State issues bonds for Chesapeake Bay pollution-fighting projects

The state has issued $186 million in bonds to help the Chesapeake Bay by financing wastewater-treatment and sewer-system infrastructure and upgrades statewide.

According to Gov. Timothy M. Kaine's office, the Virginia Resources Authority total investment in bay cleanup in the past two years exceeds $810 million.

"The commonwealth has dedicated more than $1 billion to cleaning up the Chesapeake Bay since the start of my term, and we have made fighting pollution one of our core concerns," Kaine said in a statement announcing the bonds.

The bonds will finance improvements to 13 wastewater-treatment plants and sewage systems, from Arlington County to Hampton Roads. The governor's office said the projects will provide upgrades to reduce nutrient pollution being discharged into the tributaries that feed the Chesapeake Bay.

"VRA represents the third and critical leg of our sewage treatment plant funding strategies, rounding out what the state provides localities in outright grants and other low-interest loan programs," said Virginia Secretary of Natural Resources L. Preston Bryant, Jr.

Created by the General Assembly in 1984, VRA is an independent authority that functions as the state's municipal bond bank. Using a combination of public and private funds, it makes revolving-fund loans available to local governments and municipal authorities at below-market rates so they can finance infrastructure improvements.

Virginia is a co-signer of the Chesapeake 2000 Agreement, which calls for each state in the bay watershed to reduce by 40% the level of nutrients going into the Chesapeake Bay by 2010.

Contact Jim Nolan at (804) 649-6061 or .