I appreciate The Columbian’s acknowledgment of my efforts to protect safe drinking water in its Feb. 25 editorial, “Oversight is crucial.” However, the attempt to imply inconsistency between my effort to ensure that the new Cowlitz mega-casino’s sewage system is safe and my opposition to the EPA’s new “Waters of the U.S.” rule is misguided.
I’ve always supported reasonable regulations and common-sense environmental protections, but the “Waters of the U.S.” rule is unreasonable and nonsensical. It is an unprecedented attempt by the EPA to overturn 42 years of Clean Water Act precedent to require expensive federal permitting for land use near every puddle, seasonal pond, ditch or wet area on private land anywhere in the country. Maj. Gen. John Peabody of the Army Corps of Engineers even said it was based on “inappropriate assumptions with no connection to the data provided.”
Not only would this rule impose an unnecessarily heavy burden on landowners, but the EPA has nowhere near the workforce necessary to process all the new permit applications the new rule would generate. Rather than burying itself in paperwork attempting to regulate puddles and ditches, the EPA should focus its finite resources on projects with major environmental impacts — such as a 260,000-square-foot casino planning to treat thousands of gallons of human waste directly above the aquifer that provides the drinking water for 99 percent of Clark County.
