[House Hearing, 115 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

BUILDING A 21ST-CENTURY INFRASTRUCTURE FOR AMERICA: IMPROVING WATER
QUALITY THROUGH INTEGRATED PLANNING

=======================================================================

(115-16)

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON
WATER RESOURCES AND ENVIRONMENT

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON
TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

__________

MAY 18, 2017

__________

Printed for the use of the
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure

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COMMITTEE ON TRANSPORTATION AND INFRASTRUCTURE

BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania, Chairman

DON YOUNG, Alaska PETER A. DeFAZIO, Oregon
JOHN J. DUNCAN, Jr., Tennessee, ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of
Vice Chair Columbia
FRANK A. LoBIONDO, New Jersey JERROLD NADLER, New York
SAM GRAVES, Missouri EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
DUNCAN HUNTER, California ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland
ERIC A. ``RICK'' CRAWFORD, Arkansas RICK LARSEN, Washington
LOU BARLETTA, Pennsylvania MICHAEL E. CAPUANO, Massachusetts
BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California
BOB GIBBS, Ohio DANIEL LIPINSKI, Illinois
DANIEL WEBSTER, Florida STEVE COHEN, Tennessee
JEFF DENHAM, California ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky JOHN GARAMENDI, California
MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina HENRY C. ``HANK'' JOHNSON, Jr.,
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania Georgia
RODNEY DAVIS, Illinois ANDRE CARSON, Indiana
MARK SANFORD, South Carolina RICHARD M. NOLAN, Minnesota
ROB WOODALL, Georgia DINA TITUS, Nevada
TODD ROKITA, Indiana SEAN PATRICK MALONEY, New York
JOHN KATKO, New York ELIZABETH H. ESTY, Connecticut,
BRIAN BABIN, Texas Vice Ranking Member
GARRET GRAVES, Louisiana LOIS FRANKEL, Florida
BARBARA COMSTOCK, Virginia CHERI BUSTOS, Illinois
DAVID ROUZER, North Carolina JARED HUFFMAN, California
MIKE BOST, Illinois JULIA BROWNLEY, California
RANDY K. WEBER, Sr., Texas FREDERICA S. WILSON, Florida
DOUG LaMALFA, California DONALD M. PAYNE, Jr., New Jersey
BRUCE WESTERMAN, Arkansas ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California
LLOYD SMUCKER, Pennsylvania BRENDA L. LAWRENCE, Michigan
PAUL MITCHELL, Michigan MARK DeSAULNIER, California
JOHN J. FASO, New York
A. DREW FERGUSON IV, Georgia
BRIAN J. MAST, Florida
JASON LEWIS, Minnesota

(ii)

Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment

GARRET GRAVES, Louisiana, Chairman

ERIC A. ``RICK'' CRAWFORD, Arkansas GRACE F. NAPOLITANO, California
BOB GIBBS, Ohio LOIS FRANKEL, Florida
DANIEL WEBSTER, Florida FREDERICA S. WILSON, Florida
THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky JARED HUFFMAN, California
RODNEY DAVIS, Illinois ALAN S. LOWENTHAL, California
MARK SANFORD, South Carolina EDDIE BERNICE JOHNSON, Texas
ROB WOODALL, Georgia JOHN GARAMENDI, California
TODD ROKITA, Indiana DINA TITUS, Nevada
JOHN KATKO, New York SEAN PATRICK MALONEY, New York
BRIAN BABIN, Texas ELIZABETH H. ESTY, Connecticut
DAVID ROUZER, North Carolina CHERI BUSTOS, ILLINOIS
MIKE BOST, Illinois JULIA BROWNLEY, California
RANDY K. WEBER, Sr., Texas BRENDA S. LAWRENCE, Michigan
DOUG LaMALFA, California PETER A. DeFAZIO, Oregon (Ex
A. DREW FERGUSON IV, Georgia Officio)
BRIAN J. MAST, Florida, Vice Chair
BILL SHUSTER, Pennsylvania (Ex
Officio)

(iii)

CONTENTS

Page

Summary of Subject Matter........................................ vii

WITNESSES

Hon. Pete Buttigieg, Mayor, City of South Bend, Indiana, on
behalf of the U.S. Conference of Mayors:

Testimony.................................................... 7
Prepared statement........................................... 45
Response to question for the record from Hon. Grace F.
Napolitano, a Representative in Congress from the State of
California................................................. 63
Hon. Johnny I. Dupree, Ph.D., Mayor, City of Hattiesburg,
Mississippi, on behalf of the National League of Cities:

Testimony.................................................... 7
Prepared statement........................................... 65
Response to question for the record from Hon. Grace F.
Napolitano, a Representative in Congress from the State of
California................................................. 74
Hon. Todd Portune, Commissioner, Hamilton County Board of
Commissioners, on behalf of the National Association of
Counties:

Testimony.................................................... 7
Prepared statement........................................... 75
Response to question for the record from Hon. Grace F.
Napolitano, a Representative in Congress from the State of
California................................................. 88
Craig Butler, Director, Ohio Environmental Protection Agency, on
behalf of the Environmental Council of the States:

Testimony.................................................... 7
Prepared statement........................................... 89
Response to question for the record from Hon. Grace F.
Napolitano, a Representative in Congress from the State of
California................................................. 97
William E. Spearman III, P.E., Principal, WE3 Consultants, LLC,
on behalf of the American Public Works Association:

Testimony.................................................... 7
Prepared statement........................................... 98
Response to question for the record from Hon. Grace F.
Napolitano, a Representative in Congress from the State of
California................................................. 103
Lawrence Levine, Senior Attorney, Natural Resources Defense
Council:

Testimony.................................................... 7
Prepared statement........................................... 105
Response to question for the record from Hon. Grace F.
Napolitano, a Representative in Congress from the State of
California................................................. 120

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

Hon. Elizabeth H. Esty, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Connecticut, and Hon. Peter A. DeFazio, a
Representative in Congress from the State of Oregon, submission
of a chart entitled, ``National Summary of State Information,
Percentage of Impaired or Threatened Assessed Waters''......... 3
Hon. Garret Graves, a Representative in Congress from the State
of Louisiana, submission of the following:

Written statement of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency 123
Written statement of the National Association of Clean Water
Agencies................................................... 130
Hon. Elizabeth H. Esty, a Representative in Congress from the
State of Connecticut, submission of the following:

Written statement of Hon. Marcia L. Fudge, a Representative
in Congress from the State of Ohio......................... 138
Written statement of American Rivers et al................... 140

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BUILDING A 21ST-CENTURY INFRASTRUCTURE FOR AMERICA: IMPROVING WATER
QUALITY THROUGH INTEGRATED PLANNING

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THURSDAY, MAY 18, 2017

House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Water Resources and Environment,
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:05 a.m., in
room 2167 Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Garret Graves
(Chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. The subcommittee will come to
order. Good morning, and thank you all for being here. I ask
unanimous consent that Members not on the subcommittee be
permitted to sit with the subcommittee today and ask questions
at the hearing. Without objection, it is so ordered.
I want to welcome everyone for being here today at our
hearing ``Building a 21st-Century Infrastructure for America:
Improving Water Quality Through Integrated Planning.''
Communities all across our Nation are facing increasing
regulatory enforcement, financial pressures to address sewer
overflows and other aging water infrastructure issues, as well
as other burdensome regulatory challenges that have become
priorities in recent years.
These include more stringent and widespread regulations on
stormwater discharges, daily loads, total maximum daily loads,
nutrients and other pollutants, and public drinking water
systems which could lead to many communities having to install
and operate, at great expense, advanced treatment, removal, and
prevention technologies.
A large portion of these regulatory mandates are going
unfunded by the Federal and State governments, with the result
that many municipalities have had to make substantial increases
in investments in wastewater and public infrastructure, to the
point that many communities and ratepayers are now increasingly
getting economically pressed to the limit.
And I want to give some examples of what that looks like.
In my home State of Louisiana, we have situations where the
city of Baton Rouge, where I am from, we are under a consent
decree. The city of New Orleans, under consent decree. The city
of Shreveport, under a consent decree.
The St. Louis region has a $4.6 billion consent decree,
Atlanta $4.1 billion, Indianapolis $3.1 billion, South Bend
$861 million, and that city has a population of approximately
100,000. So you can do the math there. Lima, Ohio, a population
of 38,000, has a consent decree costing approximately $160
million.
In Chicopee, Massachusetts, they had to raise rates by 134
percent. The residents now pay more than $700 a year. Baltimore
had to raise rates by approximately 9 percent per year for each
of the last 8 years, with the exception of 1 year where there
was approximately a 4-percent increase. And in Washington, DC,
the average household, for four to six people, is charged just
under $100 a month.
No one is sitting here saying that we should not have
regulations. No one is saying that we should not respect our
environment, that we should be discharging polluted water. What
we are saying is that the EPA in 2012 developed an integrated
planning approach where the idea was you were going to have
more flexibility in the way that these issues were addressed,
more flexibility for the municipalities, for the States, and
others, to solve these problems, and of course, do it in a
manner that is affordable rather than continuing to impose
unfunded mandates, continuing to see extraordinary increases on
rates of our citizens across the country.
And so the hearing today, we are interested in hearing from
our witnesses and learning more about your perspective on
integrated planning, how that is working as compared to what
appears to be a larger focus on aggressive enforcement actions
such as consent decrees, and getting your perspective on how
this process can be improved to where we can do a better job
balancing environmental success, affordability, and flexibility
for many of our States and municipalities that are dealing with
these challenges.
So I am looking forward to hearing from our witnesses
today. I am looking forward to hearing your thoughts on how we
move forward and address some of these challenges. And with
that, I am going to turn to Ms. Esty for opening comments.
Ms. Esty. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for holding this
important hearing on improving water quality through integrated
planning. In 1972, Congress enacted the Clean Water Act to
protect public health, to ensure safe sources of drinking
water, and to provide safe recreation areas for all Americans.
Forty-five years later, water quality continues to be a
challenge across the country and in my home State of
Connecticut. Poor water quality does not just threaten public
health, it jeopardizes our fisheries, limits recreational
opportunities, and is a drag on our economy.
Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent to enter into the
record a summary of recent Clean Water Act reports on the
condition of the Nation's waterways that shows a downward trend
in improving the health of streams, rivers, and lakes across
the country.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Without objection.
Ms. Esty. Thank you.

[The national summary of impaired or threatened assessed waters
follows:]

National Summary of State Information Percentage of Impaired or Threatened Assessed Waters
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Lakes, Bays and Coastal
Rivers and Reservoirs, and Estuaries (Sq. Shorelines Wetlands (Acres)
Streams (Miles) Ponds (Acres) Miles) (Miles)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2017 \1\................................................. 55.1 71.5 83.5 21.3 53.9
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2011 \2\................................................. 51 66 61 38 36
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2009 \3\................................................. 47 64 30 n/a n/a
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2007 \4\................................................. 49 52 44 17 52
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2002 \5\................................................. 39 45 51 14 n/a
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2000 \6\................................................. 35 45 44 12 n/a
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
1996 \7\................................................. 44 49 42 21 n/a
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
\1\ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Summary of State Information (ATTAINS_Database) (May 2017).
\2\ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Summary of State Information (ATTAINS_Database) (January 2011).
\3\ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Water Quality Inventory, 2004 Reporting Cycle (January 2009).
\4\ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Water Quality Inventory, 2002 Reporting Cycle (October 2007).
\5\ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Water Quality Inventory, 2000 Report (August 2002).
\6\ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Water Quality Inventory, 1998 Report to Congress (June 2000).
\7\ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Water Quality Inventory, 1996 Report to Congress (April 1998).

