Clean water protection alerts

Water quality meeting set for Little Kanawha watershed

GLENVILLE-- A public meeting to discuss water quality improvements in four streams in the Little Kanawha watershed is scheduled for 7 p.m. on May 24. The meeting will be held at the Gilmer County Senior Center in Glenville. The building is located at the intersection of U.S. Routes 33 and 119.

A TMDL, or total maximum daily load, is a plan of action used to clean up streams not meeting water quality standards. Iron, manganese and fecal coliform bacteria TMDLs are being developed for Duck Creek, Dustcamp Run, Lynch Run and Copen Run. TMDLs include calculations of pollutant reductions needed from the various categories of contributing sources. During the meeting, staff from DEP’s Division of Water and Waste Management will present its intended methodology for allocating pollutant loads. The information presented during the meeting is a preliminary step in developing a draft TMDL. After the meeting is complete, the DEP will make final allocation decisions and
begin preparing the draft TMDLs.

This is just one of several public participation opportunities in the TMDL development process.

For more information about the meeting, contact Steve Young at (304) 926-0495 or TDD/TDD (304) 926-0489. Information on TMDLs can be found at www.wvdep.org/wvtmdl.

The bi-partisan bill Clean Water Protection Act was introduced in the US House of Representatives with more than 60 co-sponsors. The bill, H.R. 2169, would restore a 25-year-old prohibition under the Clean Water Act that prevented mining companies and other industries from dumping masses of solid industrial wastes into the nation's waters.

The Clean Water Protection Act overturns a 2002 rule change by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that allows coal mining companies to create enormous valley fills, burying thousands of miles of streams, to make the practice of mountaintop removal mining cheaper. That rule change also allows other industries to dump waste in waters under the guise of renaming the waste material as "fill."

The Honorable Shelley Moore Capito
US House of Representatives
1431 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: 202-225-2711
No e-mail ( www.house.gov/writerep/) or www.house.gov/capito/

The Honorable Alan B. Mollohan
US House of Representatives
2346 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515-4801
Phone: 202-225-4172
No e-mail (www.house.gov/writerep/) or www.house.gov/mollohan/

The Honorable Nick J. Rahall II
US House of Representatives
2307 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515-4803
Phone: 202-225-3452
nrahall@mail.house.gov or www.house.gov/rahall/

WVEC Action Alert

May 14, 2007