Latest / Clean Water Conversations / Chesapeake Bay Restoration Starts in Local Watersheds: Chesapeake Bay Foundation

Transcript

Chesapeake Bay Restoration Starts in Local Watersheds: Chesapeake Bay Foundation · Clean Water Conversations

0:00
SPEAKER_01: Cleanwater Conversations is sponsored by Chesapeake Conservancy, working to conserve and restore the natural and cultural resources of the Chesapeake Bay watershed for the enjoyment and inspiration of this and future generations.
0:13
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Chesapeake Conservancy, and now on to our show.
0:29
SPEAKER_01: Hello everyone, and welcome to Clean Water Conversations, the podcast where we have casual discussions about creating clean and clear waterways right here in Lancaster County.
0:38
SPEAKER_01: I'm Ken.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: Hi, I'm Allison.
0:40
SPEAKER_01: Allison Valentine's Day is coming up.
0:42
SPEAKER_00: It's so sweet.
0:45
SPEAKER_01: Oh, you've been hanging around me too long.
0:49
SPEAKER_01: Any any fun memories, any fond memories of uh Valentine's Day, either growing up or even since you've been an adult?
0:56
SPEAKER_00: I have to say that I love that my husband and I always celebrate it the day before.
1:00
SPEAKER_00: So we avoid the crowds at the restaurants and we just have that as our little thing.
1:05
SPEAKER_00: But in a profession now where I get to be a collaborator and just say thank you and make everyone feel loved all the time, I feel like I should be sending out the elementary school Valentine's to everyone in the network.
1:20
SPEAKER_00: So I better get started now.
1:23
SPEAKER_00: Because there's a lot of love to share.
1:25
SPEAKER_02: There you go.
1:25
SPEAKER_01: And you can I'm not so noble.
1:28
SPEAKER_01: I go back to either my or my kids' uh elementary school.
1:33
SPEAKER_01: The exactly those those cards that you were talking about was always that was always nice and those little candy hearts that had the races on them and stuff.
1:39
SPEAKER_00: So we may have just bought more of those for our house last night.
1:44
SPEAKER_00: I love the way you guys celebrate holidays.
1:46
SPEAKER_01: It's just with candy.
1:48
SPEAKER_01: That's so festive.
1:51
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
1:52
SPEAKER_01: That in fact is awesome.
1:54
SPEAKER_01: Oh so what is on your list of awesomeness right now?
1:59
SPEAKER_00: Oh, my list of awesomeness is not quite well, it is exciting because we had a room full of people recently for a conversation about Act 167, which if it just stands alone, it's kind of like, what?
2:13
SPEAKER_00: What is you can probably buzz me for that just because it's about as unknown as an acronym and some sort of.
2:20
SPEAKER_00: Okay, okay.
2:20
SPEAKER_00: Well, it's related to stormwater, it's related to the support that our municipal partners need.
2:25
SPEAKER_00: And so to have a room full of people that was literally overflowing out the back door was just wonderful.
2:30
SPEAKER_00: And with new details of the MS4 permit coming out, there's some great opportunities to work together even more.
2:36
SPEAKER_00: So that's my list of awesomeness for right now, is just the way that our municipal partners are really engaging and participating to make sure that their voices are heard.
2:45
SPEAKER_00: So I appreciate them and I appreciate the way that we can be a facilitator and uh convener for these kind of conversations.
2:52
SPEAKER_01: And I'm still don't feel like buzzing you for MS4, which stands for Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System.
2:58
SPEAKER_00: Look at you go.
2:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
2:59
SPEAKER_00: I feel it.
3:00
SPEAKER_01: We've covered that repetition right there.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
3:03
SPEAKER_00: We've covered it in other podcasts.
3:05
SPEAKER_00: I thought I was allowed.
3:07
SPEAKER_01: No, no, no, no.
3:08
SPEAKER_01: It's it's on an individual episode basis.
3:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
3:13
SPEAKER_01: You're lucky.
3:14
SPEAKER_01: I'm feeling lazy today.
3:15
SPEAKER_00: No, you're feeling kind and generous for Valentine's Day.
3:19
SPEAKER_01: That's what we're gonna go with.
3:22
SPEAKER_00: What's on your awesome list, Ken?
3:24
SPEAKER_01: On my list of awesomeness, there are I have some really big projects coming up.
3:29
SPEAKER_01: I'm working on the year interview from 2024.
3:31
SPEAKER_01: And and looking back over all of the things that went on, all of the awesomeness over 2024.
3:37
SPEAKER_01: I'm just reminded just of all of the really cool stuff that our partners are doing just for getting us to the goal of clean and clear by 2040.
3:48
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
3:48
SPEAKER_01: So, you know, that that's really awesome to see all the things that were done just to get that kind of reminder.
3:54
SPEAKER_01: And uh, I also have some video projects coming up, and I love creating videos.
3:59
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
3:59
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
4:00
SPEAKER_00: That'll be fairly fun.
4:01
SPEAKER_00: That should be fun.
4:01
SPEAKER_00: That should be a lot of fun.
4:02
SPEAKER_00: Just like today's guest.
4:04
SPEAKER_00: He's really fun.
4:05
SPEAKER_00: He talked about a character.
4:07
SPEAKER_01: He is indeed.
4:08
SPEAKER_01: See, there's a reason we are laughing more just in the intro than we normally are.
4:13
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
4:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he's the senior watershed planner at Chesapeake Bay Foundation, and we are talking with Mr.
4:20
SPEAKER_01: Brian Gish.
4:21
SPEAKER_01: It's like, uh, you thought you got me, you didn't.
4:24
SPEAKER_01: He is dedicated to the craft.
4:26
SPEAKER_01: Well, and this kind of touches on one thing, a lesson that I learned early on is okay, if I'm gonna go and talk somewhere, I pull together everything I want to say, and then I throw out a good 25% of that and replace it with really bad jokes.
4:43
SPEAKER_01: Perfect.
4:44
SPEAKER_01: I love it.
4:44
SPEAKER_01: Well, and I found it makes the 75% that's left, I think it doubles the amount of impact it has.
4:52
SPEAKER_01: So essentially, by cutting out 25%, I have increased my effectiveness by 50%.
4:58
SPEAKER_01: And I have two theories why.
5:01
SPEAKER_01: One, they're having fun with the jokes.
5:03
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, this is what I like to believe, but the reality is probably more that they say, thank God it's not the joke portion.
5:12
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna focus on this and really listen.
5:16
SPEAKER_01: Um I gotta remember that.
5:22
SPEAKER_01: The exception of this is kids.
5:23
SPEAKER_01: Kids love my jokes.
5:24
SPEAKER_01: I do well with the kids.
5:26
SPEAKER_01: It's the adults, it's like they've aged out of good humor.
5:33
SPEAKER_02: Oh man.
5:35
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, my goal is to make this fun.
5:37
SPEAKER_01: I don't if you learn nothing from me, but everyone, like us around the table and everyone listening has a great time.
5:43
SPEAKER_01: I've succeeded.
5:44
SPEAKER_00: Mission accomplished.
5:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
5:46
SPEAKER_01: So that you just pretty much summed up our podcast right there.
5:51
SPEAKER_00: Well, I think our icebreaker is going to be a perfect fit as we continue to learn about Brian's uh motivations and stories of adventure.
6:00
SPEAKER_01: Well goodness.
6:01
SPEAKER_01: Then let's break some ice.
6:04
SPEAKER_01: Here's a question.
6:05
SPEAKER_01: You are going to sail around the world.
6:07
SPEAKER_01: What is the name of your boat and why?
6:09
SPEAKER_01: So I have a boat right now, and it has the most perfect name for how I use it.
6:16
SPEAKER_01: The boat is the Albatwitch.
6:20
SPEAKER_01: For those of you unfamiliar with the Albatwitch, the Albatwitch is a cryptid species, not unlike the Sasquatch, however, smaller in stature and fond of throwing apples at people.
