Page 30 The Dispatch/Maryland Coast Dispatch November 1, 2013 Regional Digest Sewer Spill Contained SALISBURY – The city of Salisbury’s Public Works Department last Friday responded to a sewer overflow near the Centre at Salisbury shopping mall, but the spill was contained near the site of origin and did not leach into any nearby waterways. Salisbury’s Public Works Department last Friday responded to a sanitary sewer overflow on Centre Drive near the Centre at Salisbury. The overflow was contained in a stormwater basin and did not make it to a waterway or threaten aquatic life or a water supply. The wastewater spill was diluted with water in the holding pond and will break down biologically as it filters through the soil. The Public Works Department’s Water and Sewer branch then used a vacuum truck to clear the grease blockage located in a sewer main on East Naylor Mill Drive. The entire cleanup and containment operation was completed by around 4 p.m. last Friday. Council OKs Earlier Springfest Vendor Closing Change In Policy Will Be Tested At 2014 Event By JOANNE SHRINER STAFF WRITER C.J. Abbott Honored SALISBURY – The city of Salisbury and Courtesy Chevrolet Cadillac last week announced a partnership to recognize C.J. Abbott, a young man slain during a murder-suicide in early September, by naming the access road at Route 13 in his honor. On Sept. 3, Ryan Shallue, 21, of Stevensville, traveled to Salisbury to confront his former girlfriend, Kristen Loetz, 21, a Salisbury University student. When Shallue confronted his former girlfriend, the 19-year-old Abbott attempted to intervene. Shallue shot and killed Abbott and shot and critically injured Loetz before turning the gun on himself. Last week, Salisbury Mayor Jim Ireton Jr. announced a partnership with Courtesy Chevrolet, where Abbott worked, to name the access road at Route 13 in his honor. Abbott was a skilled technician at Courtesy at age 19 and was on his way to qualifying as a world-class General Motors service technician by the age of 23. “A nonviolent, gregarious person, he nonetheless found himself between a gunman intent on killing his friend and the intended victim,” said Courtesy Chevrolet Cadillac owner Ray Nordstrom. “The action he took to protect his friend led to him losing his life but ultimately saving hers. Such actions are not expected of one so young, but Charles Abbott possessed a maturity well beyond his chronological age, a circumstance that likely contributed to his actions.” OCEAN CITY – Next May’s Springfest will see some changes with the arts and crafts and food tents closing two hours earlier upon vendors request. The move will serve as a test to permanently change hours for both Springfest and Sunfest events in the future. Special Event Manager Frank Miller requested the Mayor and City Council’s approval this week of an earlier closing time for vendors in the arts and crafts tents and food tent at Springfest in 2014, and a slight vendor rate increase to cover tent security for up to three hours during the evenings of the event. According to Miller, for some time, there has been discussion among special events staff to allow arts and crafts vendors at Springfest and Sunfest to close earlier than 10 p.m. During this year’s Sunfest, staff asked the vendors for feedback by survey and 80 percent of the vendors responded they want to close early at 8 p.m., due to the lack of traffic once the live entertainment starts. However, there is concern over security of vendor spaces while patrons are still on the ground for the concerts. The vendors suggested increasing vendor fees by $5 to cover the added cost of security. According to Miller, rates have remained flat since 2008. A $5 increase would cover the cost of adding eight staff security positions from 7:30-10:30 p.m. Thursday through Saturday. Staff would be acquired through the Ocean City Beach Patrol, which would keep the public out of the main tents and away from the midway exhibitors who choose to close early. The Ocean City Police Department will still maintain the grounds as usual during the entertainment hours and post-event. The midway area is the vending space in the middle of festival grounds closest to the entertainment area. The area contains mostly commercial or re-sale items versus handmade items that are positioned in the arts and crafts tents. Miller proposed those in the midway area will not be required to close at 8 p.m. but will have the option to stay open until 10 p.m. Miller added the change will close down on-site access to food and beverage within the festival grounds, encouraging patrons to use Boardwalk concessions for the later entertainment hours. Alcohol vendors may remain open as part of the midway to service the entertainment tent patrons. If the early closing time is a success during