Why not dump raw sewage on Trump Organization properties?
Along with bringing Flint Michigan water to the White House for drinking?
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you is the Golden Rule that should apply here. Particularly for a moral degenerate heathen hedonist pagan like Donald Trump.
148
THE SKY IS FALLING!!!
With this massive, illegal, and obviously impeachable set of rules, some property occupiers might think they are actual OWNERS instead of short term serfs to the federal government.
12
What do you expect from the same people who caused the deaths of dozens and dozens of children, and the mental retardation of hundreds more, in order to save $100 a day on water treatments? After all, it's your children that will be diseased and infected, not their's!
60
Total insanity. Most of the rivers and streams support life and the environment. The waters involved are in the Trump voting areas.
Seriously this is a disaster created by a lunatic President.
The best part is that it will impact Trump supporters in poor rural areas long before the rest of the country.
Perhaps once they tire of drinking sewage water and having constant diarrhea they will dump Trump and Moscow Mitch.
You can not make this stuff up.
73
Because, really, who needs clean water?
43
Water we can't drink or swim in. Air we will choke on from noxious emissions. Food that is toxic. I don't know if I can take much more of how great Trump is making America.
MAGA = Make Americans Gag Again
85
I believe we should dump raw sewer materials on the front yard of where all this people live. Their persona is synonymous of ‘raw sewer material’
19
Trump's swamp appointees are destroying our Federal Government and our land, water, air, and health;90 Regulations he destroyed to help the worst polluters, the farmers dumping pesticides in the water that comes back to irrigate our food;the swamp cabinet and the swamp WH are so low in intelligence they only see the immediacy of their own greed;As the GOP Senate, who has not bothered to listen to the astounding detail of trump's crime, are confident in their ignorant arrogance that trump will save them;but when they get to the Barricades of Heaven, nothing will save their corrupted souls that destroyed our Democracy, poisoned our air, water, food, land, and installed a criminal who wants to rule for life. Pompeo verbally assaulted Mary Louise Kelly of NPR because she asked him for examples of his remarks when he claimed to defend Ambassador Yovanovitch;trump wanted her harmed "get her out" "she's going to go through some things" means the GOP is covering for a violent criminal in the WH. Pompeo walked out, asked Mary Louise Kelly if she could identify Ukraine on a map;she could, she did;He asked her if she thought Americans gave a f&&& about Ukraine;Mary Louise said she cared about Ukraine, Patriot Americans Care about Ukraine, Pompeo & trump don't care about Ukraine, trump is aligned with Putin, not with Democracy;those who still support are intentionally ignorant or inherently evil.
35
and still..no American on the streets...I really hope Republicans will be defeated because it now sounds very much like Dictatorship
23
I find it fascinating when the current administration complain about SF violating the clean water act literally scrap it few months later. So.... do they care? or not care 🤔🤔
13
Did Trump promise a swamp bigger than Obama's swamp? I can't remember!
12
This would be a shining example of the much anticipated...draining of the swamp...and MAGA? Trump supporters are ok with this? Where's the Public Outrage?? Worst President and most Dysfunctional Chaotic Administration in America's History !! ...And 6o million of us have no problem supporting this ??
24
Evan a gallon of raw sewage is too much. Ridiculous and irresponsible.
16
Trump EPA policies stink. There are not enough polite negative words among the 500,000 or so words in the English language to describe the man or his evils.
27
Trump has been dumping sewage into everything else. Why should our waterways be any different?
27
With his mind in the gutter and with his Administration effectively being staffed by the swamp, it's unsurprising that fearless leader wants to make America safe again for raw sewage.
Make
America
Gasp
Again
17
Oh, that's good. That's great.
Make America Great Again, by dumping raw sewage onto it.
Kinda sums up the last few years, doesn't it.
20
They are copying Mexico and their water is undrinkable. Only the Republicans lets be Trump would approve of this.
8
So, cities can now dump raw sewage into the waterways and farmers can dump cow, swine and chicken waste in rivers and streams which will eventually seep into your groundwater.
