EPA Takes on Farm Runoff
12/25/99
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Title: EPA takes on farm runoff
Source: Associated Press
Status: Copyright 1999, contact source for permission to reprint
Date: December 25, 1999
Aiming to make every waterway safe for fishing, drinking and swimming,
federal environmental officials are turning their attention to runoff
from farms, logging operations and other lands. Those rules are now
under attack from landowners and congressional Republicans, and even a
top Agriculture Department official said they may be too broad and
expensive.
The Environmental Protection Agency in August proposed ambitious rules
that would require states to submit plans, within 15 years, to clean
up every waterway that fails to meet water quality standards.
States would have to commit to clean up some 20,000 bodies of water
nationwide - about 40 percent of all lakes, rivers and streams - and
potentially spend tens of millions of dollars.
Wayne Krieger, who owns a tree farm on the Oregon coast, said the
rules are a greater threat to his farm than drought or disease. "It
makes it real difficult to carry on your operation," said Krieger, of
Gold Beach, Ore., who has 57,000 trees. "You'd find yourself probably
in violation of the law every time you turned around."
J. Charles Fox, assistant EPA administrator for water, acknowledged
that the proposal is far-reaching. "It would be fair to describe this
as one of the most ambitious proposals to protect water quality in our
nation's history," he said.
The move follows nearly three decades of EPA crackdowns on sewage
plants and industries that pump pollution through pipes into lakes and
rivers.
Under the new proposal, states would be required to set allowable
pollution levels for indirect sources of pollution, such as farmers or
parking lots. Loggers may need to place bigger tree buffers along
streams, and farmers may have to use less fertilizer.
"It's a very big deal," said Jim Geisinger, president of the Northwest
Forestry Association in Portland, who predicted the proposal could
handcuff tens of thousands of large and small timber lot owners in
Washington state and Oregon.
EPA officials say opponents are overreacting.
Landowners would be required to get a pollution discharge permit only
if the EPA found they were contributing to nearby water quality
problems, and only if a state had failed to draft an adequate plan for
improving water quality, Fox said.
"We think the impact of this provision will be very, very minor around
the country," he added.
States have always had primary responsibility for identifying streams
that fall short of water quality standards and making plans to clean
them up under the 1972 Clean Water Act.
But many water quality problems - especially those from runoff - were
not addressed for years as states focused on more obvious pollution
problems, such as industries that funnel pollution into waterways.
From 1972 to 1998, states only approved 1,000 runoff plans. The EPA
estimates that about 40,000 plans will be needed.
Prodded by lawsuits and some successful cleanups, the EPA in 1996
began looking for ways to persuade more states to take action.
President Clinton announced the proposed rules in August. A comment
period closes Jan. 20, and the EPA hopes to finalize the new rules
next summer.
Environmentalists praised the EPA's move and said they were pleased
that the agency plans to hold other federal agencies responsible for
polluted runoff.
But Agriculture Department Undersecretary Jim Lyons complained in a
letter to EPA Administrator Carol Browner that the proposed rules
"will unnecessarily divert scarce resources to a top-down, process-
oriented approach that may not work."
Implementing the new rules could cost more than $100 million a year,
the letter said.
Lyons later backed off his letter, saying it was "stronger than I
would have liked" and that the Agriculture Department is still
formulating its official position.
Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., contended the EPA lacks authority under the
Clean Water Act to draft the rules, which he believes would prompt
major industry lawsuits.
Goodlatte, chairman of a House Agriculture subcommittee, said it is
scientifically impossible to assign responsibility for runoff to
specific landowners.
"It's a top-down, one-size-fits-all Washington approach that is not
appropriate," he said.