Trout Unlimited Says President's Clean Water Action Plan Is on the Right Track
Clean Water Strategy Targets Polluted Runoff and Watershed Management
WASHINGTON, Feb. 19 /PRNewswire/ -- The nation's leading trout and salmon conservation group today praised the Clean Water Action Plan announced by President Clinton and Vice President Gore, singling out for special praise the program's emphasis on reducing polluted runoff, a major threat to trout and salmon fisheries nationwide
"Polluted runoff from agricultural fields, construction sites, timber roads and other non-point sources is Public Enemy Number One number one when it comes to healthy rivers and trout," said Steve Moyer, Vice President for Conservation Programs at Trout Unlimited. "The president's plan correctly emphasizes fixing these non-point source pollution problems by focusing efforts on critical watersheds -- protecting healthy watersheds, as well as restoring damaged ones -- to get the job done."
Polluted runoff, particularly from poor farming, ranching and logging practices, has severely impacted trout and salmon fisheries by overloading waterways with sediment, which can smother newly-laid eggs, and by contaminating streams with fertilizers and toxins, which disrupt rivers' ecological balance
TU applauded the ambitious funding requests included for several key polluted runoff preventing programs, which are funded by the federal government but are implemented cooperatively with state agencies, landowners and conservationists. The Administration's proposal to Congress, which totals $568 million in new funds ($2.2 billion in total program funds, including current and new funds), includes:
* an increase of $95 million (for a total of $200 million) for the Clean
Water Act's primary non-point pollution control program, Section 319,
which is implemented cooperatively between EPA and the states;
* an increase of $100 million (for a total of $300 million) for the
Department of Agriculture's Environmental Quality Incentives Program
(EQIP), which provides funds to farmers to prevent polluted runoff;
* an increase of $69 million to the Forest service and $24 million to the
Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to expand the Forest service's efforts
to obliterate harmful, obsolete roads and to improve riparian areas and
watershed health on BLM lands;
* and an increase of $2 million (from $5 million to $7 million) to the
Office of Surface Mining's Clean Streams initiative for the purpose of
restoring the thousands of miles of Appalachian streams damaged by acid
mine drainage
TU and other conservationists expressed concern that Congress might fail to approve the Administration's requests to make the Clean Water Action Plan a reality. "This is serious money," said Moyer. "If Congress is for clean water, it ought to approve these funding requests."
TU cautioned that the President's program will also be limited by the weaknesses in the Clean Water Act's current polluted runoff which must be addressed legislatively in a reauthorized Clean Water Act. The current program is not nearly as useful as it could be because its resources are inadequate, they are not being targeted well enough on critical watersheds within states, and the current law fails to contain enforceable mechanisms that would compel recalcitrant states and individual polluters from being required to fix polluted runoff problems. "Until we strengthen the Clean Water Act's polluted runoff program, the President's plan will only get us part of the way to the goal line," said Moyer
TU also praised the program's emphasis on community-based watershed management, an approach TU has pioneered in watersheds nationwide
"A river can never have too many friends," said Moyer. "Our Home Rivers Initiatives in New York and Wisconsin have driven home the fact that watershed conservation can only succeed when everyone in the valley is involved in protecting the river. When farmers and conservationists, businesses and residents, planners and agencies are all working together, real progress gets made."
Founded in 1959 in Grayling, Michigan, Trout Unlimited is America's leading coldwater fisheries conservation organization. TU's more than 100,000 members in 455 chapters nationwide are dedicated to the conservation, protection, and restoration of North America's trout and salmon and their watersheds
SOURCE Trout Unlimited
CONTACT: Peter Rafle, Director of Communications, 703-284-9412 Web Site: http://www.tu.org
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