Washington, D.C. --- U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), a senior member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee and co-chairman of the Congressional Coastal Caucus, joined U.S. Reps. Bart Stupak (D-MI), Clay Shaw (R-FL) and Mark Kirk (R-IL) at a news conference this morning on Capitol Hill to announce the introduction of bipartisan legislation that will block a U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) proposal that would allow partially treated human sewage to be dumped into our waterways.
The Save Our Waters Sewage Act would block the implementation of a November 2003 draft policy issued by the EPA that would allow publicly owned water treatment facilities to combine filtered but untreated human sewage with fully treated wastewater before discharge whenever it rains instead of only during periods of extreme weather. Implementing this policy would effectively lift the current prohibition on bypassing the critical second step in the treatment of wastewater, allowing more bacteria, pathogens, viruses and parasites into our waterways.
The legislation follows a bipartisan letter of 135 Members of Congress sent to Acting EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson on February 22nd urging the EPA not to weaken the Clean Water Act in reference to sewage. The letter, initiated by Pallone, Shaw and Stupak, sent a strong message to the Bush administration that this policy change is not supported on Capitol Hill. (LETTER IS ATTACHED) Pallone gave the following statement at today's news conference.