6:33
SPEAKER_01: And they um I believe, I believe they are now extinct, to be perfectly honest, but they were on the shields of the Native Americans when Europeans showed up in the area.
6:44
SPEAKER_01: And their last bastion is believed to have been around Chicky's Rock.
6:48
SPEAKER_01: And so, having grown up at the base of Chicky's Rock, right there, had to go with the Alba Twitch, especially on the Susquehanna.
6:54
SPEAKER_01: So this would have to be the Alba Twitch 2.
6:58
SPEAKER_01: And if I'm going around the world, anyone who knows me is going to know that sailing around the world, that fishing rod is never leaving my hand.
7:06
SPEAKER_00: With you at all times.
7:08
SPEAKER_01: So, Mountain of Tackle.
7:10
SPEAKER_01: And I also want, and I don't care if this is a fictional item.
7:14
SPEAKER_01: I guess it's kind of less fictional all the time.
7:16
SPEAKER_01: I want the Universal Translator from Star Trek.
7:19
SPEAKER_01: Because Star Trek, I want to go fishing with everyone along the way that I find and be able to tell bad jokes and everything with them.
7:28
SPEAKER_01: Find out.
7:28
SPEAKER_01: Oh, and I probably pack a bottle of um selenium pills to counteract all the mercury I'm going to be ingesting by eating so much fish.
7:39
SPEAKER_01: Um, but I think if I have the universal translator, so I can like just jam with these guys about fishing and got my selenium, probably some dramamine too.
7:49
SPEAKER_01: I uh I've never gotten seasick because I've never been in a situation where I would have.
7:54
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
7:54
SPEAKER_01: Every time the handful of times I've been out on big water, it's been like glass.
7:58
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
7:59
SPEAKER_01: But I know I would be the first one hanging over the gunnels just in in abject misery.
8:06
SPEAKER_00: Oh, geez.
8:07
SPEAKER_00: So, Brian, you mentioned Chickies Rock.
8:09
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
8:10
SPEAKER_00: Tell us about where you grew up because it is you are a Lancaster County native.
8:14
SPEAKER_00: I know there's a full history here.
8:16
SPEAKER_00: So tell us some of yeah, what your family history is.
8:20
SPEAKER_00: I will open that door.
8:21
SPEAKER_01: So um Tommy Marley, I the pen I brought.
8:25
SPEAKER_00: There's no hesitation.
8:26
SPEAKER_00: Don't worry.
8:27
SPEAKER_01: This pen for Ken.
8:28
SPEAKER_01: Oh, like White Oak.
8:30
SPEAKER_01: Um, because my family, the Gishes, we founded the bustling metropolis of White Oak in 1733.
8:37
SPEAKER_01: Uh, most people just know it as the largest suburb of Penrin.
8:41
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
8:41
SPEAKER_01: Penn Township.
8:43
SPEAKER_01: And I am the 12th Gish born here in Pennsylvania.
8:47
SPEAKER_01: It's 12th generation, I should say.
8:50
SPEAKER_01: But family names Gish, Nisley, Heisey, Walgamuth, like these are quintessential northwestern Lancaster County names.
8:58
SPEAKER_01: It isn't just Lancaster County, it's that part, you know.
9:01
SPEAKER_01: And so yeah, my family has been in the Chicke's Creek watershed ever since.
9:07
SPEAKER_01: Um, at least my dad's side, I should say.
9:09
SPEAKER_01: My mother is not a native Lancestrian.
9:12
SPEAKER_01: You didn't know that.
9:13
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
9:14
SPEAKER_01: No.
9:15
SPEAKER_01: Um my mother's family, they moved to Etown when she was in high school.
9:18
SPEAKER_01: Now she is a Chesapeake Faye watershed girl.
9:21
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
9:22
SPEAKER_01: Um, she is from the coal region, Monnoy City.
9:25
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, I'm three-quarters Pennsylvania Dutch, but I am also a quarter of my family is from Lithuania.
9:30
SPEAKER_01: That's how I have this beautiful nose.
9:32
SPEAKER_01: Uh I like to say it's a monument to Baltic resistance.
9:37
SPEAKER_01: So, but yeah, I grew up, like I said, right below Chicky's Rock on the northern side outside of Marietta.
9:44
SPEAKER_01: So I was within walking distance of Chicke's Creek, Little Chicky's Creek, Donegal Creek, and the river.
9:51
SPEAKER_00: Hence the fishing.
9:52
SPEAKER_01: Uh well, the fishing, um, yes, by proximity, but I would say even more so from my grandfather.
10:02
SPEAKER_01: Um, I don't want to sell my dad short.
10:03
SPEAKER_01: He also took me fishing when I was little, but my grandfather, one, like he kind of his I don't know if obsession is the right word, sickness, and in as far as like a chronic fishing affliction.
10:18
SPEAKER_01: His is analogous to mine.
10:21
SPEAKER_01: Chronic fish fishing affliction.
10:22
SPEAKER_01: I think that's the name of my next band, right?
10:24
SPEAKER_01: That'd be great.
10:27
SPEAKER_01: Um opening for real big fish.
10:30
SPEAKER_01: Oh yes.
10:32
SPEAKER_01: There you go.
10:33
SPEAKER_01: So it it really is like a chronic disease.
10:36
SPEAKER_01: This and so, and he's I contracted it from him, I would probably say.
10:40
SPEAKER_01: And so from the time I could walk, I was going fishing.
10:43
SPEAKER_01: And I, if I wasn't, I wanted to be fishing with Pap.
10:46
SPEAKER_01: Um when I got a little bit bigger, where I could ride my bike to the creek, walk to the creek.
10:52
SPEAKER_01: Um, I was there.
10:53
SPEAKER_01: That's where I was and I was fishing.
10:55
SPEAKER_01: And I think this was this I can start to kind of also give my mother some credit of get out of the house.
11:01
SPEAKER_01: So it was beneficial.
11:04
SPEAKER_01: And I like even then when I could drive, um, I know after school, a lot of times things like that, I would shoot over to the river to meet my grandfather there.
11:13
SPEAKER_01: We go out wading in the warmer months, go fishing, particularly right around um uh the mouth of the Conewago Creek by Three Mile Island.
11:20
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
11:21
SPEAKER_01: We did a lot of fishing there, and so I I probably I would have to say more than anyone, my grandfather probably gets the credit for why you have to be annoyed by me on a regular basis.
11:32
SPEAKER_01: I I doubt I would be in this line of work were it not for those experiences and having those passions kind of whipped up like that.
11:40
SPEAKER_01: Well, was there was there ever like one moment in your childhood that you remember that kind of solidified where you are now?
11:47
SPEAKER_01: It's one of these things that there's so much credit in our lives that you can I can say my grandfather was the biggest influence in that regard.
11:54
SPEAKER_01: But it's almost impossible.
11:56
SPEAKER_01: You you're never gonna get them all.
11:57
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I had some great teachers growing up who kind of stirred that passion for that.
12:03
SPEAKER_01: I remember like in um junior high, uh Mr.
12:06
SPEAKER_01: King, he was a science teacher there.
12:08
SPEAKER_01: I remember still remember some of his acronyms.
12:12
SPEAKER_01: I'm not going to say them because yeah, like, and even some of his phrases, like how I knew that the part of a female flower is the pistol.
12:23
SPEAKER_01: He'd always say pistol packing mamas.
12:26
SPEAKER_01: So say you remember things like that.
12:29
SPEAKER_01: I uh shout out to Mr.
12:31
SPEAKER_01: King.
12:32
SPEAKER_01: I had some, I mean, and then going through college and grad school, I had some great professors who kind of kind of fostered these sorts of things.
12:40
SPEAKER_01: And then, you know, um in professional relationships, because I wasn't originally working here in the water world.
12:49
SPEAKER_01: So I mean my education built to that, but I wasn't kind of it wasn't exclusively to that.
