Maryland And Delaware Sign Nanticoke River Restoration Agreement

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In 2008, Maryland Department of Natural Resources Secretary John R. Griffin and Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control Secretary John A. Hughes met on the Delmarva Peninsula to sign an agreement supporting a bi-state effort to ensure long-term stewardship of the Nanticoke River.

Local, state and regional land conservation leaders gathered to celebrate the proposed preservation of 275+ acres to implement the town’s planned greenbelt along its western and southern borders. Purchase of the farmland with $4.3 million of Program Open Space funds is pending approval from the Maryland Board of Public Works, which is scheduled to review the transaction on June 11.

Joining Maryland Department of Natural Resources Secretary Griffin and Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control Secretary Hughes in signing the historic agreement were Charlie Stek, president of the Friends of the Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail and John Maounis, superintendent of the National Park Service’s Captain John Smith Trail and Chesapeake Bay Gateways Network.

The Nanticoke River flows through a variety of biologically diverse natural habitats including maritime forests, expansive Atlantic white cedar and bald cypress wetlands, and globally rare plant and wildlife species.

Extending approximately 63 miles from its headwaters in Sussex County, Del. to its mouth at Tangier Sound, Dorchester County, Md., the Nanticoke River is the largest Chesapeake Bay tributary on the Delmarva Peninsula.

Residents and visitors revere and treasure the Nanticoke watershed for its rural, natural landscape, which remains characteristic of its appearance when Captain Smith explored the river 400 years ago in June 1608.

At the request of DNREC, the National Park Service is designating the Nanticoke River as connector gateway in the Chesapeake Bay Gateways Network. The Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail will be most fully experienced by watercraft and at public water access sites.

Visit DNREC’s website www.dnrec.delaware.gov to view the Nanticoke Partnership Agreement.

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