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02/26/2020 06:00 AMFrom his bait and tackle shop on the banks of the East River in Madison, Captain “Cap” Jerry Morgan doles out advice, both as a shop owner and as a columnist for his local newspaper, about what to use for bait and lures, and where to go to find the bite. When he’s not working, he volunteers locally as a wetlands commissioner, and for a variety of state and national organizations that monitor fish populations and the health of the waters from Maine to Florida that sustain those fish.
Cap Morgan has seen Long Island Sound at its worst and at its best.
The worst was in the 1970s and 1980s, when some parts of the Sound were so polluted that some worried it might never recover. Some areas were so low in oxygen that they could no longer sustain shellfish or fish. Beaches were closed for large parts of the summer. Sewage, toxic industrial chemicals, heavy metals, and floating garbage in some coastal areas became the norm.
There were days, he admits, when he sometimes would reluctantly say this about his beloved Sound to those seeking advice: “I wouldn’t let my dog swim in it.”
A variety of local, state, and national initiatives and the hard work of hundreds of stakeholders and volunteers managed to turn that around over the course of several decades. While far from pristine, Long Island Sound is recovering. Now, when Morgan looks out at the Sound, this is what he sees: “It’s fragile.”
So, when he heard about something called The Blue Plan was in the works, he became one of hundreds of volunteers, experts, and officials working to create something called a marine spatial resource that would support both economic development and environmental conservation.
How can one resource serve both at the same time? Those who were involved in its development say it can serve both masters because at the core of The Blue Plan is a reverence for Long Island Sound, and its value both as an ecological resource and for human uses, and the fundamental legal tenet, based upon common law public trust doctrine, that it is owned by the states of Connecticut and New York in trust for the public for uses that include fishing, boating, bathing, and even gathering seaweed.
What’s clear is that it is a beloved resource that improves the quality of life for those lucky enough to live here. It also contributes more than $9 billion to the regional economy and more than 23 million people who live within 50 miles of Long Island Sound’s shores.
The problem?
“Long Island Sound...runs the risk of being ‘loved to death,’” The Blue Plan says.
“The Blue Plan is not something that says you can or can’t do something. It’s there to lay the table,” Morgan says. “Then, if there are conflicts that arise, we’re all working with the same information.”
‘The Silent 500-lb Gorilla in the Room’
When it comes to the potential for conflict, here’s an example. If the past is any guide, the Blue Plan and the information in it could prove invaluable as New England states look to leverage investments in clean energy.
“An example of new development pressure can be seen in the ocean areas in our neighboring states of Rhode Island and Massachusetts, where alternative energy facilities like offshore wind turbine installations are being proposed and constructed,” the final draft of The Blue Plan says. “While the waters of Long Island Sound will not likely experience this same offshore wind development pressure (believe it or not, it isn’t windy enough), there could be the potential for cables associated with these neighboring wind proposals to enter the Sound. In addition to energy uses, other new uses are proposed in Long Island Sound every day.”
The energy industry is—as Ben Goetsch of Branford noted during The Blue Plan’s 90-day public comment period in early 2019—”the silent 500-pound gorilla in the room.”
In addition to the wind turbine projects being developed in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, the offshore wind industry is becoming a really big deal in Connecticut, as well.
In early February, the Connecticut Port Authority approved a redevelopment plan worth in excess of $150 million that will turn State Pier in New London into a staging area for the offshore wind energy industry, according to an article in The Day. Connecticut Governor Ed Lamont was quoted in the article as saying “Connecticut can be the Saudi Arabia of wind power.”
The State Pier project is a joint venture of Ørsted U.S. Offshore Wind and Eversource. The joint venture also has contracts to provide power both to Rhode Island and Connecticut through a project called Revolution Wind, a regional energy project that includes a windfarm in the works in federal waters halfway between Montauk, New York and Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts.
Christian Fox, an employee of The Nature Conservancy who helped coordinate the development of The Blue Plan, explained that The Blue Plan will not apply to The State Pier project. The Blue Plan applies only to the deeper waters of Long Island Sound. Harbors like The State Pier in New London were specifically “clipped out” of The Blue Plan. The same is true of the harbors in New Haven and Bridgeport.
“There are already a lot of coastal management programs that apply to those areas,” Fox says. “There are harbormasters. And there is the Connecticut coastal management process.”
The Blue Plan picks up where those programs leave off, by providing vetted information to potential developers, regulators, and environmentalists about where various resources are located.
For example, if someone makes a proposal to run cables through Long Island Sound, “that’s exactly where the information in The Blue Plan would be useful,” Fox says. “If we are going to have cables in Long Island Sound, those developers need to know what’s out there, and what to avoid. The Blue Plan means everyone is reading from the same playbook, using the same information to make the best decision possible. If it does make sense for something to come through Long Island Sound, where does it make sense to put it so that it does not create conflict with what is already there?”
There are only so many areas along the Eastern seaboard where you can land the kinds of cables that will be coming from those wind farms, Fox says, and some of those places are in Connecticut.
The Last Time We Had This Conversation
The last conversation about cables in Long Island Sound took place when the 24-mile long, 330-megawatt Cross-Sound Cable was dropped into the Sound in 2002, connecting the electric transmission grids of New England and Long Island, New York. Some Connecticut officials fought it, saying the cable was improperly buried. Others feared it was designed to benefit power-hungry Long Island at the expense of Connecticut.
