Most of us don’t get too excited about a C-plus grade on a report card regardless of who brings it home. As every teacher knows, it signifies a “satisfactory” performance while a “B” is seen as “good” and an “A” is excellent. Yet this week’s announcement that the overall health of the Chesapeake Bay has earned a C-plus from the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science provides a reason for optimism. Not only because it’s the highest environmental grade the scientists have awarded the nation’s largest estuary in 22 years but because of exactly who made this improvement possible.

It turns out the Chesapeake Bay has got a friend in Pennsylvania to paraphrase the Keystone State’s longtime slogan.

Maybe that’s wishful thinking. We’ll be the first to concede that Bay cleanup efforts have fallen behind the ambitious pace set for them years ago. It’s highly unlikely that 2025 goals for reducing harmful nutrient runoff will be met next year. Yet modest improvements in such key factors as water clarity, nitrogen and phosphorus loads and the restoration of submerged aquatic vegetation are noticeable and due in no small part to actions taken by Pennsylvania, particularly by its farmers.

Runoff from Pennsylvania farmland — often laden with excess fertilizers or pesticides — has long been a major source of pollution in the Susquehanna River, which accounts for half of all the freshwater flowing into the Chesapeake. Yet why should Pennsylvanians care what happens downstream? At least that seemed to be the mindset back in the 1980s. Not so much in recent years. Not only has Pennsylvania invested an estimated $1 billion in the Chesapeake cleanup since 2019 (much of it directly helping farmers to plant natural buffers or use other social conservation techniques), but the Upper Bay has turned out to be among the biggest direct beneficiaries. That part of the Bay received a B-minus, one of the report card’s best scores.

That’s quite a change from years past and what’s just as noteworthy — if only as a matter of symbolism — is that when it was time to release the report card on Tuesday, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro showed up to highlight his state’s performance. Imagine that. The governor of a state that so often had to be dragged kicking and screaming (or by lawsuit) into the Chesapeake Bay program is happily talking about what a difference his state is making downstream. At the very least, the fellow deserves a bushel of the finest jimmies — or perhaps crab cakes if he’s not into the picking crabmeat from shell thing.

His timing could not have been better, frankly. The U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo has clearly reduced federal statutory authority — or what is known as the “Chevron deference” after a 1984 Court decision involving the California-based energy company. Can agencies like the EPA, a key player in the Chesapeake Bay cleanup, set regulations or must they stay away from policymaking even when statutory language is ambiguous? There has always been a tension there, of course, but the Supreme Court’s decision appears to have significantly weakened executive branch power (but likely strengthened judicial power).

The Chesapeake Bay watershed extends as far as New York and West Virginia and includes Delaware, the District of Columbia and Virginia. Is it reasonable to expect jurisdictions with so many dramatic differences — politically, culturally, economically, geographically — to be on the same page when it comes to determining the proper way to deal with storm drains, farm animal waste, cover crops and sewer systems? The recent disagreement between Maryland and Virginia over the latter’s choice to reinstitute winter crab dredging, a practice that could threaten the Bay’s female blue crab supply, is a case in point.

So here’s to Governor Shapiro and the folks in Harrisburg, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and beyond who noticed that their neighbors to the south really would like to do something about the national treasure that is the Chesapeake Bay and seem happy to do their part. We live in increasingly polarized times. Yet here we found some common ground — or common water anyway. Admittedly, there’s a long way to go in cleanup efforts, but it’s reassuring to know we might just have an ally on the other side of the Mason-Dixon.