I have just one question for our M.A.G.A. hat -wearing citizens; how do you like him now?
24
I am worried. We need the EPA to help keep us on track. We have a reckless President and along with his sycophants and Fox News I feel our troubles will become worse. Clean air and water are essential for all.
25
"Cities that say they are renegotiating their sewage agreements with the agency include Cleveland; Seattle; Kansas City, Mo.; South Bend, Ind.; and Chattanooga, Tenn. Other cities, including Pittsburgh, Louisville and St. Louis, have already concluded talks for new terms."
One way for people to combat this is to write your local water agency and ask questions, esp. if you live in or near the above areas. In our neighborhood, we get an annual water report and the staffers were more than willing to listen to my concerns, including reformatting their public mailer to make it easier to understand. I'm a physician so used my credentials to push my argument but anyone can take the same stance as merely a water user and citizen.
15
Is it Christmas all over again?!?
This is just what every river wanted!!!
I'm disgusted. Can't tell if it's the political climate or the actual climate.
10
Let's change the name of the EPA to the EDA (environmental destruction agency)
18
Trump and the GOP are against abortion, but fine with children sick and dying from known hazardous pollutants.
Raw sewage in rivers is something one does not expect, and must not tolerate, in the richest country in the world.
23
"EPA Makes It Easier For Cities To Dump Raw Sewage Into Rivers," reads the front page link. Not long ago, we could assume that such a headline was fiction from the script of "Soylent Green," "Bladerunner" or "Idiocracy." I can't believe that I live in a country and an era where it is real news.
19
Trump is leading US to Climate Suicide.
Trump has made US climate criminals.
This is the highest crime and misdemeanor any president could inflict on US and the planet.
15
The Trump administration is not only morally depraved, but in its E.P.A.’s policies towards our rivers are literally and figuratively garbage.
What more can symbolize this horrific President and his horrendous and extremist regime.
History will view his reign as the nadir, as the abyss, and as worthy of infamy!
7
I simply cannot fathom why the Trump administration is hell bent, politically, on reversing so many environmental protections. Even Trump's most loyal evangelical base is not calling for it.
My conclusions are three.
First, as a real estate developer, he has decided, in his typical non-nuanced way, that if he had to comply with environmental rules he thought interfered with his God-given right to make as much money as possible, then he would rescind as many of these rules as possible.
Second, he thinks doing this will get him more donations from Big Oil and other industrial polluters.
And third, it is a continuance of his mission to undo anything Obama did, good or bad, to punish Obama for the jokes he made about Trump at the 2011 White House correspondents dinner.
This may be the worst political calculus made by the GOP during the Trump years. Younger voters of both parties are generally pro-environment and believe that we need to protect the earth, so this callousness will damage the GOP in future elections. It is one thing to be clueless about these issues; it's another to roll back protections and affirmatively act to increase pollution. Voters will remember this.
28
Twenty years ago, the City of Los Angeles was under a court order to stop dumping raw sewage. After most storms, the City would close their beaches. The City hired a team of engineers to stop the spills, who designed improvements to the collection system. But most of that plan went unbuilt. You know why? Because the City wanted to reduce water consumption, and subsidized over 4 million low-flow toilets. Using less water resulted in saving taxpayers a bundle, and the beaches are now cleaner.
Now, the Republicans want to relax low-flow toilet standards and allow MORE sewage to end up on the beaches. Please don’t vote for any Republican.
16
Two possibilities people start to get sick from raw sewage or they don't. If they don't, hey - there's always a bigger tv or a larger truck or a fancier house to buy using money not spent on taxes.
If people do start to get sick, the demand for improvement will arise. The problem will either be addressed, or wealthier people and people with skills will start to move to cities where they don't have to worry about getting sick. This will destroy property values in the "leaver" cities, I'd imagine.
Detroit 2.0?
It's like maintaining the car - if you do it, it'll ultimately cost you less money.