Ms. Esty. Improving our Nation's water quality should
continue to be a priority for Congress, and I look forward to
working together to help our communities make continued
progress in restoring their local rivers, lakes, and streams
for the protection and enjoyment of all Americans.
But our communities cannot afford to improve the water
quality on their own, and that is in part why EPA developed the
integrated planning policy under the Clean Water Act, based on
the reality that States and municipalities do not have the
financial or, often, the technical expertise to address local
water quality challenges.
The integrated planning policy encourages communities to
work directly with the Federal Government and State agencies to
identify and fully implement the most effective and the most
cost-effective approaches for meeting our shared objective of
clean water that protects public health and the environment.
Our communities need additional financial resources and
assistance to clean up their local rivers, streams, and lakes.
But the primary program for providing that assistance, the
Clean Water State Revolving Fund, was last authorized in 1987,
almost 30 years ago.
Reauthorizing and funding the Clean Water State Revolving
Fund is particularly important for many of our States, and I
can speak from experience in Connecticut, where all of our
rivers basically flow into Long Island Sound. It is absolutely
essential, and I know when I served on the local town council
and was tasked to the Water Pollution Control Authority,
basically every municipality in Connecticut relies on the State
Revolving Fund to fund what typically for a community of
30,000, like mine of Cheshire, was $6 million just to deal with
the phosphorus issue.
So we know that that is often not reasonable for
communities to deal with on their own, and yet the health of
Long Island Sound is an American issue. It touches the entire
country and involves economically important fisheries and other
recreational activities. So that just underscores how important
these initiatives are.
And I am looking forward to hearing today, with your
expertise and your advice to us, to make sure we have the
support to reauthorize and fully fund the Clean Water State
Revolving Fund to allow you at the local and at the State level
to make these important investments.
And I know, having been in the State legislature and having
been in local office and worked on these exact issues, and
having worked for NRDC [Natural Resources Defense Council] on
water issues back in law school, that these are ongoing
challenges. We want the most effective use of tax dollars. We
all want that.
But the response should not be, let's just let the water
quality go. As we saw in Flint, Michigan, that is a danger.
That is a danger, and we should not be subjecting our
constituents or anyone in America to those risks.
So again, this is an important discussion we are having
here today, and we are very much looking forward to your
perspective on how this integrated planning process fits into
that broader initiative of doing it smarter, doing it better,
and stretching those taxpayer dollars to achieve the goals.
I think we need to keep hard adherence to the goals of
clean, safe, and affordable drinking water for communities and
waste systems that work, and then have the political will to
fund them at appropriate levels to help communities across the
country preserve these national treasures.
And a final anecdote: My husband grew up right next to
Waterbury, Connecticut. When he was a kid, he knew what color
Keds they were making in Waterbury in Sperry by the color that
the river was flowing. And he could smell it when he was
playing baseball.
The Waterbury Water Treatment Plant Initiative, which has
been done through the clean water fund, is now restoring that
entire river system to the cleanest level it has been since the
early 1800s. It is possible to reclaim these rivers and have
the fly fishing I now have in my district precisely because
these funds have been so important.
So again, I welcome you all to joining us here today on
National Infrastructure Week, and look forward to your
testimony. Thank you very much.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you, Ms. Esty.
And now I am going to turn to the ranking member of the
full committee, Mr. DeFazio.
Mr. DeFazio. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks for this
important hearing. We do not want overly prescriptive and
burdensome regulations. We do want to give flexibility to
communities, and we hope to hear about what a number of
communities have done or what problems they have had with a
results-oriented approach that is not following a Federal
prescription. That is critical.
But the Federal Government is not being a good partner. We
are not putting our money where our regulations or mouth is.
Now, you can go one of two ways. You can say, well, let's just
waive the regulations. Let's go back to the good old days when
the Cuyahoga River caught fire and the Willamette River in
Oregon was essentially an open sewer.
I do not believe the American people support that. The
American people want clean rivers and streams and the
recreational aspects of that. They want drinking water that is
safe, and we can do that. It would be pathetic for the
Government of the United States of America to say, ``We cannot
afford clean water. We are going to emulate China where the
water is just filthy and undrinkable.''
So today I am introducing, with Ranking Member Napolitano,
who because of a personal issue is not here, and Representative
Duncan, we are introducing a bill to reauthorize the Clean
Water SRF program. The Federal Government needs to be a good
partner. Statistics, and I will put this little chart in the
record, are alarming.
The deterioration is accelerating; just 20 years ago, 44
percent of rivers and streams, in terms of mileage measured,
were impaired, and today, it is 55.1. Lakes, reservoirs, and
ponds have gone from 49 to 71.5 percent. Bays and estuaries
particularly alarming since that is basically the breadbasket
of the oceans--the estuaries have gone from 42 percent impaired
to 83.5 percent impaired. Coastal shoreline miles, we are doing
a little better there; it is only up slightly. And then
wetlands, we are talking about 54 percent.
So hopefully we will hear from the witnesses today perhaps
Congress needs to move the EPA toward a more results-oriented
approach with more flexibility. I had a city in my district
that developed a very, very innovative way to deal with
wastewater, and I am sure others around the country have done
that.
So I am looking forward to the testimony, and hopefully we
will take action and reauthorize the Clean Water SRF program.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr. DeFazio.
Before I begin introducing our witnesses this morning, I
need to dispense with some unanimous consent requests.
I ask unanimous consent that written testimony submitted on
behalf of the following be included in the hearing record: from
the Environmental Protection Agency, from the National
Association of Clean Water Agencies.
Is there any objection?
[No response.]
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Without objection, so ordered.

[The written testimonies from the Environmental Protection Agency
and the National Association of Clean Water Agencies are on pp. 123-
137.]

Mr. Graves of Louisiana. I ask unanimous consent that the
record remain open for 30 days after the hearing in order to
accept written testimony for the hearing record. Without
objection, it is so ordered.
I ask unanimous consent that the record of today's hearing
remain open until such time as our witnesses provide answers to
any questions that may be submitted to them in writing. Without
objection.
Ms. Esty. I ask unanimous consent that the following
statements and letters be made part of the hearing record for
today: first, a statement from Representative Marcia L. Fudge
of Ohio; the second letter is from several conservation
organizations, including American Rivers, the American
Sustainable Business Council, Earthjustice, the League of
Conservation Voters, NRDC, and the Southern Environmental Law
Center.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Without objection, so ordered.

[The statements of Hon. Marcia L. Fudge and American Rivers et al.
are on pp. 138-143.]

Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you. At this time I will
recognize Mr. Rokita to introduce the Honorable Pete Buttigieg.
Mr. Rokita. Thank you.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Is that all right? All right.
Thank you.
Mr. Rokita. We will get to that, Chairman.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Pete.
Mr. Rokita. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you for your
leadership in organizing us here this morning. I am happy to
take this opportunity to welcome before our subcommittee a
fellow Hoosier, our executive brand leader in South Bend,
Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, just like it is spelled.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Rokita. Mayor Buttigieg was first elected mayor in 2011
as a young man and is currently serving in his second term.
Mayor Buttigieg is testifying before the committee, Chairman,
representing the Conference of Mayors.
South Bend is the fourth largest city in Indiana, with a
population of just over 100,000 people. It is also home, of
course, to one of the most prestigious universities in the
world, the University of Notre Dame. But perhaps more
importantly, it comes also very close to rivaling Whiting,
Indiana as the best place in the Midwest to get a good pierogi.
As the mayor will explain, South Bend also has a unique
history, perhaps unfortunately, with Clean Water Act. South
Bend is currently under a consent decree, which is in essence a
mandate placed upon them by the Federal Government but without
any funding from the Federal Government. These burdens placed
on our local governments need to stop, and I look forward to
hearing from Mayor Buttigieg and all our witnesses on this
matter. I yield back.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Reserving the right to object to
the description of Notre Dame, I recognize Mayor Pete for 5
minutes.

TESTIMONY OF HON. PETE BUTTIGIEG, MAYOR, CITY OF SOUTH BEND,
INDIANA, ON BEHALF OF THE U.S. CONFERENCE OF MAYORS; HON.
JOHNNY I. DUPREE, PH.D., MAYOR, CITY OF HATTIESBURG,
MISSISSIPPI, ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL LEAGUE OF CITIES; HON.
TODD PORTUNE, COMMISSIONER, HAMILTON COUNTY BOARD OF
COMMISSIONERS, ON BEHALF OF THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF
COUNTIES; CRAIG BUTLER, DIRECTOR, OHIO ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION
AGENCY, ON BEHALF OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL COUNCIL OF THE STATES;
WILLIAM E. SPEARMAN III, P.E., PRINCIPAL, WE3 CONSULTANTS, LLC,
ON BEHALF OF THE AMERICAN PUBLIC WORKS ASSOCIATION; AND
LAWRENCE LEVINE, SENIOR ATTORNEY, NATURAL RESOURCES DEFENSE
COUNCIL