While competing interests duked it out, the cable lay dormant. Then in August 2003, federal officials ordered it activated in the wake of the great Northeast blackout, which affected more than 50 million people in eight states and Canada. After the cable was up and running, the bad feelings and name-calling escalated.
An article in September 2003 in The New York Times quoted people from Long Island, who said the concerns of Connecticut were “garbage” and that those who objected to the cable were “a bunch of hammerheads.”
Connecticut residents were quoted expressing concerns about Connecticut oyster beds, and insisting that Long Islanders, those greedy power hogs, send “free bushels of seafood,” because of the potential for damage to fisheries around New Haven and East Haven.
It was hardly a constructive conversation.
Then there was the Broadwater Energy proposal, which was to be a 1,200-foot-long facility about 10 miles south of New Haven, near Branford, for liquified natural gas. Part of the proposal was a 22-mile pipeline that would have run through Long Island Sound. After the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission issued a permit for the project in 2008, it was beaten back several times until Broadwater Energy said in 2012 that it was abandoning the project.
In 2015, the legislation that led to the creation of The Blue Plan was introduced and passed, with a charge of developing an inventory of human uses and natural resources that could serve as a resource during permitting and decision-making.
The goal of the Blue Plan, which is currently before the state’s legislature’s Environment Committee, and which is scheduled to be submitted for approval before the entire legislature this session, is to create a common resource that all parties can use to avoid conflicts before they degenerate into name-calling, protests, and failed projects as one possible outcome and damage to the environment as another.
Fox, from The Nature Conservancy, who spends his spare time scuba diving, fishing, and sailing on Long Island Sound, says The Blue Plan provides information about significant human uses—including commercial fishing, aquaculture, shipping lanes, important sailing areas, and dive sites—along with ecologically significant uses—including hard bottom sea floors, eel grass, and species of concern including fish and birds and other marine wildlife.
Anyone interested in finding out what is where can access an online map viewer that’s been developed, and they can zoom in and zoom out to see the resources that have been identified.
“The Blue Plan, at its core, provides information and guidance,” he says. “There has never been anything like this gathered before for Long Island Sound. No matter who you are, no matter what your interest, you can use it if your work involves Long Island Sound.”
Fox calls it a “win, win, win” for existing uses, for the ecosystem, and for new sustainable development.
He comes back to the cables.
“We have seen cables create a lot of conflict in the past,” he says. “Even so, a cable coming into the Sound might be something we need. It might allow us to meet greenhouse gas reduction goals. But we want to make sure it’s done in a way that isn’t hurting the environment while it’s helping the environment. The Blue Plan could help make sure it’s placed in the best spot possible, in a way that doesn’t impact, for example, aquaculture and habitats. The Blue Plan is not about picking winners and losers, it’s about having knowledge about what’s out there.”
The Blue Plan, ideally, will allow recreational fishermen and those who understand the value of a complex seafloor and cold water corals to have a conversation with, say, a 500-pound gorilla, allowing everyone to be heard before decisions are made.
“One of the core tenets of putting this together is that no one thing is more important than that other thing. Long Island Sound is a public trust that belongs to everyone,” Fox says.
How Government is Supposed to Work
State Senator Christine Cohen, who represents Branford, Durham, Guilford, Killingworth, Madison, and North Branford, as co-chair of the Connecticut General Assembly’s Environment Committee helped develop The Blue Plan. She is now helping shepherd it through the rest of the legislative process, which includes incorporating public comment and then putting it to a vote.
The public commenting period allowed the plan developers to take into consideration input from a wide range of experts and others who care about Long Island Sound. Comments came in from an Ivoryton resident concerned about the impacts of a warming climate on eelgrass, from Branford residents wondering if the plan addresses current conflicts, from a North Branford resident who correctly noted the location of the Farm River, and from other Branford residents who took issue with a variety of issues, including several typos. The comments were taken into consideration, and some resulted in changes.
Cohen notes that The Blue Plan process includes annual hearings going forward, and that it will be a living document. She anticipates it will be approved with little to no opposition, in part because of the wide net cast when information was collected and included in the plan. She is proud of the collaborative process that created the plan, saying “this is how government is supposed to work.”
“Water plays such an incredible and important role in our ecosystem,” she says. “I grew up inland, but we always drove to the beach when I was a kid. I moved to the Sound area in 2001. I was just completely drawn to it. I wanted my kids to be raised around the water. I grew up fishing and boating and doing all the things we love to do in the Sound. We want our children to have the same opportunities.”
She says she welcomes continued feedback from constituents on The Blue Plan, and other legislation affecting the environment.
“We are here to represent the people of Connecticut and we want their voices to be heard,” she says.
Morgan also hopes it will benefit all stakeholders who value the Sound. He says it’s all about balance.
“Too much of anything will take us back to what we were before,” he says, referring to the bad old days when the Sound was sick and suffering. “The Sound is a resource worth saving for future generations.”
For more information about The Blue Plan, visit www.ct.gov/deep/, and in the search box in the upper right hand corner, type “Blue Plan.” For more information about the ongoing process in the legislature, contact Sen. Cohen’s office at www.senatedems.ct.gov/cohen-contact.