Taste 2024 was another great success! Many thanks to our sponsors and friends for raising $116k for our mission to restore the lands and waters of the Chesapeake Bay watershed. 44 businesses, nonprofits, and individuals joined us as Taste sponsors this year, including Altria, Hershey, Keith Campbell Foundation, McGuire Woods, and Smithfield. We had our biggest turnout in recent years with nearly 400 guests attending across the three events. See more from each event below.

 

Pennsylvania Taste

100 of our friends and partners gathered at the Railroad House Inn to celebrate the Chesapeake. With your help, our silent auction and raffle raised over $1,470!

It was our pleasure to award Jules Vastine (they/them) as our 2024 Pennsylvania Watershed Champion! Jules has worked in the volunteer monitoring/community science field for twenty years. In 2019, they were appointed to the National Water Quality Monitoring Council as the volunteer monitoring representative. In 2018, they were elected to the Association for Advancing the Participatory Sciences and reelected in 2021. Having grown up in the Chesapeake Bay region, Jules enjoys working with community organizations to build their capacity to monitor, protect, and restore water quality in Pennsylvania and New York.

Jules Vastine, 2024 Pennsylvania Watershed Champion

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Virginia Taste

80 of our friends and partners gathered at The Boathouse. With your help, our silent auction and raffle raised over $2,425!

We had the honor of celebrating our 2024 Virginia Watershed Champion, Katie Register, during the Taste last evening! Katie Register (she/her) has devoted most of her career to improving Virginia’s environment by reducing marine debris and plastic pollution. In 1995, she founded Clean Virginia Waterways (CVW) and served as its Executive Director until the fall of 2023. She continues to work with CVW as Director of Research and advises its new generation of leaders. Katie is also co-founder of the Virginia Plastic Pollution Prevention Network which builds collaborations to combat this type of pollution, and she has worked with the Alliance to help coordinate partnership opportunities with our Project Clean Stream initiative.

Katie Register, 2024 Virginia Watershed Champion

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Maryland Taste

200 of our friends and partners gathered at The Annapolis Maritime Museum. With your help, our silent auction and raffle raised over $3,000!

It was our pleasure to award our 2024 Fran Flanigan Environmental Leadership Award winner, Carin Bisland, 2024 Maryland Watershed Champion, Suzanne Etgen, and our 2024 DC Watershed Champion, Rodrick West!

Carin (she/her) recently retired from the Environmental Protection Agency after spending more than 30 years serving the Chesapeake Bay Program partnership. During that time, she led the partnership through the development of two Chesapeake Bay Watershed Agreements, the installation of the Chesapeake Bay Total Daily Maximum Load, and countless other efforts designed to protect the habitats, water quality, and living resources of the Bay.

Carin Bisland, 2024 Fran Flanigan Awardee

Suzanne Kilby Etgen (she/her) is the founding Executive Director of the Anne Arundel County Watershed Stewards Academy (WSA), a nonprofit whose mission is to train and mobilize community leaders to drive change for sustainable landscapes and clean waters. Since 2009, Suzanne has helped to start seven other WSAs in Maryland, and several others in the Chesapeake Region and beyond. Suzanne’s passion for her work of empowering and engaging local champions makes her worthy of our 2024 award.

Suzanne Etgen, 2024 Maryland Watershed Champion

Rodrick (he/him) became a Riversmart Homes Ambassador (RSH) at the very beginning of the program in 2020, and has loved every moment of it. From volunteering and tabling at events like Rooting DC to removing invasive plants at the Anacostia Park and canvassing neighborhoods in Ward 7 and 8, Rodrick has enjoyed sharing his green thumb with his neighbors.

Rodrick West, 2024 DC Watershed Champion

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Thank you to all of our sponsors, partners, and friends who attended each Taste event to make this year a success!