4
Flying into New York yesterday was like flying into Los Angeles of old. The plume of pollution from the coal fired power plants to the west was thick enough to obscure the view of the city from LaGuardia...incredible.
Now we know why the Trump wanted to move to Washington. He has finally had revenge on all of those New Yorkers who dissed him.
The ill effects from the coal fired EPA are already visible in our eastern cities. The sicknesses will follow right behind them. Thanks to the pro-sewage party and their President.
12
Green Party voters: this is the result of your vote in 2016. If you want to reverse all the environmental damage Trump has done, vote Democratic in 2020.
21
No one on earth has studied this more than I have. It started in the 80s with witnessing animals with two heads, mouths in the wrong places, tumors and cancer deaths of pets and family members all leading to the filing of several lawsuits one lasted 20 years. These lawsuits generated many thousands of documents. Nothing is more important to the survival to mankind because ultimately all water eventually finds it way back to the sea and the sea is dying as a result. The filth of humanity washes mostly from our millions of miles of roadways into these small water bodies, condoms, tampons, dirty diapers, medical waste, bits of billions of tiers, billions of cigarette butts, raw sewage, PCBs and other toxins, oil, farm and factory discharges. It's all found in our food, but worse it all gets homogenized impossible to remove and has displaced over 50% of all the phytoplankton in my lifetime in the oceans. Phytoplankton is critical to all life on earth, it's the beginning of the food chain responsible for feeding billions and it also sequesters CO2 and supplies most of the oxygen we breathe and responsible for curtailing global warming. As phytoplankton goes all life will soon follow its demise is imminent and likely irreversible and the simple rolling back of the protection of these waterways will be the death nail in the future of our children. Do we really want one person have the power over the fate all life?
15
The democratic challenger has a lot to work with! We should drop the Trump demonization (and impeachment) charades and focus on policy positions, like here, that are clearly wrong-headed. Bernie Sanders has always been especially good at sticking to the issues and not descending into interpersonal conflict and games.
Reversing these latest actions will be easy. But the environmental changes we need to make right now are MUCH bigger. This will require a leader - not with a plan (such plans are hashed out much later, over many iterations, by scores of officials and congressmen) - but with great popular support based on shared ideology. THIS is what it will take to reverse climate change and other major challenges we have in front of us.
Every major city in America on a waterway dumps its sewage waste DOWNSTREAM and gets its drinking water (if from the river) UPSTREAM. These cities should be able to REVERSE this arrangement. Bioremediation between cities (especially with Army Corp channelized waterways) does not work and is environmentally destructive. The cancer rates in Baton Rouge and New Orleans are the worst in the country. How can we do this to our fellow "downstream" Americans? Our country has an ethos like that of our river subculture. (India seems to have a different one.) We're transient, we gamble, live for the moment, take advantage of things that float our way and come in with the flood and rely on the river to flush away our physical and metaphysical waste.
5
Don't Donald and members of the EPA remember the door state of the waterways of yesteryear? The Potomac, Chesapeake Bay, The East River, the Hudson River, The Cuyahoga River, Lake Erie...The list goes on and on and on. Bad water, bad air, the new American Dream.
6
Here's some hope--Trump's pattern is to knock over his "toy" blocks in order to take credit for rebuilding them.
2
Democrats will need to make more vivid how the Trump administration's gutting of environmental safeguards will damage the health and well-being of citizens, particularly since it can easily get lost in the flood of other news (and other outrages). Environmental protection has a direct impact on human lives (as recently dramatized by the film "Dark Waters"), and Democrats need to make that clear--in stark terms--as the election approaches. Climate change, as real and pressing as it is, can still feel somehow abstract; even in the face of the evidence, the mind can balk at drawing a connection with the latest hurricane or wildfire. By contrast, filthy water that sickens people with diarrhea and other ailments, and particulate-choked air that exacerbates asthma and causes cancer and COPD, are tangible and immediate--and the direct result of government action (or inaction). Simple message: Trump's environmental policies, designed to make companies richer, will make you and your kids sicker.
