Groups Call for EPA Takeover of Alabama's Water Program
January 15th, 2010
Autumn on Turkey Creek falls near the Blount-Jefferson County line…
Fourteen Alabama environmental organizations filed a petition with the Environmental Protection Agency today to withdraw the state’s authority over Alabama’s water pollution permitting program because it does not meet the minimum requirements of the Clean Water Act, according to a press release issued Friday.
“The water pollution permitting program administered by the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM) is fundamentally broken and does not meet minimum federal standards,” Alabama Rivers Alliance program director Mitch Reid said in the statement. “This failure is a systemic, statewide problem. From funding to implementation to enforcement, the failures of the current system are leaving the citizens and environment of Alabama unprotected.”
The water pollution permitting program, known as the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) is a part of the federal Clean Water Act. Each state is required to implement at least the minimum standards required in the federal law.
For more than a decade, environmental and citizen organizations have worked with state agency leaders to find ways to improve this program. When that failed, the petitioners sought relief through the Alabama Environmental Management Commission (EMC), a seven-member governing board of ADEM appointed by the Governor of Alabama. Solutions have also been sought, when necessary, in the courts.
While there have been modest gains on a few individual issues, the groups say, these have not addressed the substantial systemic failures of Alabama’s water pollution permitting program.
“We have been very diligent in documenting the ongoing and chronic pollution sources, and ADEM has taken no effort to enforce even the most basic of regulations,” said John Wathen, head of the Friends of Hurricane Creek based in Tuscaloosa.
The press release says Intervention by the federal agency is “the only relief left available to the environmental community to ensure the proper actions are taken to fix this defective program.”
