Photos: Del. Scott Surovell Hosts Little Hunting Creek Cleanup

Surovell and his volunteers collected four tons of trash from the creek Saturday.

Seventy-five volunteers joined Delegate Scott Surovell (D-44th District) to collect four tons of trash during his Little Hunting Creek clean-up in Hybla Valley Saturday.  The cleanup, in coordination with Friends of Little Hunting Creek and the 25th Annual Alice Ferguson Foundation Annual Potomac Watershed Cleanup, was led by Delegate Surovell at three different sites in Hybla Valley: Janna Lee Avenue bridge, Creekside Village Apartments, and the Mount Vernon Plaza behind the Shoppers Food Warehouse and post office. Surovell was joined by student volunteers from Waynewood Elementary School, Carl Sandburg Middle School, Thomas Jefferson High School, West Potomac High School JROTC and the Junior Girl Scout Troop #128 (Waynewood & Stratford …

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Constituents Corner

Del. Scott Surovell's End-of-Session Report

Del. Scott Surovell cast 2,000 votes in this session for the 44th district.

Now that the 2013 session of the General Assembly’s work has been completed, except for the April 3 veto session, I will continue my report on several measures. I have already covered the transportation legislation and Medicaid .  I cast 2,000 votes in this session for our district. Six bills that I authored or was chief co-patron for await the Governor’s signature, along with three budget amendments. Three of my bills were referred to study commissions. Last year, we passed legislation that required voters to present some form of identification. This included a social security card, voter registration card, utility bill, bank statement or paycheck. The General Assembly this year approved a bill that deleted all of these  and requires a …

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Betsy Martin Recognized for Fighting Litter

Alice Ferguson Foundation awards local environmental steward.

The Alice Ferguson Foundation (AFF) recognized Stratford Landing resident Elizabeth “Betsy” Martin as an environmental steward and litter prevention champion at the seventh annual Trash Summit in Silver Spring, Md., on Wednesday. “Elizabeth has partnered with us during the Annual Potomac River Watershed Cleanup for more than 10 years and last year she coordinated 10 sites along Little Hunting Creek,” said Lori Arguelles, AFF’s executive director. “Martin has engaged her community and raised awareness, building local stewardship efforts surrounding the litter problem. Though her cleanup efforts are extraordinary in themselves, what makes her a true champion is her continued work outside of cleanups.” Martin served on the advisory committee …

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Del. Surovell, Volunteers Remove Tons of Trash from Little Hunting Creek.

Del. Scott Surovell and 30 volunteers participated in a cleanup Saturday of Little Hunting Creek.

In 2005, Little Hunting Creek was named “Trashiest Creek in Fairfax County.” This past weekend, Del. Scott Surovell (D-44th) and other volunteers did their best to make sure the creek doesn't win that title again. Surovell held his third cleanup this year of Little Hunting Creek, near the Sequoyah Condominiums and Janna Lee apartments in the Hybla Valley section of Fairfax County. The creek continues to be declared impaired due to e-coli bacterial impairments and polychlorinated biphenyls. On Saturday, 30 volunteers helped remove the trash from the creek. Volunteers included students from multiple area elementary, middle and high schools. A team of volunteers from New Hope Housing also participated. This past Saturday’s cleanup netted over…

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Dyke Marsh and Beyond

Snaring Snakeheads

State scientists are studying their impact.

They ply the waters of the Potomac River with metal, spider-like prongs dangling off the bow of an aluminum johnboat in search of a voracious, piscine invader lurking in the shoreline’s shallows -- the Northern snakehead fish (Channa argus).  John Odenkirk, a Virginia fish biologist, and several assistants have caught and studied snakeheads in northern Virginia every year from March to October since 2004 for the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries (DGIF). The northern snakehead, a native of Asia that can reach 15 pounds, camouflages in vegetation and woody debris along the waterway’s edge. Their mottled brown hues easily blend into the plants, flotsam and muck. “That fallen-over sycamore is great snakehead habitat,” Odenkirk …

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VIDEO: Volunteers Clean Up Little Hunting Creek

Stream is one of "trashiest" in Fairfax County.

Volunteers tackled Little Hunting Creek in Mount Vernon Saturday with a day-long cleanup that netted dozens of shopping carts, household items and mounds of trash from the polluted waterway. Some wore waders, and others balanced delicately on rocks or by the creekside to pluck trash from the creek. The creek flows out of Huntley Meadows Park and through the Mount Vernon District before eventually emptying into the Potomac River. Aside from containing trash, the creek also carries toxic pollutants. Participants Saturday included volunteer Del. Scott Surovell (D-44th), and volunteers from Friends of Little Hunting Creek and the Alice Ferguson Foundation.

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Constituents Corner

Virginia DEQ: Lee and Mount Vernon’s Streams and Rivers are Polluted

Local delegate will sponsor a cleanup of Little Hunting Creek next weekend.

Last week, I received a report from the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) regarding Mount Vernon and Lee’s rivers and streams.  The annual assessment reports are disturbing and continue to show our rivers and streams are in poor health. According to the Chesapeake Bay Foundation’s analysis of the data, 71% of Virginia’s streams violate state water quality standards along with 94% of all estuaries (tidal parts of Hunting Creek/Cameron Run, Little Hunting Creek, Dogue Creek and the Potomac River). Every embayment and stream monitored in my delegate seat violated state water quality standards. Here are the specifics for our local streams. Paul Spring Branch has elevated levels of e-coli on five of 12 samples taken where it …

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