With Gov. Timothy M. Kaine choosing not to intervene in an environmental dispute, a state panel on Thursday approved new rules aimed at curbing storm-water pollution from more than 100 cities, universities and military bases.

State environmental groups are urging Gov. Timothy M. Kaine to step in and toughen proposed rules for more than 100 cities, universities and military bases to better control the No. 1 pollution source in the Chesapeake Bay today: storm water.

CHESAPEAKE Farmers and others familiar with the 217-acre site on which a golf course made from fly ash now sits say they doubt that elevated boron readings from well tests nearby are linked to agricultural use.

NORFOLK Former CIA Director James Woolsey drives an electric hybrid car. Solar panels help power his Maryland home, and green batteries store electricity in his basement. "On a good day, I can see my meter going backwards," Woolsey said of his household energy bills.

A loophole has emerged in Virginia’s crackdown on blue crabs in the Chesapeake Bay this year – one that officials say cannot be fixed until 2009 at the earliest. The problem centers on the 1,020-square-mile sanctuary in the middle of the Bay, a safe zone intended to give female crabs a protected corridor to key spawning grounds in Hampton Roads.

CHESAPEAKE Meet the "Green Team" - 75 gifted-and-talented third-graders from Chesapeake who spent their school year learning about the polluted Elizabeth River and encouraging its revival.

Sometime before or on Thursday morning, a shorebird called a least tern laid a single egg in Cape Hatteras National Seashore. A National Park Service ranger spotted it at the end of Ramp 45 to Cape Point, a corner of the Outer Banks well known for surf fishing.

PORTSMOUTH

Police have arrested two people and charged them in connection with the April 25 killing of a pizza delivery driver.

Jamal Lee Mingga, 18, of the 900 block of Bold St., has been charged with first degree murder, robbery and two counts of using a gun during a felony, according to a police news release. Mingga is being held in jail.

NORFOLK Environmentalists announced lofty new plans Wednesday for cleaning up the Elizabeth River, including a goal of making the long-abused waterway safe for swimming, fishing and shellfishing by 2020.

Underwater grasses, key indicators of ecological health, increased about 10 percent last year throughout the Chesapeake Bay, though they remain sparse and far below restoration goals, a survey released Monday concludes.