Local Love: We Won't Back Down
How Communities Across the Country Are Fighting Against Water Polluters Right Now. Plus, A Brief Look At Pollution In The Seine.
We spend a lot of time in this newsletter educating about toxins and water pollution, and offering solutions and ways to get involved when we can. Today, we want to spend a little time looking at cases across the country where folks are standing up and not backing down against corporate greed and big polluters.
Michigan Rules In Favor Of Stricter Farm Water Pollution Regulations
Earlier this month, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled in favor of strong water pollution permits at large concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), also called factory farms. The Court held that Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) does have the ability to prevent factory farm pollution as necessary to protect water quality in Michigan.
The decision is a win for coalition efforts to push for stronger water pollution permits at factory farms.
According to the Environmental Law & Policy Center, Michigan’s 290 permitted large CAFOs produce 17 million pounds more waste per day than the state’s population of 10 million people. This untreated waste contaminated with E. coli, phosphorus, nitrates, and more, threatens drinking water supplies and drives toxic algal blooms.
Going forward, EGLE will have the discretion to implement stronger and better protections in the state’s water pollution permits for factory farms when the agency determines those protections are necessary to protect Michigan waters.
“This decision is a victory for clean water in Michigan and sensible regulation of a dangerous industry,” said Tyler Lobdell, staff attorney with Food & Water Watch, one of 11 environmental groups to submit an amicus brief last year in support of EGLE. “The Farm Bureau was pushing extreme arguments through the courts to protect the profits of industrial-scale factory farms—and now, Michigan’s highest court made clear that they aren’t buying it.”
Source: Food & Water Watch Press Release
New Book Alert: We The Poisoned
Speaking of Michigan, a new book has been released about the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, by investigative reporter, founder and CEO of Status Coup, (and friend) Jordan Chariton.
From crooked Wall Street financial schemes to political payoffs, destruction of evidence, witness tampering, falsified water data, threatened whistle blowers, and panicked phone calls, We the Poisoned: Exposing the Flint Water Crisis Cover Up and the Poisoning of 100,000 Americans reveals, for the first time, the real story behind how the government poisoned a major American city—and how they are still getting away with it.
In the foreword to the book, I write:
Chariton has shown why this story is not merely about one city, or one immoral cover-up, but really about the unholy merger of our government and corporate America—and the resulting toxicity that has infected our representative democracy. Just when it seems the layers of this cover-up have been revealed, Chariton peels back even more. He stops at nothing to expose the ugly and jaw-dropping information that we the people must know.
This book was born from his relentless reporting and dedication to exposing the truth. With water and environmental contamination surging across the country, Chariton’s writing provides a road map for how to fight back and prevent similar tragedies from happening to other communities.
Vegetation Improves In Chesapeake Bay For 3rd Consecutive Year
You can call them what you want: underwater grasses, baygrasses, or submerged aquatic vegetation (SAV). These underwater flowering plants play a key role in the health of the Chesapeake Bay and coastal waters worldwide.
The Virginia Institute of Marine Science released its 2023 Submerged Aquatic Vegetation report last month, showing that SAV expanded for the third year running to nearly 83,000 acres. Researchers have monitored the Bay's changing SAV coverage since 1978.
SAV have many ecosystem benefits, from reducing sedimentation to providing habitat for Bay critters.
“What we're seeing right now is … recovery,” Chris Patrick, director of the SAV Restoration and Monitoring Program at VIMS, told Virginia Public Media.
But take that progress as cautiously optimistic.
Patrick said the grasses face ongoing pressure from growing human populations around the Bay and its tributaries.
To mitigate that impact, local, state and federal governments will have to keep spending big on wastewater treatment system upgrades, stormwater management and agricultural best-management practices.
Colorado Community Fights A Fracking Project
Let’s send a little love to Save the Aurora Reservoir (STAR), a nonprofit created to oppose oil and gas operations in areas near the reservoir.
The Aurora Reservoir is 30,000-acre park located east of Denver in Colorado’s second-largest city, Aurora. It’s the one of the largest parks in the city and serves as a drinking water storage facility.
The community group is working to protect the reservoir and its surrounding communities from industrial activities that threaten human and environmental wellbeing, including the current proposal to drill 160+ wells on land shared by the reservoir and the Lowry Landfill Superfund Site.
The Lowry Ranch comprehensive area plan (CAP) is a proposed hydraulic fracturing project in unincorporated Arapahoe County with planned well sites north, east, and south of the Aurora Reservoir. Civitas Resources has submitted an application to lease 32,000 acres of land on a piece of state-owned property known as the Lowry Range.