Mr. Buttigieg. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you,
Congressman Rokita, for the gracious introduction. I would
welcome you for a comparative pierogi tasting and we can settle
that question about Whiting. And I want to thank everyone here
for paying attention to an unglamorous but extraordinarily
important issue for us.
As was said, South Bend is a medium-sized city. We've got
about 100,000 people, and as a mayor, I am proud to report we
are seeing our fastest population and economic growth in a
generation. But we are still struggling economically in many
ways. Over one-quarter of our population lives below the
Federal poverty line.
And, like many midwestern communities, we have a legacy
combined sewer system. So since late 2011, we have been working
to comply with the Federal consent decree that tells us how we
are supposed to modify our sewer system to reduce overflows.
We love our river and we enthusiastically support the goal
of reducing overflows. But the current plan is enormously
expensive, $861 million, as the chairman mentioned. When you
add in financing costs, that is over $1 billion. So in a city
of 100,000, that is $10,000 for every man, woman, and child, in
a city where the per capita personal income is $19,818. It is
simply not affordable.
One out of every ten households in our city would spend 14
percent of their income as a household on the wastewater
portion of their bill. Low-income families cannot afford it,
and we also cannot afford to have our economic competitiveness
diminished by wastewater rates that make us uncompetitive. And
I cannot believe that this set of harms was ever intended in
the Clean Water Act.
I do want to tell you about the progress that we have
already made. This is a two-phase plan. We have already
executed phase 1. We invested $150 million to do that. I am
also sometimes heard boasting that South Bend has the smartest
sewers in the world. Beginning at the initiative of my
predecessor, our city established a network of WiFi-enabled
small sensors deployed throughout the system that allows us to
optimize the flow.
Because of those two things, we have already reduced our
overflows by 75 percent. We have gone from over 2 billion
gallons annually to less than 500 million. But getting that
last 25 percent, that part has a price tag of over $700
million. It is all ``gray'' infrastructure, tanks and tunnels.
So it is not what you would call an integrated plan, and it
does not contemplate green infrastructure.
Now, thanks to that smart sewer data that I just mentioned,
we have been able to model with much greater accuracy the plan
that we agreed to. And what we have learned is that it is not
only more expensive but actually less effective than originally
envisioned. And yet as of now, we are required to go forward
with it.
We have figured out a way to meet the objectives for
dramatically less, from $713 million to about $200 million,
through a smarter, greener plan, but only if we are allowed to
implement it. So what communities like South Bend need most of
all is flexibility. Rigid long-term control plans that do not
evolve with technology and do not use an integrated approach
are not meeting the goal of protecting our national waters
efficiently and affordably.
Now, a lot of cities share South Bend's story, and that is
why the U.S. Conference of Mayors is calling for solutions in a
number of areas:
First, it is time to codify the EPA's integrated planning
and permitting policy. Integrated planning is designed to allow
cities to develop comprehensive plans for our water, sewer, and
stormwater needs, and invest over time according to our
priorities.
Second, we believe we can achieve long-term control through
permits, allowing for more flexibility and realistic timelines
rather than committing to highly prescriptive plans that only
allow gray infrastructure and do not keep up with the times.
Third, we are urging congressional support for exercising
flexibility in the existing law. The Clean Water Act allows EPA
to use flexibility in what are called use attainment
designations, allowing for commonsense variances. But that
flexibility is applied very unevenly across the system and
across the country.
And fourth, the conference urges eliminating civil
penalties for local governments working in good faith. We
believe the civil penalties should be reserved only for those
units that refuse to achieve progress, not for those doing our
best to serve citizens affordably. Now, the conference favors
bill 465, but all of the bills that are being discussed
recently are positive steps forward, and we thank Members for
paying attention to this. We think that the financial impact
threshold triggering a discussion--not a rollback, but a
discussion of flexibility--is urgently needed in cities like
ours. And we believe overall we need to rethink how to clean up
our lakes and rivers as effectively and cost-efficiently as
possible.
Again, I thank the committee for your attention to this
matter. I would refer you to our written testimony for more
detail. And I look forward to this morning's discussion.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you.
Our next witness is the Honorable Johnny DuPree, the mayor
of Hattiesburg, Mississippi. And with a name like DuPree, I
assume you were kicked out of Louisiana at some point. But I
welcome you being next door and recognize for 5 minutes.
Mr. DuPree. Good morning, Mr. Chairman, Chairman Graves,
and to Congresswoman Esty and members of the subcommittee. I am
Johnny DuPree. I am mayor of the city of Hattiesburg,
Mississippi, some say the home of Brett Favre because he is
still there. We are the fourth largest city in the State. We
have, per capita, more doctors in Hattiesburg than any other
city in the State.
But I want to thank you for this opportunity to highlight
the importance of investing in our Nation's water
infrastructure. I would also like to discuss some opportunities
of local government flexibility in dealing with the kinds of
water challenges like we are facing in Hattiesburg.
First, on behalf of the National League of Cities, I would
like to express our support for two much-needed policy
frameworks adopted by EPA, the integrated municipal stormwater
and wastewater planning approach and the Financial Capability
Assessment Framework for municipal Clean Water Act
requirements. They have been important tools for us for local
government dealing with stormwater and wastewater
infrastructure issues.
But while those tools have been a great help to our cities,
there is still a lot more that we could do. We have to ensure
that these frameworks can work not only for the largest cities
and the smallest cities but for all cities, all communities, to
help balance the environmental protection with economic
feasibility.
In working to serve our constituents, my other fellow city
leaders and I are faced with regulatory burdens and unfunded
mandates. We have had to make tough choices sometimes about
service or maintenance. We have seen proposed budget cuts that
would undermine our most important programs.
In Hattiesburg, we are facing challenges addressing
sanitary sewer overflows, just like other cities, upgrading our
wastewater treatment facility to the tune of maybe $150
million, and modernizing our drinking and water system. Like in
many cities, many of our pipes and mains are well past their
expected life design. Our city is 133 years old.
Our city has invested over $40 million in bond funds over
the last 5 years to meet the requirements of the Clean Water
Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act. We are projecting to spend
another $30 million in bonds over the next 5 years. And on top
of that, we have hiked our rates over and over and over again,
just this last year by 20 percent.
But all of that spending still will not be enough to meet
our needs and to meet the requirements. It is still not enough
to satisfy these unfunded Federal mandates. So let me be clear.
We are committed to making the smartest, most sustainable
investments for our community. And we care about building
infrastructure, infrastructure that will not only take us
further but also take our children and their children further.
But with limited financial capacity, both from our city and
from our citizens, those who are least able to afford it, being
able to prioritize and sequence projects would go a long way
towards making a long-term plan for integrated stormwater and
wastewater projects more feasible.
The first thing we need in our cities is flexibility,
flexibility through partnerships. Last October, Hattiesburg won
a technical assistance grant from EPA to develop green
infrastructure along the Little Gordon's Creek, which is an
impaired tributary of the Leaf River. That plan would help us
extend the life of our infrastructure and help us save money.
Mr. Chairman, this is exactly what cities and towns need,
the ability to work with our State and our EPA to prioritize
our investments and embrace innovative solutions to integrated
planning.
The second thing we need is flexibility to permit. If you
give city leaders the chance to be realistic with time and
prioritize, accordingly you get a better solution and
oftentimes a lower rate. What cities and towns need most is
affordable, flexible Federal programs that work in every
community, large and small, urban or rural; that will be
consistent in guidance, and assistance across the EPA regions.
When we can count on that Federal support, we can start fixing
the program.
Luckily, many of you and your fellow legislators are
working proactively to support integrated planning on the local
level, and I see committee sponsors of both the Water Quality
Improvement Act and the Water Infrastructure Flexibility Act.
And we urge Congress to pass them both.
As you consider these bills, there are a number of
provisions that could make the processes clearer, more
efficient, and even more affordable. I encourage you to
consider both technical feasibility and economic affordability
within integrated permits, as well as reassessing the threshold
at which financial impacts on ratepayers become too burdensome.
I also want to thank Ranking Member DeFazio in his absence
and also Congresswoman Esty and all the other Members for
introducing the Water Quality Protection and Job Creation Act,
which would go a long way towards addressing our aging
infrastructure problems.
In closing, the Federal Government's water regulations
cannot come as mandates. We need more direct funding for our
cities and we need the ability to address our wastewater and
stormwater requirements in a holistic, flexible, and affordable
manner through integrated planning.
I want to thank you all again for allowing me to come, and
I look forward to your questions.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Appreciate
your testimony.
Our next witness is the Honorable Todd Portune, who is a
commissioner for Hamilton County, Ohio.
Mr. Portune. Good morning, Chairman Graves, Representative
Esty, and members of the subcommittee. It is an honor to be
here today to testify before this subcommittee. My name is Todd
Portune, and I serve as president of the Hamilton County Board
of County Commissioners in Ohio. Today I am representing the
National Association of Counties.
Hamilton County, Ohio, is considered primarily urban, with
a population of almost 808,000 residents located in southwest
Ohio. The county seat is in Cincinnati, which is the third
largest city in Ohio.
The topic of this hearing is of great importance to
counties across the United States that are dealing with
increased responsibilities and unfunded mandates under the
Clean Water Act as co-regulators and as regulated entities.
This includes the rising expenses associated with Clean Water
Act wastewater-related wet weather consent decrees, with
tighter stormwater requirements, and the limited capabilities
of our counties and residents to absorb the cost of these
additional outlays.
Today, as you continue to assess how integrated planning
can be used to achieve Federal water quality goals, I would
like to share with the committee three key points for
consideration.
First, integrated planning can help counties address the
growing list of Clean Water Act needs. Over the years, the
number of Federal regulations and requirements facing counties
have increased dramatically.
This growing number of regulations comes at a time when
counties, regardless of their size, are experiencing
significant fiscal constraints, and our capacity to fund
compliance activities is often limited. In fact, over 40 States
put significant restrictions on counties' ability to generate
revenue or collect taxes.
Additionally, the Federal Government has increasingly been
using litigation-driven consent decrees to drive tighter
requirements for combined sewer overflows and sanitary sewer
overflows, including those at wastewater treatment plants. In
some cases, the cost of these consent decrees has ranged from
hundreds of millions to billions of dollars per county.
In my county, we oversee the Metropolitan Sewer District of
Greater Cincinnati. It serves almost 300,000 households. But
since 2004, Hamilton County and the sewer district has been
required to comply with a consent decree for a Federal water
quality noncompliance issue on our wastewater sewage system.
As a result, the county and our taxpayers are required to
invest over $3 billion at 2006 rates in additional projects and
infrastructure upgrades. In the past 10 years alone, Hamilton
County has spent over $1 billion, with over $2 billion still to
go under our decree.
Close to one-third of Hamilton County lives below the
Federal poverty level. They are the ones most hard-hit by these
new requirements and under the consent decree and other
associated costs.
Since we began, our sewer rates have increased
approximately 350 percent, and over the next 20 years annual
sewer rates will rise from $844 a year to $2,748 a year when we
finally meet the terms of the consent decree, if the remainder
of the duties must be met during that time period.
Unfortunately, my county is not an isolated case, and stories
like this are being retold across the United States.
Second, integrated planning offers a path for counties to
meet the growing universe of Clean Water Act regulations in an
environmentally sensitive, streamlined, and cost-effective
manner. That is why EPA's integrated planning framework is so
attractive to counties.
Recognizing that water affordability is a huge problem, EPA
set in place a framework to allow EPA regions to work
collaboratively with States and impacted local governments
across the universe of water mandates.
Under the plan, counties can prioritize their local water
quality and infrastructure goals across all Clean Water Act
programs based on the most pressing issues within their
community. Had this been available to us at the very beginning
in lieu of a consent decree, Hamilton County could have saved
county residents a lot of money.
Unfortunately, to date the EPA regional offices have not
used integrated planning to the extent that they could, which
brings me to the final point: Congress and the administration
have a perfect opportunity today to protect water quality in
ways that are affordable to counties and their residents.
This opportunity has been created by a number of bills that
have already been introduced, including those that have moved
through committee in the Senate. We thank the sponsors of those
bills for their work toward passing legislation to codify EPA's
integrated planning framework.
In conclusion and on behalf of America's 3,069 counties, we
thank you, the subcommittee, for the opportunity to testify
today about providing us, America's counties, with the
flexibility to work with the EPA as a true partner, saving
county ratepayers nationally close to hundreds of billions of
dollars in the process, while meeting Clean Water Act
requirements.
I will be happy to answer any questions that the
subcommittee may have, and I refer to the written testimony as
well that we have submitted on behalf of NACo [National
Association of Counties]. Thank you very much.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you, Commissioner Portune.
Appreciate you being here. At this time I recognize Mr. Gibbs
to introduce Mr. Craig Butler.
Mr. Gibbs. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman. It is my
pleasure today to introduce Craig Butler, who was appointed by
Governor Kasich in February of 2014 as the director of the Ohio
Environmental Protection Agency. Previously he was the
assistant policy director for energy, agriculture, and the
environment in Governor Kasich's administration.
He also served as the chief of Ohio EPA's Central and
Southeast District offices after graduating with honors from
Mansfield University in Pennsylvania with a B.A. in geography
and environmental science, and also a master's degree in
environmental science from Ohio University.
He has been a public servant for more than 24 years and he
is a pragmatic regulator and proponent of finding innovative
ways of solving water quality issues. And it is refreshing to
have a director in Ohio that understands the relationship
between business, economic growth, and how that can enhance and
improve and protect an environment.
And so it is my pleasure today to welcome my good friend,
Director Butler, as he is here representing the Environmental
Council of the States. I yield back.
Mr. Butler. Thank you, Chairman Graves, Representative
Esty. Representative Gibbs, thank you for the introduction.
Members of the subcommittee, good morning. I am Craig Butler. I
am director of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency,
testifying today as the Water Committee chair and Executive
Committee member of the Environmental Council of the States--
ECOS--a national nonpartisan organization whose members are the
leaders of State and territorial environmental protection
agencies across the country. ECOS members include leaders of
your States' environmental agencies, including the Louisiana
Department of Environmental Quality and the California
Environmental Protection Agency.
Communities large and small across the country are working
hard to provide a wide array of municipal services, including
delivering clean water, safe drinking water, and managing
cleaning municipal wastewater and stormwater as required by
Federal, State, and local law and regulation. State regulatory
agencies like mine are working with them to deliver the clean
and healthy environment we all deserve and want every day.
As you know, wastewater management requirements under the
Federal Clean Water Act traditionally are approached in silos,
with communities directed or required to plan and expend
resources on wastewater and stormwater obligations
independently.
This segmented approach fails to allow communities to
consider how to strategically assess and pace total compliance
investment in making wastewater and stormwater investments,