12:55
SPEAKER_01: And so it wasn't it I'm glad I got here, but it wasn't like an immediate thing.
13:00
SPEAKER_00: What made you jump into the water world from what you were doing before that?
13:04
SPEAKER_01: So I guess I'll take a step back just to school in general.
13:07
SPEAKER_01: So I went to Donegal.
13:09
SPEAKER_01: Um when I graduated, um, well, I guess a little before that, had to pick where I was going to college.
13:14
SPEAKER_01: So I applied to three schools.
13:16
SPEAKER_01: I applied to Penn State, Carnegie Mellon, and Johns Hopkins.
13:20
SPEAKER_01: And I went to Carnegie Mellon, I didn't care for it.
13:23
SPEAKER_01: So the last it was the last day to decide to say where you're going to school.
13:28
SPEAKER_01: And I still hadn't decided between the other two.
13:30
SPEAKER_01: And my mom, I guess there was something going on at school that day that I really wanted to do.
13:35
SPEAKER_01: And my mom's like, uh, you're not going to school till you decide.
13:38
SPEAKER_01: So um for a flip of a coin, I went to Johns Hopkins.
13:45
SPEAKER_01: And I started off with the intention of studying biomedical engineering and computer science.
13:55
SPEAKER_01: Well, that grew old quick.
13:57
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's not fishing in water necessarily.
14:00
SPEAKER_01: So wait till you hear what this is just kismet, what happened.
14:06
SPEAKER_01: So I knew I didn't want to do this.
14:09
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm just walking the halls of the various buildings and I was in the school of engineering.
14:17
SPEAKER_01: And I'm in what we would call, I'm gonna file this up right away, Ken.
14:22
SPEAKER_01: Okay, all right.
14:24
SPEAKER_01: Doggy, which is was the Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering, which now I think it's been restructured.
14:31
SPEAKER_01: I don't even think doggy exists anymore.
14:33
SPEAKER_01: But I'm walking through there and I stop and on the wall is a huge picture of Chicky's Rock.
14:43
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
14:45
SPEAKER_01: And this older guy comes up to me and he puts his arm around my, you see that?
14:51
SPEAKER_01: That's the largest exposed incline this side of the Mississippi.
14:57
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, I know.
14:59
SPEAKER_01: He's like, how do you know?
15:01
SPEAKER_01: Like, uh, I grew up like less than a mile from there.
15:04
SPEAKER_01: I took this as a sign from God that this was my department to go to.
15:09
SPEAKER_01: That man was Red's Woolman.
15:12
SPEAKER_01: He has since passed, but because I think he was 70s or 80s when I was there.
15:16
SPEAKER_01: He became my advisor.
15:17
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
15:18
SPEAKER_01: He's the one who, in the field of geomorphology, developed what pebble counting.
15:23
SPEAKER_01: And this is how we can tell by what size pebbles and where they are in a stream, we can tell how that stream is going to move, what its history was.
15:31
SPEAKER_01: It's a fascinating thing and it is standard now.
15:34
SPEAKER_01: Everyone does a pebble count.
15:37
SPEAKER_01: A thing that was kind of running parallel to this was when I was in college, I um was an ROTC.
15:44
SPEAKER_01: And unfortunately, when like I was expecting to be uh commissioned as a second lieutenant in the army, for some reason the army doesn't want people with like seriously dysfunctional digestive tracts.
15:59
SPEAKER_01: So I kind of had the rug pulled out from under me there.
16:03
SPEAKER_01: But talking with Reds and stuff, I decided I would go to grad school instead.
16:09
SPEAKER_01: Uh another thing that was happening kind of simultaneously with that is summers I did internships.
16:15
SPEAKER_01: Um well uh specifically I interned at the at the county of Lancaster here and I worked in um the Geographic Information Systems Department, GIS.
16:28
SPEAKER_01: You can use that now, by the way.
16:29
SPEAKER_01: Okay, yeah.
16:30
SPEAKER_01: See, it's it's like boom.
16:32
SPEAKER_01: Um and the Planning Commission.
16:35
SPEAKER_01: Um, and I had some people there who gave me just great inspiration.
16:40
SPEAKER_01: Um, Jay Parrish, who was head of the GIS department, who then went up to the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.
16:49
SPEAKER_00: He's on it.
16:50
SPEAKER_01: He was a geological survey there, and when I went to grad school, he took me with him.
16:54
SPEAKER_01: But um, and then at the Planning Commission, Scott Standish and Mike Doman, and I got to experience so many things I really liked planning, largely because of this like complete attention deficit disorder brain.
17:09
SPEAKER_01: Planning is amazing because you get to do a little bit of everything.
17:14
SPEAKER_01: So I decided to go to graduate school for planning.
17:18
SPEAKER_01: So I went to the University of Pennsylvania for that, ended up coming out with a degree, a master of city planning with a concentration in environmental planning.
17:26
SPEAKER_01: And there I had another amazing professor, John Keane.
17:30
SPEAKER_01: He wasn't just a professor, he so he taught city planning, but he taught the law classes there because he was a lawyer by training.
17:38
SPEAKER_01: I think he went to Harvard as uh a degree in law, and he did planning law, land use law, and environmental law.
17:46
SPEAKER_01: And I I I hit it off immediately with Professor Keane, and he, very pertinent to Lancaster County, he had a huge focus on ag preservation.
17:58
SPEAKER_01: And he was the one who basically refined the notion of what we would call transfer of development rights, TDR, as a mechanism for agricultural preservation.
18:10
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
18:11
SPEAKER_01: Now, TDR is the way it works.
18:13
SPEAKER_01: So if you have a property, property, we kind of might we often think of it as one thing, but it's really in legal terms what we would call a bundle of rights.
18:22
SPEAKER_01: And those could be things like you have the right to occupy that area, you have the right to sell it, you have the right to build on it.
18:29
SPEAKER_01: And so TDR, it's that last right I talked about the right to build, the development rights.
18:35
SPEAKER_01: So every property kind of has those.
18:38
SPEAKER_01: Well, we can kind of look at that not just as fixed to that property, but something we can move around and transfer.
18:44
SPEAKER_01: So what you do is if you want to preserve anything, but we'll talk about farms right here.
18:48
SPEAKER_01: So this farm, we don't want it to be developed, but it has the development potential and those development rights.
18:54
SPEAKER_01: Well, you could then sell those to someone somewhere else.
18:58
SPEAKER_01: Now you need two agreeable communities, one where they're willing to sell it, two, a community that's willing to receive it.
19:04
SPEAKER_01: But for example, here, let's say there's a farm in East Onegal Township.
19:09
SPEAKER_01: That farmer could technically develop 100 units.
19:13
SPEAKER_01: Well, we have the city of Lancaster and we have an agreement that says, hey, you know, if this these people develop this site over here in the city, we'll let you sell them those units and they can add an additional hundred units to that site.
19:27
SPEAKER_01: And it's really neat because I mean, it's wonderful what we have going on here with the Agricultural Preserve Board and Lancaster Farmland Trust LFT.
19:36
SPEAKER_01: I'm really just leaning into this acronym thing.
19:39
SPEAKER_01: I'm writing them down.
19:43
SPEAKER_01: So it's really, I mean, they do great things, but they're essentially they're buying things and holding on to them, using their money.
19:50
SPEAKER_01: Right here, if you use these TDRs, you have a market mechanism to do this where you don't need to use tax dollars.
19:57
SPEAKER_01: It helps in that way too, because suddenly plainsect farmers who may be a little more reluctant to take money from a government source.
20:05
SPEAKER_01: This is this is just a business transaction.
20:07
SPEAKER_01: Now, it's tricky, and this has been the pitfall that a lot of TDRs fall into.
20:12
SPEAKER_01: You really need to someone to really maintain this and do the accounting and do it well.
20:17
SPEAKER_01: So there is there's baggage that comes with it.
20:20
SPEAKER_01: But anyway, Professor Keene kind of crafted that.