While Civitas has stated a commitment not to penetrate the subsurface under the Lowry Superfund site and to maintain the newly established setback of 3,000 feet from the Aurora Reservoir, any approved well sites would be operating in close proximity to both. Emissions of hazardous gases have been projected to reach nearly 4,000 tons over the course of 10 years, according to STAR.
Early this month, STAR was given "affected party" status at the first of two days of public hearings in front of the state's Energy and Carbon Management Commission, allowing them to officially present and provide rebuttal during the hearings.
Government agencies like the EPA have raised concerns about the wells' proximity to the Superfund site, where about 138 million gallons of liquid industrial waste was disposed of in unlined pits between 1965 and 1980. But the EPA is not objecting to the proposal, nor is the Colorado Department of Health and Environment.
The Colorado Energy & Carbon Management Commissions’ hearing on the Lowry Ranch Comprehensive Area Plan (CAP) will continue today. Hearings are held over Zoom. The link will be posted on the ECMC website. May the STAR voices be loud!
Source: The Denver Gazette
Third Time’s A Charm in California
A Northern California nonprofit is suing a construction company for the third time (talk about stick-to-itiveness) because of stormwater runoff violations under the Clean Water Act at a facility in Humboldt County.
“We’ve never sued anybody twice, and we’ve never—ever—brought a third lawsuit against anyone,” Patty Clary, executive director of Arcata-based Californians for Alternatives to Toxics (CATs), told the Times Standard (Eureka).
The civil suit against Kernen Construction Co. alleges similar issues to CATs’ previous lawsuits. The company is discharging stormwater illegally from parts of the industrial property.
The lawsuit alleges the company is operating in areas without a permit to discharge water, failing to monitor and report water contaminants, not capturing water from the industrial yard, and building unpermitted ponds to capture stormwater. The water off the property flows into two local creeks named Noisy and Hall, which in turn flow into the Mad River, when it rains.
The Mad River, located just north of the City of Arcata, provides municipal and domestic water supply for the Humboldt Bay region, and is also used for recreation. The river and estuary provide important habitat for wildlife, migration and spawning of aquatic organisms, and support of shellfish harvesting.
The lawsuit against the construction company follows a Notice of Violation of Water Code by the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board in May. The notice includes 11 alleged violations and documents the issues in trapping stormwater, according to documents provided to the Times-Standard. Out of 37 acres of the property in Glendale in an unincorporated portion of the county, 36 acres of industrial activities are exposed to stormwater, according to the water board. During a state water board inspection of the facility in February, staff found “construction waste and salvaged construction vehicles are stored inappropriately on the ground, and they are all exposed to rain without BMPs.” BMPs are structures that trap and control water pollution.
The company was hit with a $2 million fine — a civil penalty — in 2021 by a U.S District Court civil for discharging pollutants into Hall Creek in violation of the Clean Water Act, and for noncompliance with state and federal pollution control measures at the same facility.
“This is the second go-round with this company and the second time they ignored their duty to come up with better pollution control when they exceeded EPA benchmarks,” Bill Verick, then-attorney for CATs, said in a 2021 news release. “Hopefully, a $2 million fine will get their attention. If not, we’ll be back for a third go-round.”
Why Are We Letting Olympians Swim in The Seine?
Like so many of you, I’ve been watching the Olympics with the same amount of awe and excitement to see our world athletes compete with incredible skill and tenacity.
But one thing I can’t wrap my head around is why they are letting people swim in the Seine River. It’s been illegal to swim in it since 1923. This ban resulted from the city's wastewater, including sewage, flowing into the river instead of being treated at a water treatment plant. Gross!
In fact, swimming has been a no-go in the long-polluted Seine. In anticipation of hosting the Olympics, the city of Paris poured in $1.5 billion (1.4 billion euros) to try to clean it up. But just because you make the investment doesn’t mean the bacteria will go away.
Just yesterday, Olympic organizers in Paris cancelled the open water swimming training in the Seine River, due to pollution, despite the city’s best efforts to clean it up. In recent weeks, rainfall has contributed to increased levels of E. coli and other bacterial colonies in the river.
Swimming in water with unsafe levels of bacteria can lead to health issues such as an upset stomach and intestinal problems. Swimmers may inadvertently swallow the water or pick up infections through open cuts. Many reports have confirmed swimmers did get sick.
Belgium's Olympic committee announced it was withdrawing from the mixed relay triathlon after one of the team's competitors completed in the women's triathlon and became ill. The Belgian Olympic committee said in a statement it hopes "that lessons will be learned for future triathlon competitions at the Olympic Games.
And here’s the kicker: Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo took a dip in the famous river before the games to demonstrate the cleanliness of the river for the Olympics. I beg of all elected officials: stop with these publicity stunts. They are the worst trick in the book. Let the science lead and determine whether it’s safe to swim. PERIOD.
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