sometimes resulting in unrealistic commitments and compromising
other community health and environmental investment needs.
Looking at the cost cumulatively allows communities to
determine their best collective path forward, with integrated
considerations of household economic health, community
borrowing potential, and public health and environmental
protection goals, especially as ordinary citizens today pay for
95 percent of water and sewer infrastructure development
rehabilitation and operating cost.
In Ohio we have documented clean water needs that exceed
$14.5 billion over the next 20 years, including some
communities that have multibillion-dollar consent orders to
correct combined sewer overflows. This is not only a big city
problem, however.
We have communities ranging from medium to very small, and
from urban to rural, that have financial obligations to fix
staggering problems with failing wastewater infrastructure. And
at the same time, these obligations are increasing. The portion
of household income dedicated to water and sewer bills is
outpacing inflation. These communities need the ability to
prioritize and then address problems with flexibility. This
also does not include drinking water infrastructure needs in
Ohio that are exceeding $12 billion over that same time period.
Integrated planning is one such strategy. Integrated
planning can lead to more sustainable and comprehensive
solutions, such as green infrastructure, that improve water
quality to provide benefits and enhance community vitality. It
is really important to note that integrated planning is not
about changing existing regulatory or permitting standards or
avoiding necessary improvement. Rather, it is an option to help
municipalities meet their clean water obligations while
optimizing their infrastructure investments through sequencing
of their work.
Embarking on an integrated planning process requires
meaningful investment and time. Nothing can be more
discouraging than uncertainty over whether a plan will be
accepted by a regulator when it is appropriated for dialogue.
Clarity in the Clean Water Act and certainty of support of the
U.S. EPA would lessen this risk, and communities would want to
invest time and resources in the process.
Integrated planning is supported by the 2012 EPA policy, it
has supported the integrated planning pilot projects. Limiting
uncertainty through legislation would give communities more
needed support to explore these tools for smart investment.
In Ohio we use these tools in the Clean Water Act to
minimize uncertainty to communities when we want to pursue
integrated planning. We use a phased Clean Water Act permitting
approach, which phases requirements on a typical 5-year renewal
schedule for their NPDES [National Pollutant Discharge
Elimination System] or discharge permits where permits can be
modified at mid-cycle to respond to economic change and
challenge. It also allows project priorities and the permitting
process to encourage collaboration rather than conflict and
enforcement.
Ohio has the lead on 72 of 89 combined sewer overflow
communities; 95 percent of these have long control plans that
use integrated planning. The other 17 communities have
negotiated Federal consent orders.
To give you one example, the city of Springfield in Ohio
has used a phased approach to plan and implement critical
wastewater upgrades to a permit. It has avoided enforcement and
litigation and compliance schedules were incorporated into the
permit, where we jointly prioritized projects to achieve large
amounts of CSO [combined sewer overflow] reductions in a very
short period of time.
In essence, we believe State and Federal regulators should
work together to create opportunities for communities to plan
collaboratively. Communities are often best-suited to assess
their needs and shape their own priorities, and integrated
planning helps them do this. The integrated planning process
promotes conversation with EPA and State regulators, and those
early conversations can prevent litigation cost as a result.
ECOS appreciates Members of the House and Senate bringing
the issue forward. We appreciate the work of fellow Ohioans on
the issue. Senator Portman is a cosponsor on Senator Fischer's
Senate 692, the Water Infrastructure Flexibility Act; and Ohio
Representative Latta is cosponsoring the House version, H.R.
1971, introduced by Representative Smucker; and the third bill,
H.R. 465, Water Quality Improvement Act of 2017, was introduced
by Representative Gibbs.
In closing, I will say it is encouraging to see several
Members of Congress looking at ways to use integrated planning
to be more accessible. A specific and focused amendment to the
Clean Water Act could add much-needed clarity to benefit
communities.
Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member, and members of the committee,
I thank you for the opportunity on behalf of ECOS today. I will
be happy to answer any questions.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you.
Our next witness is William Spearman III from WE3
Consultants. Mr. Spearman.
Mr. Spearman. Good morning and thank you, Chairman Graves
and Representative Esty, for holding this important hearing and
for inviting me to participate. My name is Bill Spearman and I
am a water resources engineer from Saluda, South Carolina,
which just happens to be located in Congressman Jeff Duncan's
district.
I have over 40 years of experience in stormwater management
and watershed management at the Federal, State, and local
levels. I also currently serve as the director at large for
environmental management for the American Public Works
Association that I am representing today.
APWA is an organization of nearly 30,000 members that
provide the public works infrastructure and services which are
essential to our Nation's economy and the quality of life we
all enjoy. APWA members in the local communities and utilities
they serve understand that clean water is important for the
economic, social, and environmental health of their
communities.
However, these local communities also recognize that
protecting water quality is only one of the issues competing
for their limited resources. These other issues include: police
and fire protection, streets and roads, parks and open spaces,
and many other local concerns and needs.
APWA and its members recognize the need for flexibility in
the planning and permitting process to address the differences
in communities' water quality problems, goals, and financial
capabilities. Integrated planning and permitting should provide
this flexibility.
Until now, the use of integrated planning and permitting
has predominately been driven by administrative orders or
consent decrees. Permits, though, allow for flexibility, which
may address the needs of individual communities as opposed to
consent decrees, which may result in penalties and fines if a
community is unable to meet the requirements in the consent
decree in the specified time periods.
There are also substantial differences in NPDES permit
requirements for wastewater treatment systems and municipal
separate storm sewer systems. Most wastewater system permits
are based on water quality-based effluent limits, whereas
municipal separate storm sewer permits are based on the maximum
extent practicable. Potential options could be the use of other
processes currently in EPA guidance, such as the category 5R
option.
The Financial Capability Assessment Framework issued by EPA
in November 2014 recognizes the increasing financial burden on
regulated communities for clean water activities. While
previous financial capability assessments focus on combined
sewer systems, the new guidance recognizes the cost of other
programs, such as: sanitary sewer overflows, asset management
or system rehabilitation programs, separate stormwater
collection systems, and other Clean Water Act obligations that
may be imposed by State or other regulators.
APWA supports the consideration of cost for all Clean Water
Act obligations during the permitting and enforcement process,
including the development of a definitive affordability model
and even regional affordability indexes.
I would like to close my testimony today by sharing a
current case study of an example of a successful integrated
planning process for the Reedy River in Greenville County,
South Carolina. Boyd Mill Pond, located on the Reedy River, was
designated as impaired based on South Carolina's numeric
nutrient criteria for Piedmont lakes.
With very limited data, the South Carolina Department of
Health and Environmental Control released a proposed TMDL
[total maximum daily load] for phosphorus for review by the
three entities that were affected by the permit. These would be
Greenville County, the city of Greenville, and ReWa, the local
and regional water/sewer provider.
These three groups immediately challenged the waste load
allocations in that TMDL. However, the three permittees
recognized the importance of water quality to their citizens as
well as the fact that these same citizens were going to bear
the cost no matter which alternative was accepted.
The three permittees decided to pursue the category 5R
option in lien of a TMDL and invest the money that they would
have spent challenging the TMDL in developing an integrated
planning process to achieve the desired water quality goals.
Currently, several committees and outreach goals are working
through the Reedy River water quality group. And I have
included the website in my testimony, so I would encourage you
and staff to look at that.
In closing, local governments and utilities need
flexibility in meeting their water quality issues in a
reasonable and financially prudent manner that recognizes that
water quality issues are not the only issues that are competing
for limited resources in our communities.
We encourage the committee to continue working on the
integrated planning and permitting effort to ensure that scarce
taxpayer funds are well-spent and our communities' water
resources are protected. APWA and its members stand ready to be
a resource to you and to assist you with this process. Thank
you very much.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr. Spearman.
Our last witness is Lawrence Levine from the Natural
Resources Defense Council. Mr. Levine.
Mr. Levine. Thank you. Good morning, Chairman Graves, Ms.
Esty, and members of the subcommittee. I appreciate the
opportunity to testify today.
First-class infrastructure to protect clean water and
public health is among our most important and most basic needs
as a Nation. America's municipal wastewater and stormwater
infrastructure is outdated and failing due to decades of
deferred maintenance and a failure to update pollution control
technologies.
Far too often, untreated or insufficiently treated sewage
and polluted runoff from cities and suburbs makes our rivers,
bays, beaches, and other waters both unsafe for human use and
too degraded to support the fisheries and natural habitat on
which we all depend for sustenance, recreation, and natural
flood mitigation. Likewise, our failure to invest adequately in
drinking water infrastructure means that in too many cases, the
public is still drinking water containing contaminants that
pose serious health risks.
We have heard a lot this morning about the costs of Clean
Water Act compliance. We cannot have a two-tiered system where
the wealthy get water that is clean and safe for their families
and the less well-to-do get second-class water, wastewater, and
stormwater systems that pose risks to their health and
environment. Rather, we need to create a system where all
communities can afford to upgrade their water infrastructure
and ensure compliance with legal protections that make certain
that they do.
In regard to integrated planning, there are two key points
I would like to emphasize. First, integrated planning is a
valuable tool for complying with Clean Water Act requirements.
But it must not be used to water down those requirements.
When done properly, integrated planning encourages
communities to look at all of the Clean Water Act requirements
holistically and identify ways to sequence investments to
attain the greatest health and environmental benefits in the
least amount of time. This encourages the use of solutions like
green infrastructure, which save both money and time by
addressing more than one community need simultaneously.
Integrated planning must not be confused with approaches
such as H.R. 465, the Water Quality Improvement Act, that would
roll back Clean Water Act standards that protect public health
and the environment.
Second, discussions of integrated planning must occur in
the broader context of the need for increased water
infrastructure investment at all levels of Government and the
need to fund that investment in ways that assure affordable
access for all to safe and sufficient water, wastewater, and
stormwater services. Without addressing these two needs,
integrated planning alone will not solve our water
infrastructure crisis.
NRDC offers the following specific recommendations:
Integrated planning under EPA's 2012 framework should be
used appropriately as an important tool for cost-effective and
expeditious compliance with the Clean Water Act. Congress
should not pass any legislation that uses integrated planning
to roll back Clean Water Act protections.
Likewise, the concept of a community's financial capability
must not be distorted to undermine public health and
environmental protection. Permittees must take advantage of
opportunities to improve affordability for ratepayers, and
especially for low-income households, before cost concerns are
considered as grounds for extending compliance schedules. Any
consideration of cost must also consider the benefits of clean
water and green infrastructure.
Congress should establish a low-income water and sewer
assistance program and support the creation and expansion of
complementary programs at the State and local levels.
NRDC supports H.R. 2328, which would create a pilot
program. We further recommend that Congress create such a
program nationwide.
Federal policy should promote local water, sewer, and
stormwater rate structures that are fair and equitable to low-
income households, as well as best practices that reduce costs
for all customers such as asset management, green
infrastructure, and water efficiency.
Congress should increase the cap on the amount of State
Revolving Fund assistance that States can distribute as grants.
A revised cap should provide incentives to States to invest
more in water infrastructure and to direct more financial
support to low-income communities' water infrastructure needs,
to environmentally innovative projects, and to projects that
prepare our water systems for the impacts of climate change.
Finally, Congress should triple the current annual
appropriations to the SRFs and direct the additional funds to
priorities that are currently underfunded such as lead service
line replacement, green infrastructure, water efficiency, and
climate resilience.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. NRDC looks
forward to working with the subcommittee on bold and effective
solutions to our Nation's water infrastructure challenges.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you very much. I appreciate
all of your testimony. I am going to first defer to the
gentleman from Ohio, Mr. Gibbs, for the first round of
questions.
Mr. Gibbs. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for
holding this hearing today.
I want to just go back for a minute. When the Clean Water
Act was passed, I believe it was set up to be a partnership
between the Federal Government and the States, where the States
would implement and enforce the Clean Water Act under the
guidance of the Federal Government.
And I want to get this out because I do not think the
public understands maybe what is happening with these consent
decrees. I read in your testimony and I am going to ask the
question, but we have these consent decrees, and I think they
are counterproductive because that money goes back and it
penalizes the municipalities, or villages or whoever, that are
trying to do the right thing, and they work many years and go
through litigation and get these consent decrees set up and
then they are tied into them.
And so when new technologies come about, they cannot
address it without going back and revisiting the consent
decree. There is a hesitancy to do that. And so I know the
mayor from South Bend, Mr.--I will just call you the mayor from
South Bend----
Mr. Buttigieg. Pete is fine.
Mr. Gibbs [continuing]. And my director of the EPA in Ohio,
Craig Butler, and my commissioner, mentioned some of the issues
you have. Can you expound a little bit on what these consent
decrees are doing? I know Craig Butler talked about your using
an NPDES as permits, as a way, almost a de facto way, to do it
permitting, I believe, or it sounds like.
And this consent decree issue is compounding the program at
any cost and not getting the job done, and how the integrated
planning concept can interact with that. So I will let one of
you guys go--you want to go first, Mayor? Go ahead.
Mr. Buttigieg. Sure. So first of all, we would welcome the
opportunity to work more closely with the Indiana Department of
Environmental Management, IDEM. They have been a great partner
with us and we do think that State-level handshake would be
something that, if they were more empowered, would benefit us.
The permit structure, we think, is a lot more flexible
because, as you said, it does not lock us into something. Some
of these long-term control plans, 20, 30 years, they just
cannot possibly anticipate some of the technology changes that
are going to happen.
We developed the capability through that smart sewer system
I mentioned to actually use real-world data for the first time
and run thousands of simulations to figure out what would
actually happen. And unsurprisingly, it revealed that there
were some flaws in the original plan. The permit model would be
much more flexible and would allow us to account for that.
Mr. Gibbs. Go ahead, Commissioner.
Mr. Portune. Representative Gibbs, thank you so much for
asking the question. As you correctly point out, when the Clean
Water Act was originally adopted, it was a true partnership,
including Federal money coming to help implement Federal
policy.
Today, from the standpoint of counties, we find ourselves,
with respect to Clean Water Act compliance, it being another
unfunded mandate that is imposed on local communities along
with all other obligations that we have to meet.
The flexibility that is allowable with integrated planning
will help us to prioritize what would get the biggest bang for
the buck in terms of improvements among a whole menu of Clean
Water Act programs and obligations. It will allow us to
introduce new innovative means like watershed management,
adaptive practices, green infrastructure approaches, that are
