On October 29, the U.S. House of Representatives and the Senate approved the conference report providing appropriations for the Environmental Protection Agency, Department of the Interior and other agencies. The Department of the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies Appropriations Act, 2010, passed on a party line vote (247-178) and included significant increases for EPA programs including a $2 billion increase over FY09 SRF programs.
Rulemaking has potential to impact excavation standards, including civil and criminal enforcement actions.
H.R.3202, the "Water Protection and Reinvestment Act," was introduced by Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) on July 14, 2009, with bipartisan support. It establishes a five year $50 billion fund for repairing America's corroded pipes and overburdened sewer systems, which pose serious health, environmental and security risks. The Water Protection and Reinvestment Act will provide a deficit neutral, off-budget and firewalled dedicated revenue source for water infrastructure that will not be subject to the uncertainties of the annual appropriations process.
President Barack Obama on October 28 signed into law $33.5 billion spending bill to fund government energy and water programs for the 2010 fiscal year.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson appeared October 15 before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure to discuss the Clean Water Act's (CWA) permit program and EPA's immediate plans to strengthen its enforcement efforts. Jackson specifically called out construction sites as one of "the biggest threats" to our nation's waters, adding that EPA needs "to target enforcement to the most serious violations and the most significant sources."Â To address what she describes as an "unacceptably low" level of enforcement activity, Administrator Jackson announced the release of EPA's new action plan to strengthen federal and state CWA enforcement.
The National Rural Water Association (NRWA) represents approximately 26,696 public water and wastewater utilities in rural communities across the United States. On October 4, 51·çÁ÷ Staff and M&U Regional Representative Dick Smailes, Contractors Association of West Virginia member, met with NRWA and other national leaders to discuss opportunities for collaborative efforts with 51·çÁ÷ Chapters and members. In 2009 and 2010, NRWA members will be working to administer $3.8 billion for construction, upgrades and expansions with Recovery Act funding provided through the USDA's Rural Utilities Service. For assistance establishing contact with your State NRWA Chapter, please contact 51·çÁ÷ M&U Division Director Perry L. Fowler at fowlerp@agc.org or (703)837-5321.
51·çÁ÷ has been active in our efforts to ensure that the "Buy American" requirements of the Recovery Act did not seriously delay $6 billion allocated for drinking water and wastewater projects being administered by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and $1.4 billion allocated for the USDA's Rural Utilities Service (RUS). Trade agreement exceptions to the "Buy American" requirements in most cases do not flow down to sub-federal entities, such as municipal utility authorities that procure most of these projects.  Unfortunately this new policy has created a great deal of confusion and delays as agencies have been forced to apply "Buy American" for Recovery Act programs where this policy has not previously applied.51·çÁ÷ has been successful in educating EPA about the about the potential negative impacts of "Buy American" on SRF-funded stimulus projects, including project delays, litigation, bid protests, price gouging and potential criminal penalties and liability if contractors unknowingly incorporate certain materials into projects that either are not domestically manufactured or are of unknown origin, such as valves, gaskets, screws, pipe fittings etc. 51·çÁ÷ has  also raised concerns about certain major, and in many cases advanced systems and pieces of equipment, that are not manufactured in the United States, or contain components manufactured abroad, but are preferred and specified based on performance by state regulatory authorities and water utilities. EPA has independently verified the validity of 51·çÁ÷'s concerns and has taken aggressive measures to ensure that there is a waiver process in place that recognize the realities of the water infrastructure market with respect to country of origin for materials and equipment incorporated into projects. To date EPA has issued 14 project specific regional "public interest" waivers and 4 national waivers including di minimus waivers which cover some of the aforementioned materials.51·çÁ÷ has hraised similar concerns with the USDA Rural Utilities Service (RUS) in early 2009, and on September 25 USDA issued their own di minimus waiver citing the same logic that EPA has applied in the crafting of their waiver. Hopefully this will start to free up the estimated $3.8 billion in USDA projects it will fund with stimulus dollars. It is unknown whether additional waivers or guidance are forthcoming from USDA.Please see the attached document containing all regional project specific and national waivers of the "Buy American" provision as they relate to the EPA SRF and USDA RUS programs and make sure that your state and local water authorities and other 51·çÁ÷ members are aware that waivers are being granted. Please note that project specific waivers must originate with owners procuring projects or state water authorityies funding projects . Contractors cannot initiate this process. With respect to the di minimus waiver this will largely be the contractor's responsibility to account for costs and materials that fall under the 5% threshold.  For more information, contact Perry L. Fowler at (703) 837-5321 or fowlerp@agc.org
