HAMPTON ROADS, Va. (WAVY) — From the catastrophic to the microscopic, just about everything man makes affects the health of the Chesapeake Bay watershed, which includes Virginia, West Virginia, New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware and the District of Columbia. Life around the Chesapeake B ay as we know it could be at stake after President Trump last Wednesday ordered five agencies, including the EPA, to set expiration dates on a wide range of regulations that were created to reduce pollution and improve safety. The White House calls the order a plan to "unleash American Energy innovation while wiping out legislation that stifles innovation." The Chesapeake Bay Foundation called the order a step back in time when creosote, a substance used to preserve telephone poles, created pollution in the southern branch of the Elizabeth River that sickened fish with cancer and wiped out vital underwater grasses. "And what I really fear is that we are going to see that backsliding," said Alison Prost, senior vice president of environmental protection and restoration for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation. "And we're going to see those success stories reverse, like what you talked about for the Elizabeth River, that we're going to see that throughout the Chesapeake Bay watershed, putting people's livelihoods and public health at risk." President Trump is also banning so-called "woke" efforts to improve the environment in poor neighborhoods that have shipyards and chemical tank farms as neighbors. In the southeast community of Newport News, water is sprayed on mountains of coal as the fuel is loaded on ships and transported to other countries. Residents in the area told 10 On Your Side they suffer from asthma they believe is linked to the coal piers. Newport News Mayor Phillip Jones responds following Trump anti-DEI policy taking aim at ‘environmental justice’ "These communities have been overburdened for years," Prost said. "It was commonplace. There's already industry there. Let's just put it there, again and again and again. And then finally, when more science came along, more social justice, more social science, scientists came into play and working with the other types of scientists, we realized that this was an environmental injustice, that the cumulative of impacts that, you know, well, maybe it's just one more facility, but it was on top of legacy issues." "In the Hampton Roads area, these Black communities and others are overburdened communities," Prost said. "You lay over the climate change vulnerability maps, or the public health maps, and these areas turn bright red." The Chesapeake Bay Foundation said the executive order could set back decades of progress and that could harm the flavor and the finances around the Chesapeake Bay. "The first thing that comes to mind to me is the fisheries industry throughout the Bay," Prost said. "You think about — there's commercial harvest for oysters, crabs, rockfish, many others, and if they don't have clean water or habitat, those fisheries could collapse." President Trump said energy regulations will expire no later that September 2026. The Chesapeake Bay Foundation urges concerned residents call local members of Congress and then governor's office as the state of Virginia may have to pick up more of the bill to save the Bay. ...read more read less