Forested Lands

Retaining and expanding Chesapeake forests is a critical, cost-effective way to reduce pollution and help restore the Bay. Forests are the most beneficial land use for protecting water quality, as they absorb pollution from the air and capture, filter and retain pollutants in runoff. Investing in sustainable forestry will also help address challenges like sprawl, climate change and energy independence.

Current Restoration Goal

In December 2007, the Chesapeake Executive Council committed to conserve and restore the forests of the Bay watershed by:

• Permanently protecting an additional 695,000 acres of forest from conversion to other land uses by 2020, targeting forests in areas of highest water quality value. As part of this goal, 266,400 acres of forest land under threat of conversion will be protected by 2012.
• Working with local governments, legislative delegations, land trusts and other stakeholders by 2010 to develop dedicated sources of funding to conserve forests important to water quality. Where possible, the states will support these sources through incentive programs like matching grants.
• Establishing and implementing mechanisms to track and assess forest land cover change at the county and township level every five years by 2009. These mechanisms will also be delivered to local governments, watershed groups and other partners.

Riparian Forest Buffer Restoration

Bay Program partners have set a separate goal to restore riparian forest buffers. The partners are roughly on track to meet their 2003 expanded restoration goal of 10,000 miles of forest buffers by 2010. Approximately 5,337 miles had been restored through August 2006.

The 2007 Forest Conservation Initiative also commits the partners to reaching a riparian forest buffer restoration rate of 900 miles per year, until 70 percent of all stream miles in the Bay watershed are buffered over the long term.

Urban Tree Canopy Goals

Maryland, Virginia and Pennsylvania, as well as Washington, D.C., have each involved local urban and suburban communities in setting tree canopy cover goals. Urban tree canopy—the layer of trees covering the ground when viewed from above—is a good indicator of the amount and quality of forests in cities, suburbs and towns.

Under the 2007 Forest Conservation Initiative, the Bay Program committed to accelerating reforestation and conservation in urban and suburban areas by increasing the number of communities with tree canopy expansion goals to 120 by 2020.