51·çÁ÷ and the Water Infrastructure Network (WIN) Coalition continue to push the Senate to bring S. 1005 Water Infrastructure Financing Act of 2009 to the floor of the Senate. On October 7, the WIN Coalition sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid calling for action on S.1005.S.1005 authorizes $39.191 billion for EPA water infrastructure programs over the next five years. This represents a significant increase for EPA federal assistance programs including $20 billion for the Clean Water State Revolving Fund Program and $14.7 billion for the Drinking Water State Revolving Fund Program. Annual dollars for EPA SRF Programs are detailed in the chart below.SRF20102011201220132014TotalClean Water$3.2b$3.2b$3.6b$4b$6b$20bDrinking Water$1.5b$2b$2b$3.2b$6b$14.7bOther key programs funded in the bill include $1.8 billion annually for Sewer Overflow Grants and $1.43 billion for the Critical Drinking Water Infrastructure Grant Program, which provides grants for reducing lead in drinking water and technical assistance for small, rural and disadvantaged communities.51·çÁ÷ members are encouraged to continue contacting their senators to urge support of S.1005 using 51·çÁ÷'s Legislative Action Center.For more information, contact Perry Fowler at (703) 837-5321 or fowlerp@agc.org.
51·çÁ÷'s Highway & Utilities Contractors Issues Meeting will take place on November 13-14 in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida at the PGA National Resort. This meeting is the premier national event for contractors and related businesses involved in every aspect of highway and utility construction to hear about and discuss issues and trends in these markets. In order to secure the 51·çÁ÷ rate of $179.00 a night you must register by October 16, 2009!
The U.S. EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson has directed the Office of Enforcement and Compliance Assurance (OECA) to examine its Clean Water Act enforcement program and report back to her in early October with an action plan to strengthen and improve the Agency's enforcement efforts. This new initiative comes in light of information showing that water quality goals are not being met, there are too many violations in too many places, and the level of EPA enforcement is unacceptably low, according to Administrator Jackson's memo to key Agency officials.51·çÁ÷ meet with OECA last week to discuss the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) stormwater permit program and how it is enforced on construction jobsites. 51·çÁ÷ suggested positive incentives and expressed concerns about any potentially punitive measure; 51·çÁ÷ plans to provide EPA staff with more detailed, written recommendations later this week. In addition, 51·çÁ÷ Chapters and members can help shape the future direction of EPA's national water enforcement program (and comment on EPA's current enforcement efforts) by participating in an online EPA discussion forum. The NPDES program under the federal Clean Water Act (CWA) regulates mostly stormwater discharges associated with municipal sewer systems, industrial activities and construction activities. (All facilities that discharge pollutants through a point source into waters of the United States are regulated by EPA and states under the NPDES program.) If your construction activity disturbs one or more acres of land, you most likely need a permit to discharge stormwater runoff from your construction site, available from EPA's NPDES program or the state NPDES permitting authority. Additional information on the federal stormwater requirements is online at http://www.epa.gov/npdes/stormwater. You also can obtain information about state and local stormwater requirements through the Storm Water Resource Locator.To clean up our nation's waters, Administrator Jackson's memo directs EPA OECA staff to devise a new action plan to achieve the following:(1)  Make clean water enforcement information more transparent. Administrator Jackson wants to "improve and enhance information that is available through the EPA Web site on compliance with the Clean Water Act and the level of enforcement activity in each state... [including] performance of individual businesses as well as state and national performance."(2)  Raise the bar for clean water enforcement performance.  The Administrator wants to bring strong, consistent and effective enforcement actions against those who violate the Clean Water Act. She has asked EPA staff to "boost [their] enforcement presence."(3)  Launch a major shift of EPA's clean water information systems. The Administrator wants data on facilities' discharges and their compliance status to be available to "federal and state regulators and the public, over the web, [and] on a real-time basis." For example, the Enforcement and Compliance History Online (ECHO) Web site displays inspection and enforcement information for various permitted dischargers under the Clean Water Act.  But it only reflects compliance and enforcement records that local, state and federal entities have entered into the federal database. More information on the development of the clean water enforcement action plan is online at http://www.epa.gov/compliance/civil/cwa/cwaenfplan.html or contact EPA's Deb Berlin, berlin.deb@epa.gov, (202) 564-4914.