7
Perhaps the Republican dream isn’t ambitious enough. Why just go back to the 1950’s? Let’s go back to a time when people just tossed the contents of their chamber pots out the window. Same impact as the reversal of those pesky common sense regulations.
3
Costs? Take it from the defense budget!
7
trump and the Republicans promised fantastic infrastructure overhaul. Instead this is what we get. How does this make America great? Is this issue discussed on FOX? This is not fake news--this is serious news but the trump base isn't told. donald trump and the Republican party is ruining this country. So very, very sad.
6
Why is it called the EPA?
3
Adam Schiff's inspiring #RightMatters spills onto every aspect of Trump's administration and its' blatant disregard for "the people's" environmental safety also. I fear a man who blocks subpoenas to stop witnesses to go before our court system to testify to the Potus who cares little about our children's clean air and water future. This has nothing to do with being Red or Blue. This has everything to do with justice for all. Everything to do with what is right.
I fear a man that will roll back almost 100 EPA protections for our children’s clean air and water future. Do you want our children dinking and breathing these toxins…and the toxins that flow through our watersheds?
There is only one place for this Potus...and it is "out" of our government.
4
Another example of the way Republican policies redistribute wealth to America’s new oligarch class.
All at the expense of the environment & the nation’s collective health.
Really obscene.
4
Too much for the March of Life when we know that without clean water there is no life.
4
Vote blue to save our environment and democracy. Trump and his GOP enablers are destroying both.
7
if only affected their own water that they drink then go ahead but it doesn't ..this is reprehensible
It is important to note that scientists project that continued warming will bring more heavy precipitation, thus more flooding and more water flow into sewer systems. According to NOAA, "Extreme precipitation events have grown more frequent since the start of the twentieth century, and such events are likely to become even more frequent over the twenty-first." The problem that cities have today will only get worse in the future. Of course if we were to get serious about climate change, we might reduce, somewhat, the need for these expensive projects.
7
The reality in most cities is that local elected officials rely heavily on campaign contributions from developers. New development is approved without regard to the impact of the new development on aging water and sewer systems. Impact fees charged for new development are either non-existent or laughably low. Miami-Dade County, FL has had to close beaches in recent months due to contamination for either sewerage overflows into rivers and Biscayne Bay or pipe breaks in an aging system.
9
@Frank
With these republicans in charge I'm surprised they still monitor the water quality of the beaches.
4
"Farmers and property developers will now be able to release pesticides, fertilizers and other pollutants directly into many of those waterways, as well as destroy or fill in wetlands for construction projects."
Remember how last summer lakes were closed in northern New Jersey due to toxic algae blooms that actually killed animals? This will only add to that deadly problem.
12
@Viktor prizgintas Beaches closed here in Michigan also, for the same reasons
1
Solutions to public infrastructure problems like these require money - lots of money. Cities and local agencies seek relief from EPA as they are reluctant to increase rates and taxes sufficiently to pay for these projects (that they agreed to do in the consent orders) fearing the local political backlash. Some Federal funds are provided through state revolving fund programs to assist municipalities, but nowhere near enough to fill the need. Federal spending priorities lie elsewhere.
In addition to increased federal funding, local citizens need to acknowledge their responsibilities and be willing to pay higher rates. People are used to paying peanuts for water and sewer compared to other utilities (electric, gas, telecom). If you don’t want to delay compliance with the order tell your local sewer board that you are willing to pay higher rates.
7
@Brian
Fracking uses millions of gallons of water: how much do these corporations pay for using our water? I'll bet we taxpayers pay more than the frackers.
4
This is the end result of the lie foisted on America by the very wealthy that we are collectively undertaxed, in their continuing efforts to eliminate progressive taxation to the point they pay no taxes at all.
The up-front cost of proper sewage treatment, which ends with the discharge of drinkable water, usable sand, farm fill and an assortment of expensive raw chemicals is high.
