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October 24, 2002 AMSA Fax Alert

Member Pipeline - Fax Alerts - October 24, 2002

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October 24, 2002

EPA’s Sewer Overflow Rule to Undergo Final Agency Review
AMSA has learned that EPA is about to enter final agency review of the sanitary sewer overflow (SSO) proposal. This process requires all relevant EPA offices to comment on the proposal and reach consensus on the proposal’s provisions before releasing it to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). The final agency review process is expected to take approximately two weeks. AMSA believes that its discussions with key EPA officials in recent weeks, including at last week’s Fall Leadership Retreat & Strategy Session, will help to enhance the proposal’s preamble language to include consideration of pivotal alternatives to the current zero overflow standard contained in the proposal. AMSA discussed its concerns and made recommendations regarding the SSO rule at last week’s Leadership Retreat with, among others, the Assistant Administrator (AA) for Water, G. Tracy Mehan; EPA’s AA for the Office of Enforcement & Compliance Assurance, John Peter Suarez; and Ken Munis of the Regulatory Analysis & Policy Team of the Office of Policy, Economics and Innovation. AMSA has also learned that EPA may have revamped its cost estimate of the SSO proposal in anticipation of OMB’s concerns about the rule’s relative costs and benefits. OMB has 90 days to review the proposal. AMSA will keep its members informed of developments in the SSO arena as they occur.


AMSA Hits National Radio on Behalf of Infrastructure Funding
AMSA’s views on the need for federal wastewater infrastructure funding received nationwide coverage on National Public Radio’s (NPR) All Things Considered program this week in a profile titled Raw Sewage Spills Threaten Nation's Waterways Due To Aging Sewage Treatment Plants and Reduced Funding. The show opened with the statement that “many sewage treatment plants are outdated and in disrepair. Towns are struggling to upgrade their equipment . . . and the price tag nationwide could top $600 billion.” The program stated that “across the country hundreds of wastewater plants are outdated. Many collection pipes are a century old and literally coming apart at the seams,” adding “Ken Kirk with the Association of Metropolitan Sewerage Agencies says a generation of environmental progress is at risk.” AMSA’s Ken Kirk emphasized the fact that without federal action to address the funding shortfall “we will have squandered a huge investment in clean water infrastructure and be at the same place that we were at 30 years ago, with major rivers and tributaries around the country in significant decline. And we don't want to do that.” EPA’s AA for Water, G. Tracy Mehan III, provided the administration’s position that “any new funding would have to come with congressional appropriations and there are no new appropriations right now,” adding “local governments will have to be creative.” The program’s transcript is available at http://www.amsa-cleanwater.org/advocacy/news/102102.cfm. AMSA will continue its public outreach and legislative advocacy for federal wastewater infrastructure funding legislation.

 

  • If you are planning to attend either of AMSA’s upcoming conferences — the Law Seminar or the Whole Effluent Toxicity Workshop, November 6-8 in Denver, Colo., at the Westin Tabor Center — there is still time to register. Online registration for both these timely conference offerings is available at http://www.amsa-cleanwater.org/meetings/. AMSA looks forward to seeing you there!