In recognition of the 35th anniversary of the landmark Clean Water Act, NACWA today released a report, Recommendations for a Viable and Vital 21st Century Clean Water Policy (PDF).

The report is the product of NACWA’s Strategic Watershed Task Force, which began its work in the spring, and is comprised of NACWA public agency leaders.  Frank Pogge, NACWA Board Member and Director of the Kansas City Water Department, Mo., chaired the Task Force and Charlie Logue, NACWA Board Member and Director, Regulatory Affairs Department, Clean Water Services, Hillsboro, Ore., served as the Task Force’s Vice-Chair.  NACWA applauds the work of the Task Force and their leadership in creating such a valuable document.

The Task Force’s objective was to determine how to best meet the complex water quality challenges of the 21st century, including population growth, new and emerging regulatory challenges, and climate change.  Through their deliberations, the Task Force determined that the “watershed approach” offered the best course of action to further improve the quality of the nation’s waters.  The report details both the challenges and roadblocks that stand in the way of such an approach, as well as presents a set of short-term and long-term recommendations viewed as necessary to succeed in developing effective and sustainable watershed management.

The Report’s short-term recommendations are as follows:

1. Reinvigorating the watershed-based planning process as outlined in Section 208 of the Clean Water Act;
2. Pursuing new, more aggressive measures and funding to address needed controls on agricultural nonpoint sources;
3. Promoting adaptive implementation of water quality improvement measures based on valid science;
4. Better utilizing market-based approaches;
5. Using a more appropriate sequence for establishing total maximum daily loads (TMDLs); and,
6. Prioritizing actions and planning that are currently underway according to watershed needs.

The Task Force makes the following long-term recommendations:

1. Establishing a new water quality framework via a 21st century Watershed Act;
2. Reorganizing EPA to reflect this new watershed framework; and,
3. Conducting the needed monitoring and research to show that progress is being made via a watershed approach.

NACWA was also honored to have the opportunity to announce the release of the Task Force report and discuss its findings as part of the Association’s testimony today at a hearing before the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, titled The 35th Anniversary of the Clean Water Act:  Successes and Future Challenges.  Chris Westhoff, NACWA President and Assistant City Attorney and Public Works General Counsel for the City of Los Angeles, testified on behalf of NACWA.

Westhoff stated in his testimony (PDF) that one of the greatest challenges facing the nation’s Clean Water Act programs is the water infrastructure funding gap, estimated by the EPA and other federal agencies to be between $300-500 billion over the next 20 years. Westhoff noted that while this gap is daunting, the Task Force report demonstrates that a viable watershed approach, while not eliminating the existing funding need, would make great strides in aligning often scarce investment dollars with the greatest possible benefit to the environment.

The Task Force report marks a vital step in re-energizing the national discourse on implementing an effective, viable watershed approach to ensure water quality progress for future generations.  NACWA will be distributing this report broadly to Members of Congress, EPA staff, and key stakeholders and urges Association members to download the report from NACWA’s website and to distribute it to your contacts as well.

The Task Force report is available on NACWA’s Regulatory Correspondence & Outreach webpage and NACWA’s testimony from today’s hearing is available on the Association’s Legislative Correspondence & Outreach page at www.nacwa.org .