The Clean Water Act of 1972 was landmark legislation that set an ambitious objective to “restore and maintain the physical, chemical and biological integrity of the nation’s waters.” It established an aggressive program to upgrade wastewater treatment plants across the country to meet higher levels of discharge quality. And, it established a partnership between federal, state and local governments to share the costs of such improvements, with the federal government contributing 75 percent, state government 15 percent and local government 10 percent. This collaboration demanded that the expenditure of the public’s money be cost effective and produce tangible benefits.
In the 38 years since the Act’s passage, significant environmental progress was made to reduce water pollution. Advanced sewage treatment processes were introduced that produce higher-quality discharges from wastewater plants to rivers and streams. Industrial discharges that had long contributed to water pollution were eliminated. Rivers like Chicago’s Bubbly Creek, which in Upton Sinclair’s 1906 “The Jungle” was described as “a great open sewer a hundred or two feet wide … where the grease and filth have caked solid and the creek looks like a bed of lava,” is now the site of residential development with million-dollar homes and source of four-pound coho salmon. Our own Blackstone River, backbone of the Industrial Revolution and dubbed America’s hardest-working river, now supports at least 18 species of fish, including trout.
With federal and state governments together paying 90 percent of the capital costs, this environmental progress was affordable for local ratepayers.
Worcester benefited greatly from this program. In 1977, the city’s 100-year-old, obsolete wastewater treatment plant was replaced with a new modern regional facility at a cost of $27 million. Worcester’s share of the cost was $2.7 million. As Worcester and other dischargers along the river upgraded their plants, the water quality of the Blackstone River improved significantly.
Around the same time the city tackled the issue of combined sewer overflows (CSOs), another major source of water pollution. Worcester, like many older cities, has combined sewers which carry sanitary waste in dry weather and both sanitary waste and storm water in wet weather. In wet weather, the sewer system was designed to have this combined waste discharge directly into rivers. Using the CWA partnership, Worcester addressed CSOs through construction of a treatment facility that cleaned all of its combined waste before release to the river under storm events. The cost of the CSO program was $70 million and Worcester’s share was $7 million. While CSOs remain a vexing and costly problem for many communities, Worcester attended to its CSO issues some 25 years ago.
In 1987, the federal and state governments decided to no longer pay 90 percent of the capital cost of clean water projects. Instead, their financial contribution to local governments would be limited to “low-interest loans.” With this change, the concept of cost-benefit also disappeared. The great and measurable strides made in water quality improvements during the early years of the CWA partnership have now been eclipsed by small and often dubious incremental gains at substantially greater costs.
Regulators continue to press an aggressive agenda, seemingly ignoring all of the great advances made in our rivers and streams, while chasing ephemeral improvements. Since 1987, they have unilaterally determined what ails the nation’s rivers, dictated the remedy and then handed the local ratepayer the bill. Often the science on which the new mandates are based is in question. Never is cost-benefit or cost-effectiveness considered, nor is the ability of the community to pay for projects that can cost hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars. There is no recognition of economic recessions, a community’s ability to pay, or other more pressing community needs. Instead we hear the CWA does not allow for such consideration and thus “it is full steam ahead.”
Over the next five years Worcester faces: $200 million in capital improvements and $5 million in added annual operating costs at the Upper Blackstone treatment plant to comply with the 2008 permit currently under appeal. This cost alone will add over $200 per year to the typical ratepayer’s bill. These costs are in addition to the $180 million already being spent; a potential $1.2 billion to meet the terms of a new storm water permit expected this year, a permit worded in a way that makes the city vulnerable to lawsuits from environmental groups. In addition, the city faces costs of $5 million over the next five years for CSO permit compliance, and $7 million over the next five years to deal with sanitary sewer overflows as directed by an order from EPA. This order included a fine against the city of $125,000.
Worcester remains a strong advocate of the essence of the CWA. We believe we all have a responsibility to improve our nation’s waters. However, we object to the current process that does not base permits on sound science, does not insist on a cost-benefit threshold, ignores sustainability, discounts a community’s ability to pay, does not recognize other contributors to water pollution, and imposes its will through the threat of high monetary penalties. It is time for a new approach in the noble pursuit of improving the nation’s waters before we bankrupt our cities and drive people and businesses to rural America or overseas.
Robert L. Moylan Jr. is Commissioner of Public Works and Parks for the city of Worcester.