Three Eastern Shore River Associations Combine Into ShoreRivers

A Star Democrat article (2017-11-21) announced the combination of three Eastern Shore water quality groups into a single regional entity. The article stated that the Midshore Riverkeeper Conservancy, the Chester River Association, and the Sassafras River Association were combining into ShoreRivers. The  new organization will continue to focus on local water quality and ecosystem issues. The article stated that ShoreRivers will be based near the Eastern Shore Conservation Center in Easton. The new Executive Director of ShoreRivers is Jeff Horstman.

From the article:

Horstman said that by merging together, the three organizations “become more than just the sum of our parts,” and will now be afforded a larger, single voice for policy influence and “more capacity to enact a program and more potential to undertake larger regional … pollution reduction systems.” …

“We maintain our commitment to our local communities by maintaining strong riverkeeper programs that project specific rivers, but by coming together as a team, we can now apply ourselves as regional experts, regional specialists to combat system-wide issues, regional pollution issues that endemic to our rivers,” Horstman said. “Our new consolidated ShoreRivers voice represents our native Eastern Shore environmental concerns, our voices from businesses, farmers, families and diverse community members. Together, we are 100 percent committed to our vision of healthy waterways across the Eastern Shore.”

According to the article, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan’s Chief of Staff Jeannie Haddawy-Riccio and Secretary of Staff Natural Resources Mark Belton were guest speakers at the formal announcement of ShoreRivers formation on November 17, 2017.

Learn more about how Maryland and the counties are addressing water quality, climate change, and land use issues at the 2017 MACo Winter Conference, December 6-8, at the Hyatt Regency Chesapeake Bay Hotel in Cambridge, Maryland.

Learn more about MACo’s 2017 Winter Conference: