Clean Air and Water Reports
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Executive Summary
Thirty years after the passage
of the Clean Water Act, many Washington waterways are still polluted. Indeed,
government reports show that 48 percent of the state’s waterways are impaired
for aquatic uses, meaning that they are not healthy habitat for fish or other
creatures. The federal Clean Water Act—as well as Washington’s numerous water
quality laws—contains statutory authority to deal with these persistent problems.
Yet, in many cases, the laws have not been aggressively implemented or enforced.
Washington, like other states, has always played a central role in the enforcement
of the federal clean water safeguards. However, over the last decade, lack of
adequate funding and political pressure from the polluting industries has left
Washington’s Department of Ecology (Ecology) overworked and without the resources
necessary to manage it’s mandate.
Specifically, Ecology is failing to adequately implement its water quality program
in three major areas:
- Standards and permitting
Almost 20% of the permitted facilities in Washington are operating under outdated,
expired permits. Moreover, Ecology lacks the data to set permit limits that
are protective of the designated uses of our state’s waters. 1
- Inspections
Ecology inspected only 30 percent of its permitted facilities in the last two
years, and thus has relied largely upon reporting from industry to determine
whether violations have occurred, and the severity of those violations.
2
- Enforcement
Of the 78 industrial facilities in Washington with five or more violations of
their permit limits in 2003, 30, or close to 40%, did not face any form of documented
compliance action or enforcement. 3
The causes of these flaws in Ecology’s enforcement program are varied: lack
of money and staff, lack of accountability, and industry pressure. To reduce
the amount of illegal pollution being released into our rivers, streams and
estuaries — our state leaders must take immediate action to bolster Ecology’s
enforcement efforts. Specifically, Washington should take an enforcement approach
that:
- Properly applies the letter and spirit of the Clean Water Act by setting strict
pollution limits based on the needs of the environment and public health.
- Ensures that new permits are issued expeditiously.
- Holds polluters accountable through yearly inspections.
- Takes formal concrete enforcement actions against serious violators, and denies
permits to chronic violators.
To achieve these goals, the governor and the state legislature must provide
sufficient resources and staff to enforce our environmental laws.
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