more cost-effective, efficient, and affordable for locals to be
able to meet the obligations.
And the last thing I want to say is in deference to your
time, my constituents want clean water. We are not approaching
this as a means to backslide or anything like that with respect
to the Clean Water Act. We want to comply with the obligations.
But counties, cities, local governments, that is where the
rubber hits the road. We cannot delegate down. We are asking
for help so that we can afford to meet our obligations under
the act.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Director, go ahead.
Mr. Butler. Mr. Chairman, Representative Gibbs, I will echo
some comments here that Mayor Pete and Mr. Portune talked
about. I think you are right. In Ohio we have got 89
communities that are under some type of a requirement to manage
the stormwater and combined sewer overflows. Seventy-two of
those work directly with the State of Ohio.
We take that innovative approach. We will use consent
orders, but we will also use flexibility throughout the
wastewater permit. We have got to reopen those permits in mid-
stride if we see new technologies come in for development. And
we are very flexible. We look at and use green infrastructure.
We look at and use asset management and integrated planning. We
think it is a great tool.
We talk with the other communities that perhaps are under
the Federal consent orders. Many of these are billions of
dollars. They are very lengthy. And frankly, once those consent
orders are finished, it is very difficult to see them reopened.
I think people misunderstand the idea of integrated planning.
Therefore, you have many communities, even in Ohio, that have
obligations under a Federal consent decree that are requiring
them to spend more money than they otherwise would need----
Mr. Gibbs. I am just about out of time. But would you agree
that the Federal consent orders create more of a controversial
relationship, and to integrate the permitting concept, could
bring a partnership relationship and we would actually get more
stuff done?
Mr. Butler. I would agree with that. I think using this
approach to the permitting process is a much more effective
tool.
Mr. Gibbs. Thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you.
We are now going to go to Ms. Esty.
Ms. Esty. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to the panel
for your thoughtful and grounded experience to help us fashion
better, more flexible policies, which I think we are all in
favor of stretching those taxpayer dollars to meet the
competing needs, but without lowering standards.
First question for the panel: All of you have highlighted
the importance of Federal funds to help communities meet these
water-related infrastructure needs. But as many of you know,
the primary Federal program to provide this assistance, the
Clean Water State Revolving Fund, was last reauthorized 30
years ago.
Today we have got a bipartisan bill to reauthorize it with
increased funding, perhaps not to the tripled level that was--
much as I would like to do that, but to a greater level.
Would you urge this Congress to finally reauthorize an
increase in appropriations for the State Revolving Fund
program? If we can just go right down the line because I have
got a bunch of questions.
Mr. Buttigieg. Sure. We would absolutely welcome that in
South Bend.
Ms. Esty. Thank you.
Mr. DuPree. We would absolutely support. But, Madam
Congresswoman, not at the expense of smaller communities.
Ms. Esty. Absolutely.
Mr. Portune. Congresswoman Esty, thank you. America's
counties would welcome that as another important tool in the
toolbox. But we would add that flexibility to be able to
introduce green infrastructure and things like that help us
save money as well, and that is critically important as well.
Ms. Esty. Absolutely.
Mr. Butler?
Mr. Butler. Mr. Chairman, Representative, the State
revolving loan programs are critical to all of the States,
including Ohio. They are our primary vehicle helping all
communities--large and small, rich and poor--to help meet these
obligations for clean water and drinking water needs.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you.
Mr. Spearman?
Mr. Spearman. Yes, ma'am. Most definitely. And I would also
encourage the subcommittee and committee to look at ways to
simplify the use of these funds on the local level. Sometimes
the biggest problem we have, with deference to my person from
the EPA next to me, the States sometimes are one of the
holdbacks in using it; and also increasing the use for
stormwater activities.
I represent primarily MS4 [municipal separate storm sewer
systems] communities, working with them that have different
issues than the CSO [combined sewer overflow] and SSO [sanitary
sewer overflow] communities. So making sure that they
understand that they can use these funds also.
Ms. Esty. Thank you. Mr. Levine?
Mr. Levine. Absolutely yes. As you heard in my
recommendations. A significant increase, we believe, is needed,
and some changes in the cap in order to encourage more grants
and encourage more environmentally innovative projects.
Ms. Esty. Absolutely. So I think we are all in agreement, I
know. Chairman Graves and I have talked about this, the need to
integrate new processes, new ways of doing things, again to
have the best technologies and the best practices in place and
not be locking in older, less useful, and often more expensive.
So we are committed to doing that, and your support as we
go through this process will be vitally important for us to
design the most appropriate legislation going forward that
provides that measure of flexibility.
Second question: I would contend that in addition to
providing additional resources for those unfunded Federal
mandates, which those of us who have served in local office all
really hate because our taxpayers, we have got to raise the
money from them.
The Federal Government, I believe, should be exploring
whether targeted Federal subsidies to assist individual
households, lower income, which many of you flagged that
challenge. And when you are serving a community, even rich
communities have people who have economic challenges.
As you may know, in 1990 Congress authorized the LIHEAP
program, the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program. I know
we use it extensively in every community in Connecticut. Would
you support something similar to that concept, to help
communities that low-income folks across the country, but
particularly in communities that are hard-hit, to have that
sort of a program like LIHEAP but for water resources?
Mr. Buttigieg. Yes. Certainly a community like ours could
put that to work right away.
Ms. Esty. Thank you. Mayor DuPree?
Mr. DuPree. Yes, Congresswoman. That would be something
that we would use except for the fact that in some States, they
do not allow you to have a two-tiered process. You cannot pay
two different prices.
The other thing that I would say on that is that median
income, that I think has been said by this whole process, needs
to be revisited and maybe set it based on a lower tier than on
a 2-percent median income.
Ms. Esty. All right. Thank you.
Mr. Portune. Congresswoman Esty, thank you for introducing
another innovative approach to this. The main reason why clean
water compliance is not happening across the board is due to
the lack of funding, and that is directly related to the
overreliance on the median household income approach to all of
this.
So anything that would help to reduce reliance on MHI as a
primary tool with respect to funding and would help our poor
and the working poor to be able to assist in the obligations
under the act would be another important tool in the toolbox.
Ms. Esty. Thank you.
Mr. Butler. Bringing new tools to the table to help us with
low-income communities, in addition to the good work through
the SRF programs, would be welcome.
Ms. Esty. Thank you.
Mr. Spearman. When I go around and create stormwater
utilities, one of the main issues that the local governments
have is how it will affect their low- and moderate-income
folks. And this type of program would definitely help these
communities generate the needed funds they need to help support
the other goals of the Clean Water Act.
Mr. Levine. Yes, absolutely again. And the bill that is
pending right now to create a pilot, we believe, is a good
start but actually should be expanded as a nationwide program,
exactly as you say, similar to the LIHEAP program and fully
funded to meet the needs.
Ms. Esty. Exactly. Thank you very much and I see we are
over. I appreciate your indulgence, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Yes, ma'am. Thank you very much. I
recognize myself for 5 minutes.
In a previous life, I served as a non-Federal partner with
the Corps of Engineers on a number of projects, and we grew
increasingly frustrated with that relationship. And there were
a number of projects where we found that we could build the
entire project by using the Corps of Engineers cost estimates
and our 35-percent cost-share.
We could build the entire project. If I can say that again.
So if it was a $100 million project, our cost-share was $35
million. There were a number of projects where we could build
the whole thing for $35 million.
Mayor Pete, I want to go back to something you said, if I
heard you correctly. You said that--according to my notes--$810
million is the value of the consent decree that you are facing
right now. Is that accurate?
Mr. Buttigieg. That is right, not including the financing
cost.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Yes. Which you said would perhaps
exceed $1 billion.
If I heard you correctly, you said that with flexibility,
including the use of green infrastructure, you believe that
that cost could be reduced to what again?
Mr. Buttigieg. That is right. So we got about $150 million
in already. The remaining $700-some million could be reduced to
$200 million if we are allowed to use the new approach.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. It is extraordinary. And look. We
can certainly find a lot of things to fight about, and that is
always fun to do. Of course, I am kidding. But listening to all
your testimony, each one of you, I think, used the word
``flexibility.'' You stressed the word ``flexibility.''
I do not think there is anyone who is sitting on the panel
who has any desire to trash our environment or have your
citizens living in a State that is unhealthy and an environment
that is unhealthy, where you risk your citizens' health and
safety. I assume that is OK to accept.
In many cases, folks think that all we need to do is throw
more money at problems. And in some cases, that is the
solution. But I think in this case, it may be a little overly
simplistic and unrealistic in some cases because I know that
local governments are strapped for cash. I know that many
States, including my home State, we are running into
significant financial programs. And the Federal Government, of
course, with our $20 trillion debt, does not have unlimited
financial resources.
I really think it is important that as we move forward on
this legislation, that we continue to get your ideas on that
flexibility. And I mentioned earlier that the city of New
Orleans is under consent decree. The city of New Orleans, we
worked with them in my previous life, where we actually began
building wetlands assimilation projects to complete the
treatment process in the central wetlands, working with St.
Bernard Parish and the city of New Orleans, where we are
restoring wetlands, which is an objective we have, and at the
same time doing the final stages of sewer treatment.
Do any of you--Mayor DuPree, perhaps--do you have any other
thoughts on the flexibility? And if you were given more
flexibility, any assessments in terms of what kind of reduction
that would potentially have in your work?
Mr. DuPree. Yes, sir, Mr. Chairman. I honestly believe that
if we look at partnerships--and I am talking about Federal,
State, and local--we are under a Federal consent decree right
now. We are under a Federal court order.
If we had the ability to partner, we could do things like
public-private partnerships that would lower the cost. We could
do things like design, build, operate, which would lower the
cost, if we could work and have the opportunity to do that.
Some States do not allow you to have that.
So if we had the support of the Federal Government and the
State Environmental Quality, then we could probably lower--we
could lower those costs because then there is a partnership.
And we are not asking for money then; we are asking for
innovative ways and flexibility to do things we are not allowed
to do at this point.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you.
Mr. Spearman, I assume you have multiple clients that you
work with. Do you have any examples or anecdotes of cost
reductions that would occur as a result of flexibility, and
perhaps even better environmental outcomes?
Mr. Spearman. Well, I think that there are a lot of options
available to us today. We have problems with the States and
sometimes the regions in EPA, not necessarily being flexible
enough to allow the things that are out there. I mean, we have
had a policy on integrated planning and permitting for several
years now and you are having to look at codifying these
requirements to force the issue forward. And that is something
that is very important.
There seems to be a disconnect sometimes between
Washington, the region, and then the States, and down to the
local level. So anything that we can do there to improve those
communications and direction, and I think this hearing is a
great start at that.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. That was actually going to be my
next question, was I am curious with the integrated planning
policy implemented in 2012. Do any of you have any inside
information or any insight as to where this disconnect is
occurring in terms of between the reliance on enforcement
rather than having a more flexible approach, as identified or I
think contemplated in the integrated planning process?
Mr. Portune. Mr. Chairman, if I may, Todd Portune on behalf
of NACo. And thank you for raising the issue.
I have been involved in working on this matter dating back
to 2007, testified several times before this subcommittee in
connection with the issue. The integrated planning policy that
was brought forward in 2012, I will acknowledge, was a great
step forward.
But what has happened since then is rather than EPA working
more toward--the flexible approach has been more reliant on
consent decree-enforced litigation largely because in our
opinion, what we have seen, largely because the data that
supports the old gray-build approach to fixing sewers has been
around for so long, it is much more reliable.
And with respect to enforcement activity, there is a
greater need or desire in the regions to rely on all of that
data. The green infrastructure data is not quite as voluminous
as the gray infrastructure data. So there has been a natural
tendency to fall back on gray-build enforcement approaches,
rather than moving forward with the flexible green-build
approach.
I want to add very quickly to your previous question,
though----
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. If you could please wrap up, I am
over time.
Mr. Portune. Oh, I am sorry.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you.
I think we are going to go to Ms. Johnson for 5 minutes.
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and
Ranking Member, for holding this hearing. I do not know that
there is a subject that is more important to the citizens or to
municipalities than relying on the water that we drink. And we
know there are many challenges that States and localities face
in coming into compliance with the legal requirements of the
Clean Water Act--though I think we have done a fairly good job
in this country.
Back in 2007, when I chaired this subcommittee, President
Bush did a study--or his administration did a study--that we
needed to invest $19 billion every term for the next 20 years
to bring us up to level. We have never been able to meet that
goal, though we have made some strides, I think, in ensuring
clean water.
Limited resources, population growth, aging infrastructure,
and other factors pose additional and costly obstacles for
States and municipalities in an effort to respond to both their
legal requirements and the needs of their communities.
Integrated planning is one way to address these challenges, and
in certain cases, when a city fails to meet these requirements,
civil penalties are assessed.
And my question--let me start with Mr. Buttigieg from South
Bend, Indiana, the city of Notre Dame. I graduated from that
area before you were born.
[Laughter.]
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Could you--or any other member, for
that matter, on this panel--discuss what might you believe is a
more reasonable alternative to civil penalties for local
governments, which would also ensure that municipalities
continue to make good faith efforts to improve their water?
Mr. Buttigieg. Thank you, Representative Johnson, and thank
you for speaking to the importance of the issue. I think this
goes to the question of what the relationship is between cities
and the Federal Government. Are we being regarded as a co-
regulator and a partner, or are we being regarded as a
regulated polluter?
And I think that civil penalties wind up, in a way, robbing
Peter to pay Paul, especially in a low-income community, where
you are effectively penalizing the very residents and citizens
that we are trying to serve and protect.
You could envision another approach where, for example, if
it came to that, there would be an enforced commitment that
their dollars would go into some kind of fund that would
continue to benefit residents. But I think the most important
thing is the mentality, that it focuses not on penalizing those
units of Government that are trying to do the right thing but
coming up short because of the limitation in resources, but
rather only those that are refusing to work in good faith.
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Thank you. Anyone else wish to
comment--yes?
Mr. Butler. Mr. Chairman and Representative Johnson, thank
you for that question. One concept that we have not talked
about and we use a lot in Ohio--and other States do, too--is
using supplemental environmental programs in lieu of civil
penalty.
We agree with you that the idea, also articulated by Mayor
Pete, of taking a civil penalty and having that money come to
the State or the Federal Government and then not seeing it
invested back into the community is something that we think is
counterproductive in many cases.
There may be an opportunity in some cases where you have to
use civil penalty as a tool, but in many cases we think that
money should be and could be plowed back into the community
