Publication:Arkansas Democrat-Gazette; Date:Oct 22, 2013; Section:Arkansas; Page Number:7


New take on water repealed
Law said to clash with federal act
RYAN MCGEENEY ARKANSAS DEMOCRAT-GAZETTE



After months of revising existing water regulations to comply with new state water-quality standards, staff members at the Arkansas Department of Environmental Quality must now revert to the state’s original and long-held interpretation of the federal Clean Water Act.

After last week’s threeday special legislative session, Gov. Mike Beebe signed Act 4 into law Monday, repealing changes to the state’s interpretation of the federal act. Those changes were a part of Act 954, which passed during the regular 2013 legislative session earlier this year and went into effect Aug. 16.

Act 954 changed the way stream flows in Arkansas waterways were calculated, allowing municipalities and industrial centers with water-discharge permits to discharge greater amounts of minerals, including sulphates and chlorides, into waterways. The act also removed the default assumption that all waterways in Arkansas were potential sources of drinking water, unless otherwise determined by scientific study.

Both Act 954 and its repeal were written by state Rep. Andy Davis, R-Little Rock. Although Davis argued the bill was a “common-sense” approach to regulation, department administrators and environmental activists warned throughout the lawmaking process that the legislation would likely put the state out of compliance with federal law.

In late August, about a week after Act 954 went into effect, administrators at the Environmental Protection Agency’s Region 6 office in Dallas terminated its “waiver of review” over the state’s permitting authority for permits affected by Act 954, in effect partially federalizing the permit process. In September, members of the Arkansas Pollution Control and Ecology Commission warned that municipalities and industries that initially supported Davis’s legislation may soon wish for a return to the original standards.

Calls to Davis on Monday were not returned.

Because Act 4 contains an emergency clause, it will go into effect immediately. Environmental Quality Department spokesman Katherine Benenati said Monday that she was not sure how this would affect water-discharge permits now under review by the department or the EPA, and that the department would be “working through” the issue throughout the week.

The EPA Region 6 office currently has 14 Arkansas water-discharge permits under review, all of which were affected by Act 954. Benenati said last week that the federal agency has until mid-November to state specific objections to the permits, which were temporarily in limbo during the partial shutdown of the federal government.

A spokesman with the EPA Region 6 office did not respond to requests for comment on the fate of the 14 permits.

Bill Kopsky, executive director of the Arkansas Public Policy Panel, said he was pleased to see state law returned to compliance with federal guidelines.

“The bottom line is that the Clean Water Act is still the law of the land in Arkansas,” Kopsky said. “If we had been allowed to skirt federal law, that would be a dangerous precedent.”