20:24
SPEAKER_01: And so for a while, I went and was working as a municipal planner.
20:29
SPEAKER_01: Uh my last job in municipal planning, I was the chief planner for the city of Easton, Pennsylvania, up in the Lehigh Valley.
20:37
SPEAKER_01: Great town.
20:38
SPEAKER_01: But I got to the point where after 10 years of working in that field, I was just like, you know, I don't I don't want to be municipal things anymore.
20:47
SPEAKER_01: So then I went to do doctoral work at Lehigh in environmental science.
20:53
SPEAKER_01: And unfortunately, those same things that uh turned the army off of me, it kind of started having those problems again, had to actually leave my doctoral work, take care of my health.
21:03
SPEAKER_01: It's important to look after your thankfully now, then after some time, some surgery, medication changes, and things, feeling great.
21:13
SPEAKER_01: And so I kind of like, do I want to go back into the PhD program or do some of that?
21:19
SPEAKER_01: Because it is stressful.
21:21
SPEAKER_01: Or do I want to do something else for a bit?
21:24
SPEAKER_01: So I decided, okay, I'm gonna go back to do some work.
21:27
SPEAKER_01: I was doing some consultant work originally with Lehigh Valley Planning Commission, LVPC.
21:34
SPEAKER_01: Uh my my boss who was there from Easton, she's now the director, Becky Bradley of the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission.
21:40
SPEAKER_01: And she knew kind of she knew everything.
21:43
SPEAKER_01: We've been good friends for quite some time.
21:45
SPEAKER_01: And she's like, Yeah, yeah, look, I'll I'll hire you as a consultant, you know, kind of get you back into doing this.
21:51
SPEAKER_01: Um and I was commuting from Marietta to Allentown every day, which was a bear.
21:58
SPEAKER_01: And that's when I saw this.
22:00
SPEAKER_01: Opening for Chesapeake Bay Foundation or CBF.
22:04
SPEAKER_01: Just in case you want to use it later.
22:06
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
22:07
SPEAKER_01: Look at the he's an ally.
22:09
SPEAKER_01: I'm trying to help you out.
22:10
SPEAKER_01: I know.
22:10
SPEAKER_01: I came in here thinking this is going to be an adversarial relationship with the shame buzzer.
22:16
SPEAKER_01: But really, he really wants me to succeed.
22:20
SPEAKER_01: I do.
22:20
SPEAKER_01: I do actually.
22:22
SPEAKER_01: Either that or he's playing the long game with this ruse.
22:25
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
22:26
SPEAKER_01: And the thing is, so started working this job, and I absolutely love it.
22:30
SPEAKER_01: So it was it it really took a lot of wind out of the sails for doing the doctoral work then.
22:37
SPEAKER_01: Um because I don't need it to do what I'm doing now.
22:41
SPEAKER_01: At some point, I may try to find a way to kind of integrate that into the work I'm doing so could get the degree.
22:47
SPEAKER_01: Because man, making people call me Dr.
22:49
SPEAKER_01: Gish when they don't want to, that just especially if I did stuff because we cover the acronym GIS.
22:57
SPEAKER_01: Dr.
22:58
SPEAKER_01: Gish, because you can't spell GISH without GIS.
23:01
SPEAKER_01: Nice.
23:03
SPEAKER_01: She's heard it before.
23:04
SPEAKER_01: I like that one.
23:05
SPEAKER_01: I like that one.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: I was waiting for it to show up.
23:09
SPEAKER_01: So I mean, and that's what's kind of the roundabout way that it got here.
23:12
SPEAKER_00: In 2018-2019, Brian, you and I got to work together almost daily.
23:17
SPEAKER_00: We worked together as co-leads for writing the well, get really gathering feedback to write the Lancaster Countywide Action Plan or the CAP.
23:27
SPEAKER_00: So tell us about that process for you.
23:30
SPEAKER_00: Why was it important for Chesapeake Bay Foundation to be part of it?
23:34
SPEAKER_00: But also why Lancaster's was so important.
23:37
SPEAKER_01: Well, first to say co-lead, she did the heavy lifting, um, even though it said co-leads.
23:44
SPEAKER_01: Um yeah.
23:46
SPEAKER_00: Not true.
23:46
SPEAKER_01: But no, that process was so important for a number of reasons.
23:50
SPEAKER_01: Um but it it was in a way, it was terrifying at a certain level because here they take, and I'm gonna I will tell people this day in and day out.
23:59
SPEAKER_01: You want to you want a healthy Chesapeake.
24:02
SPEAKER_01: There is no county anywhere in that watershed that's more important than Lancaster.
24:06
SPEAKER_01: Am I biased?
24:07
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
24:07
SPEAKER_01: Am I also right?
24:09
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
24:10
SPEAKER_01: And so what do they do?
24:12
SPEAKER_01: They take the most challenging county that there is to deal with, both in terms of scope and scale.
24:19
SPEAKER_01: And you go, you go first.
24:22
SPEAKER_01: We go first.
24:23
SPEAKER_01: So like we're the ones who have the hardest problem to solve, and we're flying blind, but we had such great partners working hard, just people who really wanted this to come together.
24:36
SPEAKER_01: I think we had just a perfect mix of personalities, of abilities, of knowledge.
24:44
SPEAKER_01: And we also, I think, had a really solid driving sort of ethos or something that we are going to be ambitious and realistic.
24:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
24:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
24:56
SPEAKER_01: We didn't want to just kind of sit in our laurels and not do all we could, but we also didn't want to overpromise and underdeliver.
25:03
SPEAKER_01: So I'm very proud of the work that came out of that.
25:07
SPEAKER_01: And of course, like you have a lot of these things like caps, key is implementation.
25:12
SPEAKER_01: It's only as good as the implementation.
25:14
SPEAKER_01: And along with that, you have to do appropriate tracking, you know, following along with this.
25:19
SPEAKER_01: And I think we built in a lot of mechanisms for that.
25:22
SPEAKER_01: That's true.
25:23
SPEAKER_01: And they were, I remember the Department of Environmental Protection, DEP, they were pleased, like when we kind of came out and said, hey, we want another component in this that's data.
25:35
SPEAKER_01: We weren't required to have something where we are tracking and monitoring and inventorying data.
25:41
SPEAKER_01: We said, You can't do this without that.
25:43
SPEAKER_01: So things like that, I think we stepped up to the challenge.
25:46
SPEAKER_01: And I say we, as a huge Lancaster County water community, did.
25:51
SPEAKER_01: And to have been a part of that, I'm very, very proud.
25:54
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it was right here that, and I have a picture on my phone of this of both Allison and my are hands on the mouse pushing down the sand together simultaneously.
26:08
SPEAKER_01: If you send that to me, I'll put it in the show notes.
26:10
SPEAKER_01: All right.
26:11
SPEAKER_01: I can do that.
26:12
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
26:12
SPEAKER_00: We've had the chance to revise it every two years or so.
26:16
SPEAKER_00: So we can change the BMPs or we can change the number of acres.
26:19
SPEAKER_01: What's a BMP?
26:21
SPEAKER_00: I'm the first one for the buzzer.
26:25
SPEAKER_01: Go ahead, explain what a BMP is.
26:27
SPEAKER_00: I think that's my like badge of honor between the two of you.
26:32
SPEAKER_00: Shame.
26:33
SPEAKER_00: Shame.
26:34
SPEAKER_00: All those best management practices that are included in the countywide action plan, the list of those we could adjust to fit where we are now.
26:45
SPEAKER_00: Like that was written in 2018-2019.
26:48
SPEAKER_00: So what's based on what's changed, based on new data, based on new calculations.
26:53
SPEAKER_00: How does that tool still play such an important role for us in Lancaster?
26:58
SPEAKER_01: Oh, you're asking me.
26:59
SPEAKER_01: I am.
27:00
SPEAKER_00: Because, like you said, implementations.
