The issue was a ban on hydraulic clam dredging in the coastal bays near Ocean City.
State Sen. Lowell Stoltzfus, a Republican who represents the area, said the ban represented bad science and bad economics ? but his own opposition to it was not exactly good politics.
Stoltzfus was particularly irked that he was able to kill a similar Senate bill just days before, but the House version (HB 964) was resurrected, and given preliminary approval Friday in a 29-18 vote. He blamed Senate President Thomas Mike Miller for working against him, and showing disrespect for both him and “local courtesy,” the custom by which deference is giving to the wishes of local legislators on local matters.
However, the bill was sponsored by two Democratic delegates from Stoltzfus?s district: Norman Conway, chairman of the Appropriations Committee, and James Mathias, the former mayor of Ocean City. Sen. Roy Dyson, D-St. Mary?s, the floor leader, said, “Ocean City belongs to all of us,” and the shallow coastal bays are not like the Chesapeake.
Hydraulic dredging for little neck clams is “a terrible practice in the coastal bays,” Dyson said, and it is banned by neighboring Delaware and Virginia. The Wicomico County Commissioners opposed the practice.
Stoltzfus quoted extensively from an environmental report that said the practice caused little damage beyond the typical wave action caused by the wind and passing motorboats.
“It doesn?t do lasting damage,” Stoltzfus said. “Boats dig deeper tracks, nature itself stirs up sediment.”
Stoltzfus said the ban would economically impact “a lot of people and lot of families,” not just three commercial dredgers proponents cited.
He also acknowledged that a poll by the Salisbury Daily Times found that 60 percent of the voters on the Lower Eastern Shore opposed the dredging. “It?s not beneficial to me politically,” he said. “It?s my political heat to take.”
Miller denied he had “buttonholed” individual senators on the legislation, but he did discuss it with his committee chairman after the Senate version failed.
“It?s an important environmental bill,” Miller said. “It?s not a local bill.”
A final vote is expected this week, and if the House bill passes the Senate, it goes to the governor for signature.
