Clean Water Current

NACWA members that purchased liquid aluminum sulfate may qualify for either the Direct or Indirect Liquid Aluminum Sulfate Settlement. This litigation alleges that the leading manufacturers of liquid aluminum sulfate, commonly referred to as “Alum,” conspired to allocate territories, and/ or not compete for each other’s historical business by rigging bids, allocating customers and stabilizing the price of Alum sold in the United States between January 1, 1997 and February 18, 2011.

The NACWA Security & Emergency Preparedness Committee heard a presentation by guest speaker Jake Schmitter, Senior Manager for Training and Exercises at the Electricity-Information and Analysis Center (E-ISAC), during its May 23 web meeting on the upcoming GridEx V exercise. Water and wastewater utilities can experience adverse impacts during a significant electric utility outage, and GridEx is a useful exercise for exploring these interdependencies and how utilities can respond to emergencies resulting from cyber and physical attacks.

The federal government released its Spring 2019 Unified Agenda on May 22, providing updates on the timing for all of its ongoing regulatory activity.

The Association’s Water Quality Committee met via conference call on May 22 and discussed the latest developments from the EPA and around the country.

NACWA Member Utility the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC) recently unveiled its Community Benefits Dashboard, which is a tool that tracks and transparently reports out on the utility’s Community Benefits Program and Environmental Justice investments.

NACWA conveyed the public clean water sector’s perspective to the US Supreme Court on May 16 in one of the most significant Clean Water Act (CWA) cases to reach the High Court in decades. For more information and analysis, see NACWA’s recent Advocacy Alert.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Environment and Climate Change held a legislative hearing on May 15, entitled Protecting Americans At Risk of PFAS Contamination & Exposure. The hearing aimed to address the tsunami of legislative bills that have been introduced in the 116th Congress on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS).

The US Environmental Protection Agency’s Assistant Administrator for Water, David Ross, along with representatives from the US Departments of Agriculture (USDA), Interior (DOI) and Commerce (DOC), hosted a roundtable on nutrient-related pollution in Baton Rouge, LA last week.

NACWA met with senior EPA Office of Water staff last week to discuss compliance issues for combined sewer overflow (CSO) communities that have reached the end of their long-term control plan (LTCP) projects. The conversation focused specifically on communities that may still not be meeting water quality standards, despite having completed all the work and CSO remediation projects that they agreed to under their LTCP, and how to address these issues through future permits.

The 7th Annual Infrastructure Week concluded Monday, May 20 with more than 500 Affiliate organizations hosting nearly 150 events across America to promote infrastructure, a number of them specifically aimed at elevating clean water priorities.

Officials from EPA’s Office of Wastewater Management, along with EPA Regions 6 and 9, held an initial conference call on May 15 with several NACWA members and the North American Development Bank (NADB) to discuss collaboration opportunities with clean water utilities from Mexico. EPA’s primary focus is to mitigate the transboundary contamination that often flows north into the United States, but the Agency is also interested in addressing aging infrastructure and funding issues.

NACWA participated in the Massachusetts Coalition for Water Resources Stewardship’s (MCWRS’s) 10th Annual Water Resources Strategies Symposium last week in Marlborough, MA as part of a panel to discuss the importance of clean water advocacy.

NACWA submitted stakeholder comments last week to the House Transportation & Infrastructure Committee on the need for clean water to be a top priority as part of any comprehensive infrastructure legislation during this Congress.

The US House has a full schedule this week addressing water issues, including four hearings scheduled on Wednesday, May 15.

The Water Environment Federation (WEF) hosted its inaugural Stormwater and Green Infrastructure Symposium last week in Fort Lauderdale, FL. During the technical sessions, EPA gave a financing update, and stated that the expert consultants to help advise and inform the Environmental Financial Advisory Board (EFAB) workgroup on stormwater funding should be finalized this week.

The P3Great Lakes Initiative is seeking municipalities from the Great Lakes basin states—Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio Pennsylvania and New York—to finance green stormwater infrastructure via Environmental Impact Bond (EIB).

NACWA participated in the Oregon Association of Clean Water Agencies’ (ORACWA’s) annual Stormwater Summit on May 8, providing an overview of national legislative, regulatory, and legal developments impacting municipal stormwater utilities.

A special open panel discussion featuring NACWA Board Members is set to make the case for water infrastructure investment during national Infrastructure Week (May 13 – 20, 2019). The panel—entitled, The Future is Now: Smart Water Infrastructure, scheduled for May 15 in Washington, DC—features NACWA Board Members Kyle Drefuss-Wells, CEO of the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District, and Ted Henefin, General Manager of the Hampton Roads Sanitation District, among other panelists. They will make the case for smart water infrastructure investment, as the White House and Congress engage in talks over a possible $2 trillion national infrastructure package.

NACWA’s Communications & Public Affairs Committee held a teleconference presentation, Crisis Communications Strategy for PFAS: The Emerging Public Issue, on May 1, with guest speaker, Stephanie York, a Vice President of the crisis communications firm, Hennes Communications—one of the top crisis management firms in the country. An audio recording of the session is now available on NACWA Engage Forum, as well as a PFAS one-page primer/fact sheet that was used during Water Week.

NACWA participated in two sessions at the ALI-CLE 2019 Clean Water Act Conference last week, co-sponsored by the Environmental Law Institute. The conference provides in-depth legal analyses, policy perspectives, and insights on the challenges environmental attorneys and related professionals in water law are facing today.