27:02
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
27:03
SPEAKER_00: Like, you and your team at CVF as others, like you're implementing it.
27:07
SPEAKER_01: Because if you are plans die, they're like sharks.
27:11
SPEAKER_01: They have to keep swimming and moving or they die.
27:14
SPEAKER_01: That's a good analogy.
27:16
SPEAKER_01: Well, I mean, a static plan that doesn't adapt to circumstances, because yeah, you you you put your best effort in up front, but things are you're gonna get things wrong.
27:26
SPEAKER_01: You can't get it all right.
27:27
SPEAKER_01: And if you just kind of just lock into what that original sort of plan was, I forget there's um or some sort of bias they call that.
27:36
SPEAKER_01: I think it's like mission bias that okay, I'm doing this.
27:39
SPEAKER_01: This is because we this is this was the plan.
27:42
SPEAKER_01: And well, you need to kind of look at what's working, what isn't.
27:45
SPEAKER_01: Um, how do we adapt to kind of achieve the goal?
27:50
SPEAKER_01: You may have heard this story before.
27:52
SPEAKER_01: I've been told it's apocryphal that pens don't work in in outer space because you need gravity.
27:58
SPEAKER_01: Um, so NASA developed the astronaut pen where it's in a pressurized ink cartridge so you could write with a pen.
28:05
SPEAKER_01: The Russians used a pencil.
28:07
SPEAKER_01: So the difference between these is what you would call working the problem or working the solution.
28:15
SPEAKER_01: NASA worked the problem.
28:17
SPEAKER_01: They're like, what's the problem?
28:18
SPEAKER_01: A pen won't work in space.
28:20
SPEAKER_01: The Russians, and I don't get me wrong, the Russians did a lot of things that were bizarre and just terrifying.
28:27
SPEAKER_01: But no offense to any Russians who might be listening.
28:30
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
28:31
SPEAKER_01: In this case, though, yeah, they um there's like, it doesn't matter that a pen doesn't work in space.
28:37
SPEAKER_01: What's the solution is how do we write in space.
28:40
SPEAKER_01: So to basically to be able to do that sort of adaptive management of these plans, I think it makes the plan so much stronger.
28:48
SPEAKER_01: It it doesn't in any way weaken it.
28:51
SPEAKER_01: And so we have such, like we said, we have such a heavy lift here.
28:55
SPEAKER_01: We want to give ourselves the tools to be as successful as we can.
28:59
SPEAKER_01: And one of the tools that we have is this reflection, reevaluation and saying, Yeah, we did this, and now we're gonna do it even better.
29:10
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
29:10
SPEAKER_00: So that's really great.
29:12
SPEAKER_00: You you do that a lot.
29:13
SPEAKER_00: Like the cap is one plan that you worked on, but with all of your experience and expertise, and tell us about some of the other watershed planning that you do.
29:22
SPEAKER_01: Certainly.
29:23
SPEAKER_01: I am one of the two senior watershed planners at the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.
29:28
SPEAKER_01: And I do a lot of things, wear a lot of hats, but kind of the most central one is developing watershed plans.
29:35
SPEAKER_01: And the watershed plans we develop, they're called Section 319 plans.
29:40
SPEAKER_01: Uh this relates to a piece of the Clean Water Act, Section 319 under it.
29:47
SPEAKER_01: And underneath that, they have the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, has all these sorts of things, these nine requirements that you really have to like you need to meet these if you want this plan to be approved.
30:01
SPEAKER_01: Things such as um you have to have education components, you have to identify your sources of pollution, you have to identify funding streams, potential funding, among others.
30:12
SPEAKER_01: And if you get all these sort of boxes checked, and they go through a very rigorous review, if you get those checked, there's a pool of money that can only be given to projects in approved 319 plans.
30:24
SPEAKER_01: Now, our plans, I talk about myself and my counterpart Caitlin, who started when I did Caitlin Gogola, who, in our work, she is my better half.
30:33
SPEAKER_01: She is she is the heart, the soul of the work we do.
30:37
SPEAKER_01: And uh, I wouldn't tell her this to her face, of course, but actually I do.
30:42
SPEAKER_01: I tell her all the time because it's like no, she and and part of the reason we were told after we because there were quite a few people who applied for our two positions.
30:51
SPEAKER_01: We were told one of the big reasons that we were hired was they just like we just have this really strong feeling that those two people are going to work well together.
31:00
SPEAKER_01: And we probably work too well together.
31:02
SPEAKER_01: They're like, oh man, what have we created here?
31:05
SPEAKER_01: But we're very complementary to each other's sort of abilities, skill sets.
31:10
SPEAKER_01: Caitlin is really good in developing means of public engagement, things like that.
31:16
SPEAKER_01: I am, well, back from my days when I worked in consulting, um, worked at Ratu.
31:22
SPEAKER_01: I was called the data monkey because I just love data and analysis.
31:27
SPEAKER_01: So you bring those two together, and it's just this very synergistic thing.
31:31
SPEAKER_01: I mean, she is on maternity leave right now, and I constantly pester her, not about work stuff, just about other things, more annoying things than work.
31:40
SPEAKER_01: And so the four plans that are that we've written so far, we have here in Lancaster County, um, Peckway Creek, and the upper Conestog River, the headwaters area of that.
31:51
SPEAKER_01: And then Caitlin, her first one was Half Moon Creek and uh Marsh Creek, both in Center County.
31:58
SPEAKER_01: So it's interesting because uh I'll be honest, uh 319 funding, what is allocated is a pittance.
32:06
SPEAKER_01: I believe it was something, it was under 5 million for the entire Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.
32:11
SPEAKER_01: And you guys know how fast you could eat that up with projects, particularly some of these bigger agricultural ones.
32:17
SPEAKER_01: And when you have a few dozen streams, I mean, so we really say this process that we do this, it isn't just for that, but if I'm going for a different grant, I'm getting money somewhere else.
32:28
SPEAKER_01: I can say, look, check out this plan that we wrote.
32:31
SPEAKER_01: This thing went through this rigorous review from DEP, EPA, both of which were acronyms I've established.
32:38
SPEAKER_01: You have.
32:38
SPEAKER_01: And and we're doing projects in line with this.
32:41
SPEAKER_01: It gives weight to when you apply for those other sources.
32:44
SPEAKER_01: The other side of it is like, so these plans, we do very rigorous analysis in these.
32:50
SPEAKER_01: Because, like we've said, we have limited resources.
32:53
SPEAKER_01: You want to do like you want the biggest bang for your buck.
32:57
SPEAKER_01: You want to be pointed.
32:59
SPEAKER_01: And these plans are the means to do that, to really do that.
33:04
SPEAKER_01: And it combines uh both that analytic side and this human side to kind of saying where are the areas we want to focus.
33:11
SPEAKER_01: And because I can write the most perfect plan in terms of the science, but people don't want to do it, it's gonna go nowhere.
33:20
SPEAKER_01: And conversely, if people want to do a bunch of things that aren't really kind of going to create load reductions, it's like, well, you're spinning your wheels.
33:30
SPEAKER_01: So and we kind of tried, like the cap, we try to build these, and I'm not gonna name individual people and things because I'm gonna miss someone, but talking more in terms of sectors, whether it's folks like us at CBF, nonprofits who are involved in this governmental and quasi-governmental agencies, and even things like people on the outside might not immediately kind of connect to this, but things like Lancaster Farmland Trust.
33:57
SPEAKER_01: Um, and along with them, kind of other ag um sort of focused organizations such as Agribusiness.
34:04
SPEAKER_01: We have that.
34:05
SPEAKER_01: And of course, first and foremost, the citizens who are um would implement this, especially here in Lancaster County, the agricultural community and plainsec community as a subset of that are very important.
34:17
SPEAKER_01: So we feel this this process, it's very valuable to kind of do the deeper dig and not just willy-nilly.
34:25
SPEAKER_01: And and on top of that, so um there was this thingy that came out two years ago.
