The Chesapeake Bay Conservation Acceleration Act of 2025 aims to improve water quality and agricultural sustainability across the seven-state Chesapeake Bay watershed by establishing a partnership initiative to help farmers implement conservation practices focused on reducing erosion, nutrients, and sediment while building climate resilience. The bill creates a federal task force led by USDA and EPA to better measure and report nutrient reductions from conservation activities, and launches a pilot program that covers all costs for landowners to install riparian buffers through certified providers, eliminating administrative barriers. The legislation also expands agricultural education by extending grant eligibility to junior colleges and vocational schools with $60 million in annual funding through 2031 for work-based learning programs in food and agricultural sciences, and grants the USDA direct-hire authority to quickly fill technical positions. Additionally, the bill transfers federal oversight of wild-caught invasive catfish species from USDA to FDA, requiring the agencies to coordinate through a memorandum of understanding within 90 days and finalize new regulations within 180 days.
Take Action
Your position
Add a comment
to comment on this bill.
Annotate the text
Highlight any passage on the Summary or Full Text tab to attach a note. Annotations appear on the Annotations tab.