Springfest 2014, the same procedure will be considered for Sunfest 2015. The delay in implementation is due to the 2014 Sunfest processes already being well underway by the conclusion of Springfest. Councilman Joe Mitrecic, who is the chair of the Recreation and Parks Commission, stated the alternative has been discussed at the subcommittee level and approved by the commission. He added the other 20 percent of the vendors who completed the survey weren’t necessarily against closing early but were giving early times or later to close, or didn’t comment at all. “Most of the vendors you talk to don’t have the opportunity to enjoy Ocean City at all. To go out to dinner or something like that because they are tied up at the tent all night,” he said. “I think this is the right thing to do, and I think it will be a big success.” The council voted unanimously to approve the request. Offshore Seismic Gun Testing Concerns Aired By SHAWN J. SOPER NEWS EDITOR OCEAN CITY –- The potential risks do not outweigh the possible rewards was a common theme last month at a public forum at the National Aquarium in Baltimore on the proposed plan to allow seismic air gun testing up and down the East Coast, including off the coast of Ocean City. With a renewed interest in tapping potential oil and gas reserves just off the mid-Atlantic coast, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM), an arm of the Department of the Interior, is considering allowing private sector energy companies to utilize potentially harmful seismic air gun testing to determine what lies beneath the ocean floor. However, a grassroots effort to derail the proposed use of seismic air guns, which shoot extremely loud and repeated blasts of sound into the ocean floor to determine the location of oil and gas reserves off the coast is gaining momentum with hundreds of thousands of concerned citizens signing petitions to block the potentially harmful survey technique. The latest in a series of public forums examining the potential dangers off Maryland’s Atlantic coast including Ocean City and Assateague was held at the National Casino Sewer Hookup To Impact Traffic OCEAN PINES -- Worcester County Public Works officials last week advised local residents to expect traffic delays SEE NEXT PAGE Aquarium in Baltimore, and the overall message was as loud and clear as the seismic air gun testing itself. “Imagine dynamite going off in your living room every 10 seconds for weeks or months at a time,” said Oceana Marine Scientist Matthew Huelsenbeck at the October forum. “That what it’s like for sea life that is subjected to seismic testing, but we don’t have to turn the Atlantic into a blast zone to fulfill our energy needs.” The environmental advocacy group Oceana in September delivered a petition containing over 100,000 signatures to BOEM calling for the federal government to halt the practice. Oceana and its partners are holding a series of public forums up and down the east coast including the hearing on Oct. 17 in Baltimore specific to the potential Maryland impacts. Seismic air guns shoot blasts of sound into the ocean floor, each of which is 100,000 times more intense than a jet engine. According to the federal government’s own report, the use of seismic air gun testing to survey what lies beneath the ocean floor is expected to injure and possibly kill 138,500 dolphins and whales along the East coast including nine critically endangered right whales, of which there are only about 500 left in the world. While the federal report only references high-profile marine mam- mal species such as dolphins and whales, seismic air gun testing could impact other ocean species up and down the food chain. At the hearing in Baltimore last week, fisheries management groups said the testing could undo years of conservation efforts. “The Mid-Atlantic Fishery Management Council has worked diligently over the past decade to rebuild mid-Atlantic fish stocks and is concerned that the proposed seismic exploration for oil and gas along the Atlantic coast could contravene its efforts to conserve and manage the living marine resources under its jurisdiction,” said Mid-Atlantic Fisheries Management senior scientist Richard Seagraves. Others argued at a time when Maryland is on the threshold of offshore wind energy, potentially damaging seismic air gun testing is not needed. “Maryland’s coast and our beloved Chesapeake Bay need wind mills, not oil spills,” said Chesapeake Climate Action Networks Director Tommy Landers last week. “Maryland’s tourism industry is already threatened by climate change and rising sea levels along our precious coastline. We need to invest in clean, lasting renewable energy that will help clean up our air for decades, not offshore oil that could wreak havoc on our environment and our economy.”