34:31
SPEAKER_00: Of course, that's a technical term.
34:33
SPEAKER_01: I know the comprehensive evaluation of system response report, yeah, that one Caesar kind of taking a step back and looking like, okay, we've been trying to clean up the Chesapeake for years.
34:47
SPEAKER_01: What's working?
34:47
SPEAKER_01: What isn't?
34:48
SPEAKER_01: And and sort of there what they kind of really kind of identified as an issue is, you know, we're looking at this thing as this whole big problem rather than where are these places where we can have these successes rather than like the big thing that comes up is um the the deep channel in the Chesapeake there.
35:09
SPEAKER_01: And so we kind of as kind of so I remember Caitlin and I were looking at this, we're like, this isn't what we're doing already.
35:17
SPEAKER_01: We break these watersheds down, we do very detailed uh topographic analysis to break bigger watersheds into tiny little basins, and then we focus on them.
35:26
SPEAKER_01: Peckway Creek, there were um 33 basins, we focus on seven.
35:31
SPEAKER_01: And DPA basically told us because I remember while this is at DEP, Scott Heidel, he reviewed my plan and he he told me when he for Peckway, and he said when he saw Peckway on a on his desk, he's like, oh, you've got to be kidding.
35:45
SPEAKER_01: Because the scale, 153 square mile watershed.
35:49
SPEAKER_01: And so watersheds are broken up into these things, hydrologic unit codes or hucks.
35:55
SPEAKER_01: Um, and then in the numeric sort of order, the bigger the number, the smaller the watershed.
36:01
SPEAKER_01: So most of what they do are huck twelves.
36:04
SPEAKER_01: Um, and it's hierarchical.
36:06
SPEAKER_01: The Peckway's a Huck 10.
36:07
SPEAKER_01: And when he saw that, he's just like, why am I even gonna look at this?
36:10
SPEAKER_01: Well, when he got in, he's like, Yeah, this is how you do it.
36:14
SPEAKER_01: You break it down.
36:14
SPEAKER_01: You don't like what do they say?
36:16
SPEAKER_01: How do you eat an elephant?
36:17
SPEAKER_01: One bite at a time.
36:18
SPEAKER_01: So we've taken that approach throughout here.
36:22
SPEAKER_01: And yeah, that's I think really important to making these plans sort of work.
36:27
SPEAKER_01: And yeah, we like it.
36:29
SPEAKER_01: And and I'm not saying this to knock other people's plans, uh, because we have resources and some skill sets that not every organization is gonna have.
36:39
SPEAKER_01: We so many of these plans, you look at them and it's just page after page after page of blocked text.
36:44
SPEAKER_01: And that's all well and good if you're applying for grants, but if you're just some a person not here in the biz, are you gonna read that?
36:54
SPEAKER_01: So we try to make these much more compelling graphically, something that you want to kind of turn the next page, engages you that way.
37:01
SPEAKER_01: So we definitely pull in a design element.
37:04
SPEAKER_00: Make it look pretty.
37:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
37:05
SPEAKER_01: I mean, like me.
37:06
SPEAKER_00: Uh-huh.
37:07
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, gotta have the eye candy.
37:10
SPEAKER_01: Uh that was the other reason I was hired.
37:13
SPEAKER_01: So we we really try as best we can to kind of make this a something that isn't just gonna sit in a shelf and gather dust apart from when someone wants to apply for a grant randomly.
37:23
SPEAKER_01: Like, no, we want people to see this as a tool to get to know your watershed.
37:27
SPEAKER_01: And the the plan itself is just kind of the culmination in doing things like I was really happy this past year as part of Langster Water Week.
37:35
SPEAKER_01: We did the experience the upper conestoga event.
37:38
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
37:38
SPEAKER_01: And um, we did it at Historic Pool Forge, and Dawn up there, she was just wonderful.
37:44
SPEAKER_01: Like, I can't say enough about how much she helped, but we did it during Water Week.
37:49
SPEAKER_01: We had over 200 people were there, Fed and Pizza.
37:52
SPEAKER_01: We had all sorts of different organizations from Trout Unlimited, T U to um conservation districts here, Lancaster Conservancy, all these different groups.
38:04
SPEAKER_01: Kind of just process isn't just about reducing loads, nitrogen, sediment, phosphorus.
38:11
SPEAKER_01: It's also about making this waterway, the creek, important.
38:15
SPEAKER_01: I mean, to the people, like seeing it not as a thing in the community, but a part of the community.
38:21
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
38:21
SPEAKER_01: And those sorts of events are just so great for that.
38:24
SPEAKER_01: Um, because and that's we look at it's a big picture.
38:27
SPEAKER_01: Yes, we have those specific requirements to pass a watershed implementation plan or WIP.
38:34
SPEAKER_01: Um, so we have all those requirements, but we're not going to confine ourselves to that.
38:38
SPEAKER_01: We're going to look bigger.
38:40
SPEAKER_01: So I'm really excited about the next plan that I'm writing.
38:43
SPEAKER_01: Well, the details just came out for the new municipal separate storm sewer system or MS4 permit.
38:50
SPEAKER_01: How can thinking and acting like a watershed help Lancaster as it relates to those requirements?
38:55
SPEAKER_01: Well, here's the thing: like, watersheds do not respect municipal boundaries.
39:01
SPEAKER_01: You know, they go where they want to go.
39:02
SPEAKER_01: True.
39:03
SPEAKER_01: And and so thinking about this from a watershed perspective, I think, is important rather than, and and I'm going to say rather than even looking at MS4 as a regulatory structure.
39:15
SPEAKER_01: We're so focused on checking boxes, doing things.
39:18
SPEAKER_01: And I understand if you're a manager of a municipality, you got to maintain compliance, things like that.
39:23
SPEAKER_01: But I think we really need to start changing our mindset about MS4 to start looking.
39:30
SPEAKER_01: Hey, these things can really benefit us, these projects, not just it's a requirement.
39:35
SPEAKER_01: Right.
39:36
SPEAKER_01: You start looking at things like, well, if you're managing stormwater better, it does so many good things for your community.
39:42
SPEAKER_01: Whether it's flooding, you know, people, if you get water backing up in your basement, if you have combined systems like in Lancaster City, I mean, overflows go into the river.
39:52
SPEAKER_01: Um, also a lot of these projects they can take place and and they sometimes we even create new public open space, things like that.
40:01
SPEAKER_01: So we need to start get out of the mindset of oh, this is something we have to do, and start thinking, oh, this is something we get to do.
40:08
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
40:09
SPEAKER_01: Um, I mean, and there are some interesting things like trying to navigate, if you do look at it at the regulatory side, um, particularly in a place like Lancaster County, trying to reconceptualize, because we we look at a lot of this as purely urban and suburban, these really defined systems, but trying to see, well, are we focused on just meeting certain lines or are we looking to improve water quality?
40:34
SPEAKER_01: And that then pulls in things that are rural, particularly agriculture, into that equation.
40:39
SPEAKER_01: Also, I think like we talked about that municipal boundary issue, like watersheds don't really care about municipal boundaries, looking at those partnerships where municipalities can say we're going in on this together, you know, and rather than kind of this sort of sometimes it's a zero-sum game mentality.
40:58
SPEAKER_01: MS4s are a bit tricky for me because I do these 319 plans.
41:03
SPEAKER_01: And the federal government, they are very careful about not letting you double dip.
41:10
SPEAKER_01: And because these you have federal requirements and different things, they don't really, they aren't super keen on me saying in my plans, stormwater things.
41:19
SPEAKER_01: Like, no, no, no, that's the purview of the MS4, you know.
41:22
SPEAKER_01: Whereas for me, I think, again, I I I'm I'm very much against silos.
41:26
SPEAKER_01: I really like as much as I can getting some integration in here.
41:29
SPEAKER_01: And so I sneak things in.
41:31
SPEAKER_01: And I'm I can't be explicit in the way that I could, for example, saying here are where buffers should go.