through supplemental environmental projects on other further
upgrades to the drinking water or wastewater systems, green
infrastructure, integrated planning, or asset management, or
any small number of tools where you can invest those dollars
and see them pay multiple dividends to the community.
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Thank you.
Mr. Portune. Congresswoman Johnson, Mr. Chairman, it is an
excellent question. And with respect to the position of
counties, the issue of civil penalties is counterproductive to
what we are all trying to accomplish here because it does
divert money away from the very needs that are at hand at a
time when the availability of funds is so restricted and so
narrow with respect to the matter at hand.
Flexibility, the ability to apply things that provide more
efficient and effective ways to do this that save money, is
also something that is critically necessary. And we would also
add that a focus on water quality, instead of just simply
volume reduction in approaches to things, puts the issue right
back where it needs to be.
But at the end of the day, we want to have a partnership
with EPA and not be considered--and I think Mayor Buttigieg put
it very well--as regulated water polluters. We are all working
for the same thing.
Ms. Johnson of Texas. Thank you very much. My time has
expired.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you. I recognize Mr. Massie
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Massie. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I represent 20 counties in northern Kentucky, but 3 of
those counties are within a sanitation district that has about
100,000 wastewater accounts. They are under consent decree.
This is Sanitation District 1. It is Boone, Kenton, and
Campbell Counties, directly across the river from Cincinnati.
When they signed their consent decree, they thought they
were signing up for a $700 million burden. But it has now
become a $2 billion burden. I just did some quick math here.
Two billion dollars divided by 100,000 accounts is $20,000 per
account. That is like an economic blight on the region.
Every household that has this account is now encumbered
with that, and if you build a new house there, you basically
are going to take $20,000 off the long-term property value
because now you have the benefit of being covered by this
legacy obligation.
There are 300,000 people within that district. If you just
go every man, woman, and child, it is about $7,000 they owe to
this. At this scale, it almost seems like they could build
their own wastewater treatment facilities at every house at
$20,000 an account. So there has got to be something more
efficient here. Households are ultimately, as their rates go
up, they forgo preventative maintenance on their houses and
things.
Mayor Buttigieg, I want to ask you, what are some of the
things that you are not able to do now that you would like to
be able to do? Because I would like for my community to have
that flexibility as well.
Mr. Buttigieg. Well, a lot of it is this green stormwater
infrastructure. If we are given the flexibility to use that in
our approach, then we can prevent a lot of the water from going
into the system in the first place. That is the appeal of rain
gardens, green roofs, permeable concrete that effectively
drinks the water rather than it sort of sheeting off and going
into the system.
It is a lot more attractive than a system of gray
infrastructure that only contemplates tunnels and tanks. At one
point we actually had to contemplate, in order to meet the
original consent decree, we were talking about deep rock
tunneling. It would be like building a subway in a city of
100,000 people. Much as I would love to have a subway, it did
not really add up.
Mr. Massie. So you would need a submarine for that subway,
too.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Buttigieg. We are getting smarter and smarter about how
to do this, and that is why we think integrated planning makes
so much more sense. But the flexibility, and to go to an
earlier question that was raised, is also very uneven in its
application.
Whenever we get together in the mayor's water council, we
are always comparing notes. How is your region? Did they let
you do this? Ours is not. Who is better? Who is worse? It seems
that even if you feel that the EPA leadership in Washington is
singing the same tune as we are about some of these integrated
approaches, sometimes it has to go through a bit of a gap in
the regional offices. And we know that----
Mr. Massie. So there is too much gray area in the gray
water?
[Laughter.]
Mr. Buttigieg. That is one way of looking at it,
Congressman, yes.
Mr. Massie. That was my only question. I would like to
yield the remainder of my time to Congressman Gibbs.
Mr. Gibbs. Well, on the consent decree, we have really
brought that out. But I want to have Director Butler talk a
little bit more on the integrated permitting, some of the
benefits we have seen, and in the Columbus blueprint plan you
basically use--I think you have done that integrated planning
in a de facto way using the NPDES permitting process. Can you
expound on what has happened and the successes?
Mr. Butler. Sure. Mr. Chairman, Representative Gibbs,
Columbus is another place where a multibillion-dollar project
has recently, in the past few years, come back to us and we
have talked not only about green infrastructure, but about the
comprehensive integration of integrated planning. This was
really not a concept that they were familiar with when they
signed onto the consent decree in the mid-2000s.
So they went so far as to not only just include the gray
water, but they started looking at wet weather and stormwater,
integrating that into a total plan, looking at green
infrastructure, where it was appropriate and where it made
sense, rebundling through our NPDES permitting process while
they were still under consent order. That saved them a
multibillion-dollar project and it saved them hundreds of
millions of dollars a year.
I just want to give one caution, if I am permitted here.
Green infrastructure is a new concept. You have to be very
careful in how you use it. Sometimes you do not get the
benefits that you expect, and frankly, it does not always save
you money.
But there still is an inherent benefit that comes along
with it. You are able to then open up some green spaces versus
building a tunnel. You are able to bring in some stormwater
infiltration concepts. It really starts bringing some community
vitality and green space back in, which then raises the overall
value of the property values.
So it is a real balance. It is a tool that should be
integrated into this integrated planning model. But it does not
always work. You just have to be careful and make sure that you
use it appropriately.
Mr. Gibbs. Thank you. Thank you, Chairman.
Mr. Levine. Mr. Chairman, might I add briefly to that
response?
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. I think we are out of time, but
will see if we can get back to you.
Mr. Levine. Thank you.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Let's see. I guess we are going to
recognize Mr. Lowenthal for 5 minutes. The gentleman from
California.
Dr. Lowenthal. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I want to also
thank all the witnesses. It has been very educational for me
listening to the importance of integrated planning. And you
have clearly educated us on the challenges that you all face in
terms of what local governments and municipalities have to do
in complying with the Clean Water Act, their requirements, with
your limited resources. And I appreciate that EPA has begun to
work with you about developing new approaches that lower cost
but still meet water quality and environmental standards.
But I want to emphasize, just before I ask the questions,
something that has been brought up by many of you on the panel,
that we are not talking about the weakening of the standards
that are so important to the health of our community. And this
should not be used as a rollback of the Clean Water Act. We
have seen examples when we have done that, when we have let
costs just dictate it, i.e., Flint, Michigan, where costs
dominated what could be done.
I am very concerned because as we move forward, that we
will see in the next budgetary process that the President has
recommended a 31-percent cut to the Environmental Protection
Agency. I think that would be devastating. That would be just--
all the discussions that we have had today, I think, would end.
My first question is for Larry Levine of NRDC. In your
testimony, you expressed support for the general concept of
integrated planning. But like what I just mentioned, you
caution us that not all integrated planning bills currently
before this subcommittee approach integrated planning in the
same manner. And you suggest that House bill 465 ``would roll
back existing standards.'' It would roll back the Clean Water
Act protections.
Can you talk to us a little bit on how you see H.R. 465
weakening existing Clean Water Act protections under the guise
of integrated planning?
Mr. Levine. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Lowenthal. So in several
ways, the bill would roll back key protections under the act.
The language in the bill would use both cost, under the
heading of economic affordability, and a new terminology in the
act of ``technical feasibility.'' And the definitions for those
terms would use those to do an end run around water quality
protections currently in the act.
The Clean Water Act already includes ways to account for
cost and technical feasibility, such as the process for doing a
use attainability analysis or a variance from water quality
standards under very limited circumstances and subject to the
approval of EPA, just as any other change in a State water
quality standard must be approved. The bill, unlike that
process, would inject these cost factors into individual
permitting decisions at the discretion of the individual
permitting agency.
Other language in the bill treats wastewater and stormwater
as though it were not a core public service. It indicates the
importance of balancing the cost of Clean Water Act compliance
against money that might be diverted from other ``core public
services.'' That is a misframing of the entire issue. I think
we all would agree that urban and municipal wastewater,
stormwater, drinking water services are all a core public
service.
The bill also essentially puts on blinders to ways that
municipalities and utilities can reduce cost burdens on low-
income households while generating the revenue that is needed
to meet Clean Water Act goals. So, for example, rate
structures, while there are State limitations in some places on
the way that local rates can be structured, there are also many
things that can be done to have more equitable rates that place
costs more fairly on who is putting the most burden on the
system, which will tend to help low-income households.
The bill also substitutes this notion of ``reasonable
progress'' for actual compliance. Existing law has requirements
for what a compliance schedule must look like and what it must
achieve. A compliance schedule must require compliance as soon
as possible with interim milestones along the way to ensure
accountability for making those steps as soon as possible
toward ultimate compliance. It does not, under current law,
lower the bar for what ultimately has to be achieved at the end
of the day.
And I will briefly mention two more points. The bill fails
to account for the benefits of investing in clean water, while
focusing exclusively on the costs. It is important that
communities have a return on the investment they make. It is
not simply a liability.
And finally, other language in the bill provides
essentially a one-way ratchet to weaken requirements and
integrated plans. There is language that speaks of revisiting
plans when permits are renewed in order to consider modifying
or removing requirements to ``help the municipality comply.''
That clearly seems to be an intent to consider weakening plans
over time rather than ensuring compliance in the long run.
Dr. Lowenthal. Thank you. And Mr. Chair, just before I
yield back, I would like to say my legislative director just
received her Ph.D. from the University of Notre Dame, and she
is always talking about Mayor Pete in a very positive way.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Fantastic. We are looking for
better environmental policy out of you now.
[Laughter.]
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you, Mr. Lowenthal.
We are going to turn to the gentleman from Texas, Dr.
Babin.
Dr. Babin. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank the
witnesses for being here. Appreciate you.
I am not real sure who to ask this question of but I think,
Mr. Butler, it might be to you. But if anyone else would like
to chime in on this, I would appreciate it.
According to a recent Boone and Crockett Club--if you are
hunters, you have heard of Boone and Crockett--but according to
a recent Boone and Crockett Club analysis of the ``Function
300'' section of the Federal budget, it says, ``Natural
resource programs can provide the underpinning for a strong
economy and rural quality of life.''
The report further says that, ``The sum of our investments
in conservation has been to secure the foundation for the use
and enjoyment of America's natural resources.''
The city of Orange, Texas, which is in my district, located
on the Louisiana border in the southeast Texas corner, hosts
one of the Nation's top-rated bass tournaments on the Sabine
River at Toledo Bend Reservoir. And the local Chamber of
Commerce hosts several other water-based tourism events
annually that epitomize the best of the small-town, family-
friendly, outdoor recreational lifestyle.
Yet there are two bayous nearby that need urgent attention,
and the water utility ratepayers of some neighboring
communities have fixed income residents and cannot afford
higher taxes. These are communities that lost population after
the devastation of Hurricane Rita in 2005.
They qualify for USDA community assistance, but they are
not able to make capital investments in their local
infrastructure because building permits are blocked because of
water quality issues that they simply do not have the resources
to fix on their own.
So I would ask this question: Do you believe Federal
priority, a focus for water quality grants, should be focused
on those types of circumstances, where communities lack the
local resources to fix the problems and therefore cannot grow
their way out to a better economy because of the EPA denial of
permits due to water quality? What do you suggest is a remedy
for this obviously catch-22 situation?
Mr. Butler. Mr. Chairman, Representative Babin, I know
about the Boone and Crockett Club but I am not a member and I
wish I were. So Ohio is not much different. Lake Erie is the
wildlife capital of the world; it has $14 billion of annual
economic impact in the State, so truly recreation drives a lot
of investment for sure.
I will speak to your question this way, which is the State
revolving loan funds we have talked about under the Clean Water
Act, the State of Ohio has capital grants of about $100 million
a year. We turn that into about $1 billion every year of
investment in drinking water and wastewater infrastructure.
I noted in my testimony we have about $14 billion of
infrastructure need. So while we think it is a fantastic story
to tell about what we have done, it does not really catch up to
the need that we have that continues to grow in the States.
That need is particularly skewed, if you will, towards low- and
moderate-income communities.
As much money as we can offer through loan programs, or
even a modest amount through principal forgiveness of grants,
as Mr. Levine talked about, the need is substantial, whether we
are combining that just with our State revolving programs or
combining it with USDA dollars or other Federal and State
dollars.
It is very, very difficult, and there are always more
communities on the outside looking in than we can provide
funding for to help them out of this catch-22 situation. They
cannot go and offer economic development either through
recreation or through business development because they do not
have the capacity in their wastewater facilities to upgrade
those systems to offer that capacity for economic development.
So while I think States are proud of their investments
through the State revolving programs, the catch-22 that you
mentioned is something that still exists in a significant way
and is something that we need to find the solution for going
forward.
Dr. Babin. I certainly hope so. In just a few seconds,
would somebody else like to----
Mr. Buttigieg. Very briefly, if I may, Mr. Chairman,
Congressman----
Dr. Babin. Yes, sir.
Mr. Buttigieg [continuing]. We believe that one of the
virtues of integrated planning is that smaller communities can
pool their resources. So when you are in an area like that,
instead of three communities doing three tanks and three
tunnels, maybe one can do a tank and a couple others can do
green infrastructure. So coming together, we think, allows more
efficient problem-solving even among communities joining
forces.
Mr. DuPree. Yes, sir. And at the same time, we used to talk
about affordability. It does not take into account the CSOs or
the SSOs. It did not--that is all it does. It does not pull in
drinking water because it is so expensive. And so when we talk
about subsidies for water, we need to make sure that although
we are increasing the State revolving loan fund, we do not take
money from other programs that they could benefit from.
Dr. Babin. Great. My time has expired. Thank you very much.
Appreciate it.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. Thank you. I will now go to the
gentlewoman from Illinois, Mrs. Bustos.
Mrs. Bustos. Thank you, Chairman Graves.
First of all I would like to give you a little background
and then I will get right into my questions. This will just
take a second. But I represent part of a city called Peoria,
Illinois. You know the old saying, ``Will it play in Peoria?''
A town of 115,000 people. The Illinois River runs through it.
So right now they are looking at what would be considered
an innovative, cost-effective solution using green
infrastructure to address combined sewer overflows. But even--
as we call it, it is termed cost-effective; it has got a $200
million price tag. All right? So pretty costly.
And I know that Peoria and towns across the country need
the EPA to be partners in working to improve water quality and
upgrade our aging water infrastructure. And I know that also
means that we do not need to weaken the Clean Water Act, but it
does mean that we need to give our towns, our cities, tools to
look at integrated planning and resources they need to support
investment in water infrastructure, and also to create jobs. So
