[T]he Senate Natural Resources and Energy Committee passed a water quality bill Wednesday that puts in place a road map for slowing pollution in Vermont’s lakes, rivers and streams.
The 136-page bill, S.49, passed by a 4-1 vote. The Senate Finance Committee will consider the funding in the bill as soon as Thursday.
The bill raises $10.2 million for a new Clean Water Fund through permit and registration fees and a flat $25 annual tax on all property owners, known as a per parcel fee. The Senate bill raises about $2 million more than the House version of the water quality bill, H.35, which passed earlier this month.
The bill is considered to be the foundation for the state’s effort to restore dozens of polluted waterways across Vermont, including Lake Champlain. The bill sets timelines for state agencies to adopt pollution control measures on farms and issues stormwater discharge permits for new and existing development.
Sen. Mark MacDonald, D-Orange, voted against the bill, in part because it does not require mandatory management practices for foresters. But he said the entire bill is a “good step forward.”
“We cannot clean up the waters of the state with voluntary practices,” he said. “I was not going to, as a committee that deals with forest issues, exempt them from the requirements.”
Michael Snyder, commissioner of the Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation, opposes mandatory management practices for foresters. He said there are two dozen practices that apply to forestry operations designed to protect water quality, including standards for stream crossings. The practices are not mandatory under law, but they are enforced.
The bill requires the department to revise the rules by July 1, 2016.
“Let’s get this right. Let’s make sure we know how to make them mandatory,” Snyder said. He added that only 2 percent of Vermont’s forests are harvested every year. “Forests are not the problem. In fact, we are the solution.”
Representatives of the Vermont League of Cities and Towns are worried about how much it is going to cost to clean up the state’s waterways.
“A lot of the responsibility has been shifted to municipalities,” said Karen Horn, VLCT’s director of public policy and advocacy.
Both the House and Senate bills remove provisions exempting towns from paying a host of fees on permits for lake encroachments, wetland impacts and stormwater runoff. Horn said towns have not paid these costs because the money is difficult to recover from a user base.
Towns will also have to pay for wastewater treatment upgrades that reduce phosphorus pollution under a provision in both the House and Senate bills. Horn said in current law, the state pays for these costs.
“That language is deleted in this bill. That is a big problem for us because the capital costs are pretty significant,” she said.
David Mears, commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation, said towns have a valid concern. But given the scale of the state’s plan to restore Lake Champlain’s water quality, as required by the Environmental Protection Agency, he said it would be challenging for the state to continue funding the upgrades.
“It’s not a problem created by legislation. It’s just a fact: We are going to have sewage treatment plants to upgrade,” he said.
The cost to upgrade the state’s wastewater treatment plants to achieve phosphorus reductions proposed under the state’s Lake Champlain cleanup plan range from $66 million to $172 million, according to a report by the Department of Environmental Conservation. Costs could be much higher if EPA requires stricter concentration limits.
Mears said the state is seeking flexibility from the EPA about how it upgrades water treatment plants. The state plans to target upgrades in the Lake Champlain basin first.
EPA is expected to issue a draft decision this spring on whether it will accept the state’s plan to restore Lake Champlain’s water quality to state standards. EPA models indicate the state’s plan does not achieve the necessary phosphorus reductions in the Missisquoi Bay and South Lake sections of Lake Champlain.
The House version of the bill asks the Agency of Natural Resources to develop rules for the implementation of the state’s antidegradation policy, which requires that certain waterways cannot be polluted beyond current levels.
“The point here is to keep clean water clean and do everything we can to restore damaged water,” said Sen. Diane Snelling, R-Chittenden, vice chair of the Natural Resources and Energy Committee.