41:38
SPEAKER_01: I can talk more generally about it.
41:40
SPEAKER_01: And all of our plans, well, certainly ones I write, I embed a good bit of strategic ambiguity.
41:46
SPEAKER_01: Part of, I mean, and that was part of the incentive of breaking things into these smaller basins because you get these smaller areas.
41:52
SPEAKER_01: I can say, I want things happening in this area, but I don't have to call out a given farm or something.
41:58
SPEAKER_01: Because that instantly changes the dynamic and how that farmer interprets what's being because right now, now I have a federally approved document that says I something has to happen here.
42:09
SPEAKER_01: And that just in Lancaster County, that's you're just setting yourself up for failure if you view it that way.
42:15
SPEAKER_01: But if I say, let's focus in this area, let's do so many miles of stream buffers, let's do so many acres of cover crops, so many acres of no-till.
42:23
SPEAKER_01: And I talk about it in an area.
42:25
SPEAKER_01: Now, these can be small, it could be one square mile, that's 640 acres.
42:30
SPEAKER_01: But it basically takes confrontation out of it.
42:33
SPEAKER_01: And so kind of how all this sort of comes back in with the MS4 and things like that.
42:38
SPEAKER_01: I think just a lot of it we just need to kind of reframe how we're thinking about these things.
42:43
SPEAKER_00: So the good news about the information they've shared so far is that municipalities can be and will be incentivized to put in a new plan for their MS4 permit along with neighboring municipalities.
42:55
SPEAKER_01: As they should.
42:56
SPEAKER_00: Right.
42:56
SPEAKER_00: So we really can design it like a watershed.
42:58
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
42:59
SPEAKER_01: And that's yeah, and that's it's great.
43:01
SPEAKER_01: And then I remember when we first started the CAP, it wasn't always like that.
43:06
SPEAKER_01: No.
43:06
SPEAKER_01: And I'm I'm really glad that they listened to that feedback.
43:09
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
43:09
SPEAKER_00: That's some of the things we said.
43:10
SPEAKER_00: What's going to be different?
43:12
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
43:12
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm I'm that's the type of thing that's encouraging, not just because now there's this other tool, but also shows that, hey, you see something isn't working out, great, bring it up, and changes can happen.
43:24
SPEAKER_01: So yeah.
43:25
SPEAKER_00: Is there anything you want to add related to CBF's Pennsylvania team or goals for the year?
43:30
SPEAKER_01: We have things like education, where they're taking kids out doing things here in Pennsylvania.
43:35
SPEAKER_01: We have our um staff attorney who is working on litigation, also getting bills through um the state legislature.
43:45
SPEAKER_01: But we also have these on the ground people like Ashley, who I mean, Ashley's amazing.
43:50
SPEAKER_01: Think about like I I would love to have someone calculate the number of trees she has planted in Lancaster County over the years.
43:57
SPEAKER_01: I think she knows actually.
44:00
SPEAKER_01: I remember some sort of like talking with her, and there is an estimate of some uh amount.
44:05
SPEAKER_01: Um it's incredible.
44:06
SPEAKER_01: So, but a lot of times, um, as you'll see in any organization, sometimes things get siloed.
44:12
SPEAKER_01: You're not seeing that same amount of integration where people are kind of the left hand isn't necessarily know what the right hand is doing.
44:19
SPEAKER_01: So we're trying to do more integration of that.
44:23
SPEAKER_01: Particularly, you have people such as Caitlin and myself who are doing this planning work.
44:28
SPEAKER_01: You have folks like Ashley and Kristen and someone, a newer employee, Reese, um, who have a long history of actually implementing things, getting practices in there.
44:38
SPEAKER_01: And of course, we have the earmarks teams for the Peckway and Half Moon Creek watersheds.
44:44
SPEAKER_01: So bringing all that together in a more sort of concerted way, more focused way, um, that connects to, and wherever your hand is with that buzzer, keep it away because I'm immediately gonna spell out this thing.
44:58
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I've been sitting there in fear of being acronym shame.
45:04
SPEAKER_01: I'm just waiting to like you're gonna ring the bell and she's just gonna go, shame.
45:10
SPEAKER_01: Shame.
45:12
SPEAKER_01: And there he goes out the door, hanging his hand.
45:15
SPEAKER_01: So we have our four P's.
45:17
SPEAKER_01: So PA four P, and those are plans, partners, priority places, and practices.
45:24
SPEAKER_02: Oh wow.
45:26
SPEAKER_01: What this is, you get these plans in the beginning, things like Caitlin and I do.
45:30
SPEAKER_01: Then the key is to find those key partners that are gonna implement those things.
45:36
SPEAKER_01: And we want them to be in the priority areas.
45:39
SPEAKER_01: We know we have limited resources, we can't do everything.
45:42
SPEAKER_01: It's a matter of getting the right people in the right place to implement the practices that are going to have the biggest impacts.
45:53
SPEAKER_01: And those practices, because of where we are, they tend to be focused on ag areas, which makes sense.
46:00
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
46:01
SPEAKER_01: I found like you can, depending on the person with whom you're having the conversation, you can shut the thing, shut the conversation down by focusing on the bay.
46:11
SPEAKER_01: There's some of the farmers here who've never been to the bay, but a lot of them haven't.
46:15
SPEAKER_01: Right.
46:15
SPEAKER_01: I talk about that, it's it's kind of not real in the same way that I say, hey, you know, right here, this is your stream.
46:23
SPEAKER_01: We want kids to be able to fish in it, swim in it.
46:26
SPEAKER_01: And and that's kind of very much reflected in how we do things here in PA.
46:31
SPEAKER_01: It's like, you know, we make it relevant here, we show the benefits to the people here.
46:35
SPEAKER_01: And so we fight for things here, particularly um our uh our staff attorney in Pennsylvania, Trish Salvia, and then my boss, Harry Campbell.
46:44
SPEAKER_01: They do a lot of work with the legislature.
46:47
SPEAKER_01: Well, how are you approaching beyond 2025?
46:51
SPEAKER_01: Well, I mean, we touched a little bit on the Caesar report, you know, kind of looking, kind of re-sort of conceptualizing how we see the issues we're facing when it comes to the bay.
47:03
SPEAKER_01: We have decades of experience to draw on.
47:06
SPEAKER_01: So it isn't like we're starting from scratch.
47:09
SPEAKER_01: But we also, kind of like we said with the Lancaster County Cap, you need to look what worked, what didn't.
47:14
SPEAKER_01: And I think you need to have a vision that has solutions for everyone, that works for everyone, that everyone benefits from.
47:21
SPEAKER_01: And the other thing is coming from bottom up rather than top down, which is exactly in line with what we did with the cap.
47:29
SPEAKER_01: Sure.
47:30
SPEAKER_01: You know, um, I think those are going to be some important things going forward.
47:34
SPEAKER_01: And I mean, and we're doing Langster County, great things are happening here.
47:38
SPEAKER_01: I have to give you credit, Allison, because I look back from when we started the CAP.
47:42
SPEAKER_01: You've built a very impressive team.
47:44
SPEAKER_00: I'm extremely proud of and excited about the team.
47:48
SPEAKER_01: I work a fair minute with Megan.
47:49
SPEAKER_01: She is amazing.
47:50
SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh.
47:51
SPEAKER_01: She is.
47:52
SPEAKER_00: She keeps so many details, keeps them straight, and just then like dives in on the strategy and then putting pieces together.
47:58
SPEAKER_00: So I'm great.
47:59
SPEAKER_00: I'm so glad that you get to work with her.
48:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
48:01
SPEAKER_01: I mean, and it's just, it's, I don't know, it's that sort of bottom-up.
48:04
SPEAKER_01: These are the things.
48:05
SPEAKER_01: You see these things happening here, and that is what's going to carry us beyond 2025.
48:10
SPEAKER_00: You know, so thanks for your work, Brian.