certainly appreciate all of you being here and testifying
before us today.
So in Peoria--this is my question now--this plan is to
reduce the water overflow, the combined sewer overflow, into
the Illinois River while also beautifying the streets and the
areas in the city's older neighborhoods.
So my first question will be for Mayor DuPree. You
mentioned that your city is part of the EPA's green
infrastructure pilot program?
Mr. DuPree. That is correct.
Mrs. Bustos. How did your city become interested in using
the green infrastructure to help address the water quality? And
do you have thoughts on how the program is going so far? If you
could share that.
Mr. DuPree. Well, I think it is going well. One of the
things that we had, not only are we under a consent order, an
amended, agreed order, we also are working with EPA on the
sanitary sewer overflows. They have cited us for almost
everything you can count on.
We had to look for innovative ways in order to make that
happen. And this is actually a way that EPA and the city and
the State came together to form this coalition so that we could
come up with innovative ways to do something. That is what
integrated planning is all about, is about seeing if it is
affordable.
We understand that if it is not affordable, it is not
sustainable. So you have to work all those things together, and
that is a way the partnership actually works. And hopefully
they are going to come down in the next month or so and we are
going to actually have a schematic to work on green
infrastructure. And hopefully it will be a pattern that can be
used across the United States.
Mr. Portune. Mr. Chairman, Representative Bustos, if I may,
in Cincinnati, Hamilton County, we also had an approved green
infrastructure alternative to what was originally in our
consent decree, which was a massive $500 million deep tunnel
approach.
The actual cost of our green approach to do the same thing,
reducing the CSO issues and the volume of water that we were
required to address, was almost cutting that in half. Our final
cost on it is projected to be $244 billion versus $500 billion.
It is actually a little bit less than half of the cost was
saved.
But there is one other thing about cost savings that no one
has brought up that I want to also quickly add. Green
infrastructure keeps water out of the sewer system. That
produces an additional benefit to operational costs because you
are not treating so much volume at the back end. So not only
does it reduce costs on the front end in terms of capital
expenses, but operational expenses of the sewer district are
reduced as well to increase the benefit.
Mrs. Bustos. All right. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Levine, if green infrastructure is cost-effective and
provides benefits in terms of quality of life and public
health, why are more communities not using it? And do you have
thoughts on how Congress can help with that?
Mr. Levine. That is a great question. It is important to
recognize that a lot of communities are using it. Especially in
the last half-dozen years or so, as EPA has made important
steps forward and called attention to the ways in which the
existing Clean Water Act scheme allows for, and can even be
used to encourage, green infrastructure in permits as well as
consent decrees to meet CSO obligations, to meet municipal
stormwater obligations, to meet in some cases sanitary sewer
overflow obligations.
We have talked a lot about flexibility in the testimony and
responses to questions and answers. I think, really, the word
is being smart, is what I would say. It is not about new
flexibility that is needed. It is about doing things in a smart
way. And in many instances, as Mr. Butler pointed out, for
example, green infrastructure will be the smartest way to do
it.
In some other instances it may not. But being smart about
this allows us to be cost-effective, allows us to achieve the
maximum benefit for the investment, not only the benefits to
clean water but the benefits to neighborhoods, the benefits to
communities. And in fact that also, when you consider the wide
range of benefits, allows you to tap into additional sources of
money as well.
When you are serving multiple benefits, you can tap into,
for example, community revitalization dollars, or
transportation dollars that are going towards rehabilitating
streets, and get green streets as part of that project, and get
the water benefit as well.
So I think part of it is a need for greater realization and
understanding among those communities that have not yet done so
of what all those multiple benefits are. I think Congress can
certainly encourage that with the ideas like, in a couple of
the bills, dedicating EPA resources towards promoting green
infrastructure, establishing that as an office within EPA; and
then, of course, by using Federal funds such as the SRF to
direct dollars towards these sorts of projects that have tended
to be underfunded the way States have used the SRF in the past.
Mrs. Bustos. All right. Thank you. My time is expired. I
yield back.
Mr. Graves of Louisiana. All right. Thank you.
I am going to go to the gentleman from Texas, Mr. Weber,
for 5 minutes.
Mr. Weber. Thank you, Chairman.
Mayor Pete, pronounce your last name for me.
Mr. Buttigieg. Buttigieg.
Mr. Weber. Buttigieg?
Mr. Buttigieg. Yes, sir.
Mr. Weber. Have you had that name long?
[Laughter.]
Mr. Weber. You made an interesting statement earlier. You
said you felt like the cities should be regarded not as
regulated polluters but--what was the other half of that?
Mr. Buttigieg. Partners, or even co-regulators.
Mr. Weber. Co-regulating partners. OK. That is an
interesting concept, and I agree with you, by the way.
And Mayor DuPree, you know the answer to this, or you may
both know the answer to this. How many--you all are up here
with the Council of Mayors. Is that correct?
Mr. DuPree. National League of Cities.
Mr. Weber. National League of Cities?
Mr. Buttigieg. I am here with the Conference of Mayors.
Mr. Weber. Repeat?
Mr. Buttigieg. I am here with the U.S. Conference of
Mayors.
Mr. Weber. Conference of Mayors. So how many mayors' cities
are reflected in here, Pete, with your organization?
Mr. Buttigieg. The Conference of Mayors is 1,400 mayors
overall, some but not all of which have CSO issues.
Mr. Weber. 1,400. And I see the answer to the League of
Cities has been delivered.
Mr. DuPree. 19,000 cities.
Mr. Weber. 19,000 cities. OK. And I will go right over to
counties here, Mr. Portune. Is that how you say that?
Mr. Portune. Yes, sir, Congressman Weber. Thank you. 3,069
counties in America.
Mr. Weber. 3,069 counties in America. Do any of you have
any idea--when you talk about consent decrees or fines that
have been levied if you will, do any of the three of you, or
any of you at the panel, have any idea what the sum total of
that dollar amount is?
Mr. Buttigieg. I would refer you to the written testimony
that is submitted. There is an Appendix 1 from the U.S.
Conference of Mayors testimony listing out individually--I do
not see a total here, but it certainly runs well into the
millions among the cities that have been fined.
Mr. Weber. Just into the millions?
Mr. DuPree. I would probably say it would be more than
that. I mean, if----
Mr. Weber. Right.
Mr. Portune. Congressman, if I may, this is not fines, but
there was a count done. There are 781 counties, cities, or
sewer districts that are involved in consent decrees. EPA
estimates the cost of compliance with those consent decrees to
be $150 billion. We have also received estimates that suggest
that the number may be close to $500 billion. Regardless of how
you look at it, it is a lot of money.
Mr. Weber. Oh, absolutely it is. So that is the vein I am
in. So if it is $150 billion or $500 billion--let's just take
an average. Let's say $250 billion. All right? What is that,
one-quarter of a trillion dollars? You know, $100 billion here,
$100 billion there, pretty soon you are talking about real
money.
Mr. Buttigieg. Yes, sir.
Mr. Weber. So do you know the fines as related to that?
Anybody? What I am getting at is what if we could take the
money that the cities are having to pay and apply it to that?
Any kind of ratio? Anybody have any kind of idea?
Mr. DuPree. I do not have a ratio, sir, but we have worked
with the EPA on this itself in order to put those monies back
into the community. I think that is what we have been talking
about.
Mr. Weber. Sure.
Mr. DuPree. Instead of actually fining them and they are
going off to an abyss somewhere, actually put them back into
planning to make projects work better. But in order to do that,
there has got to be a partnership. You have got to start
working together and not just arbitrarily----
Mr. Weber. That is why I liked Mayor Pete's comparison
there. Not a regulated polluter but a--what was it?
Mr. Buttigieg. A co-regulating.
Mr. Weber. A co-regulated partner, I think was the word you
used, which I like those terms better.
So someone said earlier up here from this side that the
fact that the EPA was getting cut 30 percent was probably
problematic. But what if we took those regulators and those
salaries and all the money that is spent from the EPA's
standpoint and we said, look.
If we got regulating partners in the cities and the
counties, would we really need that much Federal regulators? I
mean, if their job is to go down and tell you what you already
know is wrong, what you already know needs to be done, and by
the way, we are going to fine you for that? Would it not--Mr.
Butler, you want to weigh in on that?
Mr. Butler. Yes, please. Mr. Chairman, Representative
Weber, through the Environmental Council of the States, the
organization represents all of the States, we have engaged with
new Administrator Pruitt under his concept of cooperative
federalism. And in short, I think what he means, and we
understand and agree with, is how do you reset the relationship
and have this conversation between the Federal EPA and States?
We are co-regulators.
How do you set the arrangement between us? We look at what
they are good at and what they should do versus what the States
should have primacy for since we are fully delegated States. We
welcome that conversation. We are having that now under this
idea of cooperative federalism.
So frankly, how do you have the Federal EPA get out of the
way of the States so we can do what we need to do in many
cases? We do not mean that in a way that indicates they do not
have value. We think that they do. But frankly, there is a
level of duplicity in many cases that we think that there is
not value. And you could take----
Mr. Weber. Oh, there is value. We are paying for that. You
can put a dollar value on the money that is being allocated
that is not going to the communities. Yesterday there was a
news release by the EPA--I do not know, maybe you all saw it--
it is WIFIA, Water Infrastructure Finance and Innovation Act, I
guess is the----
Mr. Butler. WIFIA.
Mr. Weber. WIFIA. WIFIA?
Mr. Butler. WIFIA. Yes, sir.
Mr. Weber. WIFIA. OK. So you all are aware of it, there is
$1.5 billion for water infrastructure projects. So we just got
through saying earlier there was $150 billion to $500 billion
in compliance actions, to come into compliance. Is that what we
are saying? So what does this mean from yesterday? Does that
mean you can get low-interest loans? What does that mean to
cities and counties? Anybody?
Mr. DuPree. Well, you have to apply, first of all. It
started as a pilot program, I believe. And so I think it has
been funded. You have to apply for it in the first round in
order to participate in it. But it is more of a loan program
than a grant program.
Mr. Weber. So it does not fix the long-term problem if EPA
tells you that you have problems, and now you need to pay them
for telling you?
Mr. DuPree. Well, it goes a long way to start the process.
It takes a lot more than what Honorable Portune just rattled
off with those numbers. The numbers, they are enormous, the
amount of money it is going to take to fix the infrastructure,
the water, sewer overflows that we have in America.
The city of Hattiesburg is 133 years old. We have not only
a storm sewer overflow, a sanitary sewer overflow problem, we
have a wastewater problem, we have a water problem, and they
all come on top of each other. And without us working together
and planning to try to solve that problem and how do we pay for
it, then it is not going to happen.
Mr. Weber. I got you. Thank you. I appreciate that.
Mr. Chairman, thank you for the indulgence. I yield back.
Mr. Mast [presiding]. Any time.
We will go to Mrs. Lawrence.
Mrs. Lawrence. Thank you so much. I want to say for the
record that being a member of the National League of Cities and
the U.S. Conference of Mayors, I really do appreciate and thank
you for being here, and the counties and the other speakers.
Mr. Butler, I do want to say I too welcome a conversation
about the States and the EPA interaction. Many of you know I
represent the State of Michigan and lived through a horrific
example of a failure of connection and checks and balances when
it comes to water infrastructure.
And when we are talking about this and we have to talk
about the dollars, water is a basic human need and we have to
treat it as such. It is not a luxury. And our investment in our
water infrastructure is something we have kicked down the road,
and I pray to God we never had another Flint situation. But
that should have been our awakening. Nine thousand children are
still suffering from the results of that. And so I am very
passionate about this issue.
Mr. Levine, you said in your written statement, ``The
United States must significantly increase the investment in
municipal water infrastructure to protect public health and the
environment.'' In your opinion, if Congress does not increase
the Federal investment in our Nation's clean water
infrastructure, will acting on this planning legislation be
enough for the communities to meet their clean water needs?
Mr. Levine. Thank you. Absolutely not. It will not be
enough by itself. There is a need for three things that go
together. One is smarter efforts, along the lines of integrated
planning, that will find the most cost-effective solutions to
get us--if they can be implemented, get us where we need to go
as quickly as possible, as cost-effectively as possible.
Second is there need to be additional Federal and State
dollars to assist what local utilities and local governments
are able to generate as revenue on their own because what the
locals can generate on their own is not going to be sufficient.
Third, there is a need to make sure that when local revenue
is generated--because additional local revenue is also needed--
--
Mrs. Lawrence. Exactly.
Mr. Levine [continuing]. That when that local revenue is
generated, it is done so in a fair and equitable way that does
not place undue burdens on low-income households. And there are
ways to do that. There are ways that Congress can help do that.
There are ways that States can help do that. There are ways
that locals can help do that.
Mrs. Lawrence. And this is an issue. Affordability of water
is becoming an issue in America that is very concerning. And
that issue must resonate to a level of high priority.
Mayor DuPree, thank you for your support of the Water
Quality Protection and Job Creation Act, a bill that will
authorize the clean water at $20 billion over 5 years. I am
proud to be a cosponsor of this legislation and happy to say
every Democratic member of the subcommittee supports this
legislation. Can you describe how important it is for Congress
to take action on this legislation?
Mr. DuPree. Thank you for the question, Mrs. Lawrence. Just
in Hattiesburg alone, we have a $150 million project on
wastewater, probably $46 million or $45 million that has to do
with sanitary sewer overflows. And then we have water quality.
We have not lead pipes but we have asbestos, asbestos-lined
pipes that probably are going to be $50 million. So we are
talking about $200 million to $300 million of projects. And
part of my community, 37 percent, is below the poverty line or
at the poverty line.
Mrs. Lawrence. Wow.
Mr. DuPree. There is no way--there is a breaking point
where you cannot afford to do any more than what you are doing.
We have spent about $45 million in bonds already to try to
solve the problem. That is about as far as we can go. That is
why we are all up here.
Mrs. Lawrence. Yes.
Mr. DuPree. Affordability is one of the problems. And
having help is one of them. Becoming--I almost said co-
conspirators--becoming co-partners in what we are trying to do,
and that is trying to provide quality of life and health for
people that we represent.
Mrs. Lawrence. Yes.
Mr. DuPree. Economic development for people we represent.
Without the bill that you have sponsored, I do not think we
could--and it is just a start.
Mrs. Lawrence. It is just a start.
Mr. DuPree. But it is a great start. If we could get that
bill started, I think it would help not only cities like
Hattiesburg, but cities across the United States.
Mrs. Lawrence. Thank you. In my time that is left, I just
want to make sure that I put on the record that the investment
in our water infrastructure should be a priority, based on the
fact it is a basic human need and based on the fact of the
environment, and we cannot reproduce our water source.
And the fact that we have lived through a documented
demonstration--I am sad to hear about the asbestos in the
water. Ladies and gentlemen, we have to drink water. And if you
are poor and the only source of water is from what you turn on
in your faucet, you are subjected. You are subjected to that.
And as we talk about infrastructure and the dollar and
legislation, water should elevate to be a priority in our
investment. Thank you, and I yield back.
Mr. Mast. Thank you.
The Chair will now recognize my friend, Mr. LaMalfa.
Mr. LaMalfa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And I apologize for
not being here for much of this because it is multi committees,
same time around this place. So thank you for your indulgence
if I am asking questions that might be a little duplicative,
but hopefully not. Anyway, thank you to the panel for appearing
here, and for the committee.
I have a district that is very rural in far northern
California, a lot of very small towns. And some of them are
incorporated and some of them are not even incorporated. So my
constituents, whether they are city council, city managers, or
farmers, have not had a very good experience with the EPA,
especially in very recent times.
So the issue is, what the EPA says it is going to be doing
is often hard to hear behind the truckload of paperwork and
redtape you have to sort through first, trying to finally get
to an end goal that probably most people would mutually agree
would be a pretty good end goal.
Clean water systems, it is a high priority. Sewer systems
that do not fail, that do not overflow, whether it is a rain
situation or flood, we all want these things. And so a lot of
