Bill aims to shore up Clean Water Act

Legislators are proposing an amendment to the Clean Water Act that would give authority to community-based partnerships to address fisheries habitat issues

April 12, 2000
Web posted at: 11:45 a.m. EDT (1545 GMT)

By Environmental News Network staff

Despite the Clean Water Act, 38 percent of the freshwater ecosystems in the United States are not fit to swim in or fish.

Introduced today by Sen. Kit Bond (R-Missouri) and Rep. John Tanner (D-Tennessee), the Fishable Waters Act of 2000, an amendment to the Clean Water Act, would encourage community-based partnerships to address fisheries habitat issues.

"The Fishable Waters Act shares the same intent of the Clean Water Act by proposing to fulfill goals that have not yet been met to restore and maintain the biological integrity of the nation's waters," said Steve Moyer, vice president for conservation programs at Trout Unlimited. "The intent of the bill is to enhance the Clean Water Act instead of undercutting it."

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Passed in 1972, the Clean Water Act established a national objective to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the nation's surface waters so that "fishable and swimmable" water would be achieved. The act has not been modified in several years.

While the chemical state of surface waters has improved dramatically, their physical and biological health have received much less attention and far fewer resources, conservationists say.

Statistics support their claim. Nearly 40 percent of the nation's waters still are not considered fishable. Less than 2 percent of 3.6 million stream miles are healthy enough to be considered high quality. Seventy percent of riparian corridors have been damaged or destroyed.

In developing the Fishable Waters Act, the Fishable Waters Coalition, an alliance of farmers, anglers, state resource agencies and environmentalists, concluded that the Clean Water Act did not provide a complete strategy to solve the nation's fisheries needs.

The Fishable Waters Act would create a framework to build healthy fisheries across the country

"What was possible in 1972 is unlikely to be either fiscally (practical) or politically viable now," wrote the American Sportfishing Association in a detailed summary of the legislation. "There will never be sufficient federal resources to do everything; we first must undertake to target those water bodies in which specific protection and restoration activities will make healthy fisheries a realistic possibility. Top-down regulation does not represent a complete solution, particularly when addressing non-point source pollution problems."

If passed, the Fishable Waters Act would provide financial and technical aid for local, voluntary partnerships to boost watersheds across the country. The act aims to strengthen the work of local watershed councils by linking financial resources to biological priorities.

Instead of increasing regulations, the act takes "a bottom-up approach," said Thomas Van Arsdall, vice president of environmental policy for the National Council of Farmer Cooperatives. "The more local you get, the more likely you are to build consensus."

Supporters of the proposed legislation say current funding is insufficient or trapped in federal spending accounts.

The Fishable Waters Act would establish a new program within the Clean Water Act that would allow states to use funds deposited in their Fisheries Habitat Account for approved conservation projects.

The act would also expand the spending authority of states under the Clean Water Act Section 319 program. The act would allow states to use up to 20 percent of its Section 319 funds to provide financial support directly to landowners participating in approved projects or to designated watershed councils.

"I think there is a fair amount of cooperation right now between fisheries and environmental groups and the private sector, but there is not nearly enough," said Moyner. "Most fish-habitat and water-quality problems occur on private land. There needs to be more collaboration to tackle these issues."

Copyright 1999, Environmental News Network, All Rights Reserved

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Fishable Waters Act of 2000
Trout Unlimited
American Sportfishing Association
National Council of Farmer Cooperatives
Bass Anglers sportsman Society
National Corn Growers Association
Izaak Walton League of America
American Fisheries Society
International Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies
Pacific Fisheries Council
The Fishable Waters Coalition
EPA

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