Comp plan update must protect Delaware waterways

Consultants gathering information to update Sussex County's comprehensive land-use plan say that as of 2012, about 11.3 percent of county land had been developed, while 84 percent remained undeveloped or in agriculture.

That number doesn't sound worrisome – until it's paired with a new report from the Center for the Inland Bays.

Developed land brings with it more roofs and more roads, impervious surfaces where water cannot soak in and instead runs off, carrying pollutants that flow into the Inland Bays. The Inland Bays report says studies show that, when 10 percent of a watershed's surface is impervious, a tipping point is reached, a point where a significant decline begins for the estuary.

The Inland Bays watershed has reached 10.4 percent impervious cover, the report states, with some of the most intense development along bay tributaries. While the county's estimate of developed land may not measure impervious surfaces, everyone with a stake in updating the comprehensive land-use plan must recognize Sussex County is reaching a tipping point.

We still have room for development, but we have already reached a level of development where, without careful protections for the bays, further growth threatens forests and salt marshes along the bay. Losing them will further degrade water quality in the bays and their tributaries – where the water is already so poor, swimming is widely discouraged.

The land-use plan update offers county officials an opportunity to protect our bays and waterways by taking a simple, common-sense step: require 200-foot buffers along the bay and its tributaries.

The plan should also go one step further: adopt a natural areas ordinance to protect marsh and forest state officials have designated as significant, notably Love Creek Natural Area. Sussex officials could look to New Castle County, which already has a natural areas ordinance that designates varied levels of protection based on the importance of the tract as a natural resource.

Protecting existing forested buffers along the Inland Bays and their tributaries, and requiring wider buffers around all new developments, will not prevent development. What these relatively simple steps would do is provide a path toward responsible development that protects property values and preserves and improves our waterways for everyone.