The Iowa Department of Natural Resources developed the "antidegradation" standards for high-quality Iowa waters over many years. The state Environmental Protection Commission voted to approve those rules in December 2009, and the state legislature's Administrative Rules Review Committee blocked Republican efforts to overturn those rules in February 2010. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency signed off on the Iowa standards in September 2010:
EPA Region 7 has issued its approval of Iowa's Antidegradation Policy and Implementation Procedures, which are to be used by the Iowa Department of Natural Resources to protect high quality Iowa waters. High quality waters are those with pollutant levels lower than what is required by state regulations.
"Implementation of the rule will yield great water benefits to the residents of Iowa and people who visit the state," said Karl Brooks, regional administrator. "The rule helps guarantee Iowa's waters to be safe for aquatic life and recreational activities."
Iowa is obligated under the Clean Water Act (CWA) to develop and adopt a statewide antidegradation policy and to identify procedures for implementing the policy. Antidegradation refers to federal regulations designed to maintain and protect high quality waters and existing water quality in other waters from unnecessary pollution. It also provides avenues for the public to engage in determining acceptable levels of pollution.
There are three components to water quality standards: water body uses such as swimming and fishing, the criteria to protect those uses and an antidegradation policy to preserve the high quality of minimally polluted waters.
Immediately after the EPA announced its decision, the Iowa Farm Bureau and two other groups challenged the legality of the water quality rules. Two of their objections related to the December 2009 vote by the Environmental Protection Commission. They claimed that commissioner Susan Heathcote, whose term on the EPC has since expired, had a conflict of interest because of her work on water quality for the Iowa Environmental Council. That non-profit organization, with which I'm involved, had advocated for the DNR to adopt strong antidegradation rules. The IEC is also one of three groups that are intervening in the Farm Bureau's lawsuit to ensure that the antidegradation standards will not be relaxed.
Farm Bureau requested copies of all internal communications related to Heathcote's work on water quality for the Iowa Environmental Council. The council provided public documents about its antidegradation work, and the DNR provided all e-mails on the subject between DNR staff and Heathcote in her IEC role, as well as all the relevant communications by Heathcote in her EPC role. Farm Bureau is seeking more internal IEC documents through a Motion to Compel filed with the district court in May.
This week the IEC formally asked the court to deny Farm Bureau's request. A hearing is scheduled for August 23. IEC Executive Director Marian Riggs Gelb charged that Farm Bureau is "using the legal system to harass and intimidate us." She noted that during the three years the Environmental Protection Commission was considering the antidegradation rules, Farm Bureau representatives never expressed concerns about Heathcote's alleged conflict of interest to the Iowa Ethics and Campaign Disclosure Board. Riggs Gelb said the IEC had already devoted "a huge amount of staff time" to comply with the Farm Bureau subpeona, and accused the industry group of launching a "fishing expedition to get confidential information." I posted the full text of the Iowa Environmental Council's August 11 press release at Bleeding Heartland.
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