His overview of the issue, noting some 300 miles of seriously degraded streams in the county's 12 watersheds - the land surrounding and feeding major bodies of water - was the first topic of the evening.

Those streams are severely eroded and have lost their ability to function. What remains after the rush of stormwater off impervious surfaces like roads, parking lots, roofs and driveways is a gouged-out streambed several feet deep instead of the shallower channel that would spread across a valley floor in heavy rains.

"Most of the damage occurred when there were no stormwater regulations at all," Bowen said. "So most of the runoff in the county is untreated. That is our greatest challenge."

Stormwater regulations were developed in the 1980s, but did little to fix the problem.

"By using stormwater ponds, we thought we had the answer," Bowen said. "But now we're learning that exacerbated the problem."

Last year the County Council was unable to pass a bill that would have created a stormwater utility to deal with refurbishing streambeds and related tasks. The work would have been paid for by a fee, or tax, based on the amount of impervious surface on a property owner's land.

The need to speed up the restoration work is growing, and so is the potential cost. When the issue came to the forefront in 2005, there was an estimated $500 million backlog in stream repairs countywide. Two years later that had grown to close to $800 million, and it's still growing.

Soon federal and state rules concerning sediment runoff, and the pollutants it carries downstream to the bay, will begin to force jurisdictions to address the issues.

But redoing streambeds alone won't clear up the situation, Bowen said.

"Even if we were doing all that we should be doing, it would still not be enough," he said. "The waterways would still be impaired" due to ongoing septic seepage and other issues.

In the current economy, with other needs competing for pieces of a smaller pie, it is difficult to see a major commitment to the stormwater issue.

The historic impact of our activities on local waterways was perhaps exacerbated by the huge boom in building after World War II, but it started long before that, South River Federation Executive Director Erik Michelsen told the 40 people attending the forum.

"What we are seeing is streams actually reacting to the systemic impact of colonization and industrialization," Michelsen said.

Margaret Palmer, an expert on stream restoration and director of the University of Maryland's Chesapeake Biological Laboratories, also told those gathered that stream restoration is not the only answer.

In fact, some of her research indicates that most restoration work does not reduce a key bay pollutant, nitrogen. But some new techniques have shown promise, notably the Wilelinor stream restoration south of Annapolis that her lab has been studying for a few years.

But, like Bowen, she stressed the urgent need to fix streams sullied before stormwater regulations were introduced.

"To improve things we have to concentrate on already developed areas," she said.

But she warned the effort to restore natural streams is off target.

"The dream of natural streams, give it up," she said. "Restoration should be more about maintaining ecosytem health" by whatever means work.

Maintaining and restoring forested areas is vital, as is reducing impervious surfaces and getting localities and individual property owners to reduce the runoff feeding into streams, the speakers agreed.

"It is all of the above," Bowen said.

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