John Sarbanes: “We need to rebuild the country. We are up to the task if we are given the tools and the leadership to do that.”

This bill takes important steps to support the ongoing restoration of the Chesapeake Bay by reauthorizing NOAA's Chesapeake Bay Office and authorizing the agency's long-running Bay Watershed Education and Training, or B-WET Grant program.

Without the strong and continued investment the EPA has requested for the Chesapeake Bay Program in fiscal year 2024, the risk is we could jeopardize decades of work in collaboration towards the Bay's restoration.

But these are dramatic changes that can bring us to a new place and, I think, have given many people a sense of hope instead of despair in the face of what we are seeing with a warming planet.

They want to be on the field of their democracy. They want to feel like they have some power within their own democracy.