The cost of cleaning up the mess, curing diseases caused by polluted waters and the potential death of the ocean’s blue-green algae, source of most of the oxygen we breath and the greatest destroyer of CO2 astronomical.
The cost could be the life of humanity as a species.
Not only are we failing to clean sewage into clean drinking water and replenishing the source, especially underground aquifers - while removing salable raw materials - the worst raw sewage cones from industry - these short-sighted policies will, not could, will, cause more deadly “red tides” and further pump greenhouse gasses into the air.
They will create more “Superfund sites” like the Hudson River, with no money left to pay the huge cleanup costs - if there are any of us left to pay at all.
The federal government used to pay half the cost of sewer plants. Now it pays nothing, for the wealthy have won laws leaving the coffers worse than empty.
12
@Eatoin Shrdlu
Fracking uses millions of gallons of water: how much do these corporations pay for using our water? I'll bet we taxpayers pay more than the frackers.
We must save the planet now. We can't wait until we elect a government that will solve the problems for us. We're climate criminals leading the planet, under Trump, to climate suicide.
5
For many decades, I have fought the good fight — young people, it is now up to you to carry the torch. I am old and tired; hopefully, you still have full lives ahead of you.
12
Columbus, Ohio has done so much over the past 50 years to separate waste water from storm water. The City, along with State and federal funding, spent millions, when a million dollars paid for a lot more than now, to pay for separation at the source, homes and businesses and factories whose builders tied the two together, dumping waste lines of every single house into drainage lines. Where possible, these builders were fined and made to separate the lines. I remember the City going about neighborhoods dumping red dye into toilets to see where it came out. Too often it was the drain lines.
After rains in older parts of the city, the odor was overwhelming. Now there's none. Suburban cities that use our sewage system, we had less control there, and Columbus built a huge drain pipe to keep rainwater out of combined systems so that wastewater didn't overflow into rivers we took our drinking water from. By the way, Columbus provides drinking water to most of the county.
You mentioned cities that are building huge retaining pipes containing a mixture of waste and rainwater as a simplistic method of storing it until it can later be treated. This is simply an admission of failure for not separating drainage and wastewater at the source over decades and letting builders continue to to dump waste into drainage lines.
8
@Edward
@Atikin
You are right and thank goodness for our young people running for office. Trump's highest crime and misdemeanor is that
Trump is leading US to Climate Suicide.
Trump has made US climate criminals.
This is the highest crime and misdemeanor any president could inflict on US and the planet.
1
I grew up in Pasadena, TX just south of the Houston Ship Channel. My dad worked on the shores of the ship channel. I remember how it was before there was an EPA in the 1950s and early 60s. The ship channel often caught on fire and shipping traffic could be halted for hours or days. My dad would vomit at work from the pollution at the paper mill where he worked. His identical twin worked there too for almost 40 years. He died in 2003 of a Glioblastoma brain tumor. This type of tumor is always fatal and incurable. The Houston metro area has a higher rate of death from Glioblastoma brain tumors than any other location in the US. The last thing Houston needs is more pollution in its environment with a population of 2.5 million.
45
Why is sewage treated at all before being dumped? Because by 1860, Scientists realized that human civilization had a problem with its liquid waste. This polluted the public commons, turning it toxic, and eventually come back to civilization in the form of water-borne diseases like cholera. This was back when Scientists weren't routinely accused of being 'communists' when they presented inconvenient results. Starting with London, cities realized that the public commons couldn't protect itself, so people, in general, would have to be taxed to construct a large public facility that treated the raw sewage, rendering it much safer and less of a pollution hazard. And even today, people willingly give up about 1% of GDP to treat their liquid waste. Did you use a toilet today? You didn't use it because you think it's cool, but because the 'big government' mandates them all over the place. And you didn't think "gosh, I really feel my freedom slipping away when I use this thing. Darn those communistic Scientists!".
Global warming is a problem with our gaseous waste, which untreated has become a pollutant. We could, of course, tax ourselves and fix the problem. But the difference between 1860 and today, is in 1860 people didn't fight Science tooth and nail when it highlighted a pollution problem in the public commons that would require... gasp!... a common solution.