times these municipalities have been in a depressed economy, a
depressed region, and so for them to work through this, they do
not just instantly have, for a small town, $5 million for a
water treatment plan or what have you.
That just does not come out of a small town that has a lot
of its storefronts boarded up due to the economy. Maybe some of
my wooded areas in northern California, the timber industry has
been run out of business by other environmental concerns. So
they do not have the economy any more.
So it is hard to understand whether the EPA really, really
understands themselves how a small town like Dunsmuir,
California, or Hamilton City, California, can struggle to
follow every single requirement that are put on them simply
because they do not have the money or the staff or the time to
get every single detail right. Then boom, a bunch of fines or a
threat of fines.
So a question for several of you on the panel here. I will
try Mr. Buttigieg, Mr. DuPree, and Mr. Portune. Please all take
a whack at this. What do you feel the factors the EPA does
consider when they are working with small communities? And then
the second half: What additional factors should they be
considering when they work with smaller, mid-sized communities
like this to make sure that they are not completely overwhelmed
by the requirements?
So please, the three of you. And we have got to be somewhat
economical on time. Thank you.
Mr. Buttigieg. So I think the only--the primary factor is
compliance. And of course, we all want compliance, but we want
it to happen with regard to affordability. Sequence also
matters, being able to do what is most important first. And
this is where the flexibility and the variances are important.
One story that is often heard in the Mayors Water Council
is that of Lima, Ohio. There is a river that is required under
their consent decree to be fishable and swimmable. It is 4
inches deep at its highest; it actually runs dry part of the
year. Nobody is ever going to fish or swim there. They still
want it to be clean, but the question is, is that the right
priority? Or if the EPA were encouraged or permitted to take
sequence and affordability into account, would that have been a
lower priority than more urgent needs?
Mr. LaMalfa. So maybe two or three things you could do.
This one will clear it up 80 percent; this one will be 10 more
percent, and this thing will be 5 more percent. Maybe we should
try to do the 80-percent thing on cleanup on water quality if
it is the most affordable.
Mr. Buttigieg. Yes. Often we talk about the knee of the
curve. So in South Bend's experience, I will not try to
recreate the visual aid. But basically, we got 75 percent of
the benefit with the first 20 or so percent of the cost. And
now we are at the knee of the curve and it is going to shoot
up. And each incremental bit of benefits is going to be much
more expensive than the first phase.
Mr. LaMalfa. Mr. DuPree?
Mr. DuPree. Yes, sir. I would think that EPA would need to
take some of the things into consideration, like poverty,
employment or unemployment rates, residential factors. They
need to look at the income of the low-income community that you
have.
Mr. LaMalfa. So the affordability of what is even going on
in the town there?
Mr. DuPree. Yes, sir. And the median income. The median
income is set basically at 2 percent. And maybe we need to look
at the lower rates. Those who are low income, set the rates
based on them and not a cookie cutter, not a 2 percent across
the United States, because all of our citizens are not the
same.
Mr. LaMalfa. Yes. Thank you.
Mr. Portune?
Mr. Portune. Congressman, thank you for the question. Your
question actually demonstrates why there is a need for Congress
to take action and to codify the integrated planning because
since EPA announced it in 2012, they have not implemented it or
taken advantage of it as much as they can.
States are far more aware of the need for flexibility than
EPA has been, and integrated planning will allow for this
bundling of interests to come together to prioritize need based
upon the availability of funds to get the biggest bang for your
buck. Your example of the three separate elements was a perfect
one, a great one, why integrated planning is necessary.
And I would also add quickly that with respect to rural
communities, America's 3,069 counties are not all urban. They
are a wide range.
Mr. LaMalfa. Thank goodness.
Mr. Portune. Yes, sir. And it is the smaller counties or
the more rural counties that may not have the resources to be
able to figure everything out. That is why we need EPA as a
partner and not as a regulator, so that with this flexibility,
bringing in State agencies, bringing in others, you can look at
not only what the demands and the needs are, but everyone is
working together then in a footing as a partnership to figure
out what the best approach needs to be. And that is just simply
not happening right now.
Mr. LaMalfa. Yes. On my ranch, I like to choose my
partners, but I know what you are saying.
Mr. Portune. Yes, sir.
Mr. LaMalfa. So getting ready to yield back, Mr. Chairman.
So the bottom line, what I heard and is one of my other points,
is that integrated planning needs to be pushed forward farther
and faster instead of on the back burner like it has been so
far. Yes or no?
Mr. Portune. Yes.
Mr. LaMalfa. OK. Thank you. I appreciate it, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Mr. LaMalfa. I am going to give myself
about 5 minutes now.
I appreciate all the comments. One of them that actually
stuck out to me very well--I think it was from you, Mr.
Butler--you made a very important point I think we should all
remember up here in Washington constantly.
Are the cities, are the States, those entities, are they
meant to be regulated entities, or should we be looking at you
all as peers that have just as much been elected as we have
been elected up here, and are supposed to be partners in this
project that is our community and making it better? I think it
is something we should continually remember in that.
I want to get to a little bit more the issue of
affordability. And recognizing that we are all elected, we are
not spending our own money. We are spending the work of
somebody else's hands every single day at whatever level that
we are at.
So I want to ask, to each of our mayors, if you were given
the reins of the EPA, if you were given the reins to it, what
steps would you take to address the affordability in the
context of the integrated planning and permitting policy? And
you can start at whichever end of the mayors you want. I do not
care.
Mr. Buttigieg. Well, the power of the purse, of course, is
over here and not in the agency. So needless to say, we would
benefit from more resources coming our way.
But in terms of what the EPA can do regardless, again the
biggest thing we need is partnership, the ability to take, for
example, a more sophisticated measure of affordability into
account than just that 2 percent across the board of median
household income because it does not really capture what is
happening to the folks who are on the short end of that half,
that are in the median.
The ability to cross-pollinate green infrastructure
solutions from among different communities--mayors have to
solve these problems locally every chance we get. And so we are
cooking up good ideas. Now we need the flexibility to use them,
and the EPA could actually be a very helpful forum sponsoring
our ability to take them to scale, to share them, and to deploy
them more widely.
I think there is a lot that we can do as a partner if we
can just get that handshake between us and Federal partners who
share the same goals, get that handshake to be more effective
and more efficient.
Mr. Mast. Great. Mr. DuPree or Mr. Portune?
Mr. DuPree. We had this discussion on the way over here. We
are probably going to say much of the same thing. But number
one is partnership. You got to start off working together. We
all have the same goals. We got to figure out how we are going
to get there, and we have to do that together and not
separately.
And then the other thing is flexibility because after you
have the partnership, then you have the authority to move. You
have the authority to act. And I think that is what we do not
have, is the authority to act. We have to act based on what we
are told instead of a partnership based on a shared commitment
to do something, to go forward on.
And then the affordability issue--if you get those first
two, then you work on the affordability issue and how do we
make it happen? Because if I cannot pay for it, I cannot make
it happen.
Mr. Mast. You all represent unique and diverse communities
that all have very specific issues.
Yes, sir?
Mr. Portune. Mr. Chairman, thank you. First, act, and by
that I mean codify. Adopt integrated planning as a measure to
ensure that this approach with flexibility and partnership is
the way in which we are approaching these issues with respect
to Clean Water Act compliance across all programs to give local
communities the flexibility that they do need.
Reduce reliance on the median household income. I think we
all agree that this cookie cutter approach does not work. Each
of our counties or cities or municipalities are unique. There
has got to be more of a deeper dive with respect to what are
the factors that are affecting local communities.
One-fourth of counties have not yet recovered from the
recession. So that is an important issue that must be greatly
understood.
Third, focus on water quality as the goal as opposed to
just a numbers game with respect to reducing the number of CSOs
and SSOs and that sort of thing. At the end of the day, there
might be, in our community or others, 10 CSOs that still need
to be eliminated to the cost of potentially $100 million. But
the impact on clean water is negligible, when there may be a
much better 21st-century science approach toward getting that
last measure of clean water that needs to be done.
Utilize pilot projects to help build the data on how green
infrastructure, adaptive management, watershed management does
work and work effectively in reducing costs but providing
greater impact on clean water.
And then last, with respect to the civil penalties
approach, and this is not backsliding at all, if there are
local communities that are recalcitrant or refusing to comply,
that is one thing. But the main reason why there is not full
Clean Water Act compliance is just the lack of money. And civil
penalties do not help that situation at all.
Take the money from fines and penalties and actually put it
back into what we are all trying to do, which are programs and
initiatives that will improve clean water.
Mr. Mast. Great. And I just have a couple more quick
cleanup questions for you, one that I want you to think about
real quick, and I am going to ask you something specific before
that. But it is a chance for you to send a message. I like to
give flexibility, so you can give this in terms of a letter
grade, A to F, or 1 through 10. I do not care how you answer
it.
But think about for a second, what grade would you give the
EPA in implementing the integrated planning policy? And while
you think about that as our mayors a minute, I wanted to ask
you this.
You have all spoken a good deal about the green
infrastructure approaches that exist out there. It is one thing
to learn about them in academia and to talk about them. I was
wondering if you could give any of the specifics about the ones
that you have in place being used as we speak, the measurable
savings that you have seen as a result of using porous roadways
or floating wetlands or oyster beds or rain gardens or water
farming, whatever that may be. What specific ones do any of you
have in place as we speak that you are seeing the payout on.
Mr. Buttigieg. So for us, permeable concrete is a good
example. You might not even notice unless you look closely, but
you look closely at the parking spaces that we are putting in,
some new streetscapes, and you can see how it drinks up the
water instead of sending it into the sewer.
We are doing downspout disconnect----
Mr. Mast. Is that just on city properties or----
Mr. Buttigieg. Yes. We are doing it on our roads, and in
some neighborhoods we have the opportunity to do that, too. But
of course, we are encouraging the private sector to do that
because parking lots are such a big part of where the runoff
comes from.
A downspout disconnect program: A lot of people have
downspouts that go straight into the system. And so we are
making it easier for residents to have those go into the yard
where the soil will drink up some of it.
Rain gardens: Making sure that we have ways of collecting
the water. We are even contemplating----
Mr. Mast. Do you have a number, though, on how many gallons
you are taking offline compared to what goes into the system? I
am just trying to get a few specifics.
Mr. Buttigieg. Not handy, but we would be happy to get that
back to you.
Mr. Mast. Great. Do any of you other mayors have any of the
specifics that you would want to offer up real quick?
Mr. DuPree. I do not have any specifics on any of those. We
are working so hard just trying to take care of the things that
we already have consent decrees on right now, to be innovative
is very difficult.
Mr. Mast. OK.
Mr. Portune. Mr. Chairman, thank you for calling me a
mayor. I am actually a county commissioner.
Mr. Mast. I apologize.
Mr. Portune. But just for the record, I appreciate it, and
our mayors would actually take that as a compliment, as do I.
Mr. Mast. You see, you are fully honorable.
Mr. Portune. I am grateful for that.
A couple of examples in Cincinnati that I would refer you
to. One is the Lower Mill Creek partial remedy, Lick Run
improvement. I cannot tell you the difference in the gallons of
water because actually, we are accomplishing about the same
thing. The importance, though, is the reduction in cost.
We were obligated, unless we came up with a green approach
that was approved by EPA, to build a huge, deep tunnel to the
cost of about $500 million. We instead got approval to use a
green approach that included daylighting streams, introducing
new foliage and green grass where there was none before to
absorb the water, permeable pavers, and things like that.
The total cost again was less than half of the cost of the
other, and in the process, it also has allowed us the
opportunity to begin the improvement of an urban neighborhood
and to create jobs from that.
The second example is the Cincinnati Zoo, that calls itself
the greenest zoo in all of America. And so I will boldly go
forward and say that they are. But they are using permeable
surfaces in all of their parking lots at the zoo. And what that
has done is allowed the zoo to meet all of its nonpotable water
needs throughout the entire zoo, saving a tremendous amount of
money and operational cost.
Mr. Mast. I have already gone well over my time and I still
have one more cleanup question for you. So I apologize. But I
appreciate it. I think it is a conversation we had to have
more, especially if we are going to have folks move in that
direction.
They need to see measurable apples to apples comparisons
about what they could do with an equal flow of water, meeting
an equal nutrient load in terms of what is going into the
system, and a dollars-to-dollars comparison, in my opinion.
Just one last cleanup question, give you an opportunity to
wrap up with whatever you might have. But if we are really
going to achieve a paradigm shift where local and State and
Federal officials can exercise a practical leadership and work
together to determine what our environmental and spending
priorities should be, what would you do? Anything else you want
to offer on that?
Mr. DuPree. The only thing I would offer, Congressman, is
that water quality is so important. And when you look at the
affordability issues and what they talk about, they do not
include water quality. It is only CSOs and SSOs. And that is
because the cost of water is so high. And so there has got to
be a greater focus on water quality and not just on SSOs and
CSOs.
And I will tell the only other question that you asked
about, green infrastructure, we have a barrel retention basin
at our new police department I forgot about. So we do have that
plus the Little Gordon's Creek we are working on right now for
green infrastructure.
Mr. Portune. Mr. Chairman, I would agree with respect to
Mayor DuPree that the goal of this is clean water. And so the
focus needs to be on what can we do using innovative means and
approaches, collaborative approaches, that are going to allow
us to clean up the waterways of America in ways that are
efficient, effective, and affordable?
So if the goal is clean water, that has got to be what the
focus is. This cannot just simply be a numbers game in the
number of CSOs that are being reduced.
And I do have a grade for EPA's implementation, if you
wanted that.
Mr. Mast. I would love to hear it.
Mr. Portune. I would give EPA a C-minus with respect to
their approach. They have taken steps in bits and spurts.
Lately there has not been as much. Clearly I credit EPA for
introducing integrated planning back in 2002, but it has just
simply not been implemented across the board the way in which
it could be, and there is a distinct difference between the way
in which the regions approach it compared to headquarters here
in Washington, DC.
So credit for having started. A passing grade, but not
where they should be.
Mr. Mast. Any other grades you want to offer before I close
this?
Mr. Buttigieg. Maybe Incomplete. Again, that idea of
integrated planning is welcome, but it hasn't been completely
implemented, and it seems not always to have penetrated into
the regional offices even if it's embraced here in DC.
Mr. DuPree. I will give it a B just for the attempt.
Mr. Levine. If I may, Mr. Chair?
Mr. Mast. Very good. Well, yes, by all means. You want to
offer up a letter? Give me a letter.
Mr. Levine. Yes.
Mr. Mast. And aside from that letter, I am going to close
it.
Mr. Levine. I am going to revert back to before letter
grades in first grade, second grade, grade school. I am going
to say Needs Improvement. But I want to say that that's really
what we ought to be grading, is collectively grading EPA,
Congress, local governments, local utilities. As people have
said, there's partnership that is needed. There are many legs
of the stool. EPA cannot do it alone.
Mr. Mast. Needs Improvement. We will put it in the record.
If there are no further questions, I would like to thank
each of you as our witnesses for being here this morning. We
really appreciate your time. This has been incredibly
informative for me, I know for everybody else as well on the
dais.
If no other Members have anything else to add, the
committee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:13 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

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