Schrader accuses EPA of 'turning its back on 35 years' of precedent

By STEVE BROWN

Capital Press

Legislation to prevent "another layer of regulations" concerning runoff from state and private forest roads has been introduced in Congress.

At issue is a 2010 ruling by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals declaring that runoff must be treated the same as runoff from factories and parking lots.

The appeal was filed by the Northwest Environmental Defense Center, which demanded that a permit from the National Pollution Discharge Elimination System be required for logging roads in Oregon's Tillamook State Forest.

"The environmental community wants to limit runoff and sediment into salmon-bearing waterways, and I'm in agreement on that," said Rep. Kurt Schrader, D-Ore., a sponsor of House Resolution 2541. "Now they're saying, 'I'm going to fine you and demand more permitting.' That's the height of being a Jekyll and Hyde."

Schrader said the court ruling creates new law without input from elected representatives.

"This is about (the Environmental Protection Agency) turning its back on 35 years of understanding that runoff is considered a nonpoint source. It's just flat wrong," he said.

The legislation is co-sponsored in the House by Schrader and U.S. Reps. Greg Walden, R-Ore., and Jaime Herrera Beutler and Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash. The Senate measure, S1369, is co-sponsored by Sens. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., and Mike Crapo and James Risch, both R-Idaho.

"It's getting good feedback from colleagues around the U.S.," Schrader said.

Peter Heide, senior director for forest policy at the Washington Forest Protection Association, said the court ruling, if allowed to stand, "adds another layer of regulations for activities already covered under the forest practices permit, which provides for clean water in Washington."

Oregon has a program similar to Washington's, he said, with adaptive management and a monitoring program for improving roads, abandonment planning and other practices.

"There's no need for additional court interference. It wouldn't change anything but paperwork. And it would be an added cost to agencies to administer," Heide said.

A Sierra Club spokeswoman said her organization opposes the proposal to overturn the court decision.

"The ruling is sound. The legislation actually takes us backward and goes beyond what protections we had before," Catherine Semcer, senior representative of the environmental group in Washington, D.C., said.

The measures in place before the ruling excluded from review a lot of construction that affected runoff from timber roads, she said.

"The conservation measures will help a lot of people in the long run, for irrigation, fisheries, drinking and recreation," Semcer said. "The more we get a handle on water quality, the better off we are."

Heide said the Clean Water Act allows citizen lawsuits. The appeals court ruling "opens up a tremendous liability" that could be "devastating," especially to small forestland owners, even if they are in compliance with the most stringent practices in the country.

"This is a nonpartisan issue," Heide said. "Not environment versus jobs, not big industry versus environmental industry, just a costly imposition on landowners and agencies."