonprofit organization, founded in 1972 that serves as a network for tens of thousands of activist citizens to work together to educate the American public and our political leaders about the catastrophic effect of overpopulation on our environment and quality of life.

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