48:13
SPEAKER_00: It's super, super helpful at the local level with Pennsylvania and then Pennsylvania's role within the bay watershed.
48:20
SPEAKER_01: Great.
48:20
SPEAKER_01: All right.
48:21
SPEAKER_01: There's a rumor, Ken, that your favorite portion of the program is coming up.
48:26
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
48:27
SPEAKER_01: Because I've talked too much and too long.
48:30
SPEAKER_01: It is that time.
48:31
SPEAKER_01: It is trivia time.
48:33
SPEAKER_01: Huzzah! Alrighty.
48:38
SPEAKER_01: Uh, you, as we previously determined, are a fisherman.
48:43
SPEAKER_01: Oh boy.
48:44
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
48:45
SPEAKER_01: So we played a similar game when I believe it was Sally Reynolds who was here.
48:49
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
48:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because she's a bird watcher.
48:51
SPEAKER_01: So I described the bird, she told me what the bird was.
48:54
SPEAKER_01: So I'm gonna describe the fish, you tell me what the fish is.
48:57
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
48:57
SPEAKER_01: Here we go.
48:58
SPEAKER_01: Challenge.
48:59
SPEAKER_01: And away we go.
49:00
SPEAKER_01: This is a freshwater perseform fish native to most of Canada and to the northern United States.
49:07
SPEAKER_01: Uh, it's a close relative of the European Xander.
49:10
SPEAKER_01: Walleye.
49:12
SPEAKER_01: It is a walleye.
49:14
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
49:14
SPEAKER_01: I never would have gotten that, by the way.
49:16
SPEAKER_01: Persiform means perch-like.
49:17
unknown: Aha.
49:18
SPEAKER_01: There you go.
49:19
SPEAKER_01: This is our carnivorous freshwater ray finned fish in the Centrachida family, native to eastern and central United States, Canada, Mexico.
49:31
SPEAKER_01: Very, very common.
49:32
SPEAKER_01: Fishing?
49:33
SPEAKER_01: This is one of the big ones.
49:34
SPEAKER_01: Uh I mean, are we gonna talk about bass?
49:36
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
49:37
SPEAKER_01: Oh, of the largemouth.
49:39
SPEAKER_01: They actually they're in the Susquehanna, they are not native to it.
49:42
SPEAKER_01: Hmm.
49:43
SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
49:44
SPEAKER_01: So where are they native to?
49:46
SPEAKER_01: Uh, Mississippi drainage and the Great Lakes drainage.
49:50
SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
49:50
SPEAKER_01: They've been introduced along with the smallmouth, which is kind of like a cornerstone species now in Susquehanna.
49:56
SPEAKER_01: Well, there are two types of this species in North American fresh waters in the genus Pomoxis.
50:02
SPEAKER_01: Both are popular game fish among recreational anglers.
50:05
SPEAKER_01: Oh goodness.
50:07
SPEAKER_01: Um that's tricky.
50:08
SPEAKER_01: Those are the sunfishes, so it would um, I don't know if you're talking about, because it could be a couple things, I think, like a crappie, it could be You got it.
50:17
unknown: Woo!
50:18
SPEAKER_02: There you go.
50:18
SPEAKER_01: Woo! This is also known as a preacher.
50:23
SPEAKER_01: This freshwater persiform fish, native to much of North America, was described in 1814 by Samuel Lathan Mitchell.
50:32
SPEAKER_01: So persiforms, that narrows it down to it could be something like a perch.
50:36
SPEAKER_01: Oh, a yellow perch.
50:37
SPEAKER_01: It is this uh species of large freshwater predatory fish native to North America and is actually known for a shortened version of its name.
50:51
SPEAKER_01: It's a muskelunge or muskie.
50:53
SPEAKER_01: It is a musky.
50:54
SPEAKER_01: I believe that is the genus Essox.
50:58
SPEAKER_01: Uh species of carnivorous fish in the genus Esox.
51:02
SPEAKER_01: They are commonly found um in moderately salty in fresh waters in the northern hemisphere.
51:07
SPEAKER_01: Um, well, Esoks then, it's gonna be the pike family, so it could be a northern pike.
51:12
SPEAKER_01: It is, yeah.
51:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
51:14
SPEAKER_01: We're a pickerel.
51:16
SPEAKER_01: This species of freshwater fish is in the charred genus.
51:21
SPEAKER_01: Is it brook trout?
51:22
SPEAKER_01: It is brook trout.
51:23
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for thank you for not making me go.
51:26
SPEAKER_01: Let's do one more.
51:27
SPEAKER_01: Let's do one more.
51:28
SPEAKER_01: Uh first discovered in 1962, this fish was described as similar to a combination of a carpet of tuna.
51:34
SPEAKER_01: This flatbush fish is native to waters around New York and is known to congregate with crabs.
51:40
SPEAKER_01: Oh dear goodness.
51:42
SPEAKER_01: Um you're talking about the salt.
51:46
SPEAKER_01: Jimmy Buffett?
51:47
SPEAKER_01: No.
51:48
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
51:49
SPEAKER_01: I'm sure it's some pun thing coming out of this, but I don't know, flatbush.
51:54
SPEAKER_01: That is the incredible Mr.
51:56
SPEAKER_01: Limpet.
51:58
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
51:59
SPEAKER_01: Oh wow.
52:01
SPEAKER_01: Is this am I gonna get shame, shame for not knowing that?
52:05
SPEAKER_01: No, no, I'm shame, shame.
52:06
SPEAKER_01: Uh, folks, Uncle Ken is showing his age.
52:09
SPEAKER_01: Uh that was a Don Knotts movie from 1966.
52:13
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
52:14
SPEAKER_01: There you go.
52:15
SPEAKER_01: I was actually describing him as in his fish form.
52:18
SPEAKER_01: I just mentioned Don Knotts and Phyllis Diller to people in our teams chat at work uh a couple days ago.
52:23
SPEAKER_00: And they all probably went, Who?
52:25
SPEAKER_01: Harry loved it.
52:26
SPEAKER_00: Oh.
52:27
unknown: Yeah.
52:28
SPEAKER_00: Okay, fair enough.
52:29
SPEAKER_01: Oh my goodness.
52:30
SPEAKER_01: That's it.
52:31
SPEAKER_01: That's our show.
52:33
SPEAKER_01: We've hit the max.
52:34
SPEAKER_01: We're done.
52:35
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for allowing me to punish you this week.
52:38
SPEAKER_01: I imagine this, if I'm not mistaken, is coming out around Groundhog Day.
52:42
SPEAKER_00: Around that time.
52:43
SPEAKER_01: The fourth, I believe, is when we're going to be able to do it.
52:45
SPEAKER_01: Well, hope you had a good one, you woodchuck chuckers.
52:49
SPEAKER_01: Rise and shine.
52:50
SPEAKER_01: Thank you, Brian, for coming in.
52:52
SPEAKER_01: You you you educated the heck out of us, to tell you what, and entertained us as well.
52:57
SPEAKER_01: I do my best.
52:58
SPEAKER_00: Brian, thank you for what you do and the way that you bring Lancaster's story to Pennsylvania.
53:03
SPEAKER_01: Thank you for letting me tell that story.
53:05
SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate it.
53:06
SPEAKER_00: Always.
53:07
SPEAKER_01: Well, folks, we will be back in just a couple of weeks.
53:11
SPEAKER_01: Until then, take care.
53:17
SPEAKER_01: This episode of Clean Water Conversations is sponsored by Chesapeake Conservancy.
53:22
SPEAKER_01: Conserve, restore, and empower with data.
53:26
SPEAKER_01: And produced by Lancaster Clean Water Partners, striving for clean and clear waterways by 2040.
53:32
SPEAKER_01: If you have comments or suggestions for show topics or are interested in becoming a sponsor, please contact us at info at Lancaster Cleanwater Partners dot com.
53:41
SPEAKER_01: Thanks for listening.