42
@Phil Death toll was obviously greater and people valued life more in some respects.
Under Trump the EPA has lost direction. Why not go against all of T's lack of thought and concern for our planet.
He is far from a scientist and has no knowledge of climate change, denier that he is.
Republicans have lost direction with there main goals of governing with principals. The impeachment trail of T is a sham on the party.
14
@Kevin - he is soon to get rid of the EPA!
How the wealthiest people and corporations can pander to politicians who enact such horrible reform reversals is beyond me. Don't any of them have children who will inherit the world we create?
25
@peter bailey Yes they do but their children won't be living in the (poorer) areas that most of the pollution problems occur. These politicians only think of themselves when they do such things. Not exactly what being elected is all about.
20
@d.p. Sadly, I'd have to disagree. I think for many politicians, getting elected is about getting elected, whereupon you do stuff for the people you think are most important, especially if you get voted out of office and need to keep paying that expensive mortgage. I lost a lot of faith in politicians after Citizens United.
19
Sure, but the vast amount of money they will pass down is assumed to be enough to keep their descendants miles away from the icky troubles. Cholera is for poor people.
1
Thank you Trump for your continual attack on our country. We look forward to drinking sewage .
Save every last dime for the rich folks in this country.
We certainly want “we the people “to give up our health for the enrichment of corporations
Such an honor
25
How convenient: in case of administrative, political, and/or engineering incompetence blame it on “climate change”.
2
Shouldn’t the EPA be renamed the EDA-Environmental Destruction Agency?!
24
@Tom Kochheiser No, it's EPA- Environmental Pollution Agency.
Such a vile and destructive regime. I guess they're unloading all of these EPA actions now that the news media (the Times aside) is preoccupied with impeachment.
I really hope the Democrats are keeping track of all of this so it can be reversed when they return to power.
17
@Brian - but in another term it will be much to late!
1
EPA employees are trying to fight back against the cuts that have made it impossible to do their jobs.
The AFGE - their union - has a petition asking for support but apparently the NYT does not allow a link.
One would think that the dispute within this agency would be newsworthy - that EPA employees WANT to do their jobs but are not being allowed to do so.
"In light of the attacks by the Administration, EPA employees around the country are joining together to articulate a bold new vision for an EPA Workers’ Bill of Rights that embraces science, bolsters working conditions, and delivers a fair contract that ensures EPA workers are able to carry out the agency's mission to protect public health and tackle climate change.
We employees at EPA have committed our careers to protecting human health and the environment. Our fight for a fair contract is a fight to continue our mission to protect all Americans and preserve the soul of the EPA.
The health and future of our country and planet depend on it."
21
@cynicalskeptic A “fair” contract wouldn’t have anything to do with money, now would it?
2
@Mickey
Did you read their statement or does any mention of union provoke a knee jerk reaction?
It's more about staff cuts and changes to work rules that make it nearly impossible to do the jobs they were hired for.
Some of the largest and most effective regional offices were gutted when Trump first took office.
Frankly, I'd say most of their staff are underpaid compared to the private sector. Believe it or not some government employees actually try to do a good job. Most EPA employees went to work ther hoping to make things better - and have had to deal with political appointees who want them to do nothing. They're being put to work on small scale problems while major pollution sources are deliberately ignored.
2
After YEARS, and I mean YEARS of work the clean up the Hudson, the East River and the Gowanus canal, we’re going to change the rules. Sad.
30
How can this be happening? I find this infuriating and cannot understand how he gets away with this. The US public does not agree with Trump’s environmental policies. How can he have the power to make these changes.
17
Perhaps if Rick Snyder had gone to jail for involuntary manslaughter, where he belongs, this wouldn't be happening now? Then again, when was the last time a Republican was held responsible for causing the needless death of a bunch of people, let alone anything else? The Iraq War? "Well, sure we got a few things wrong there", - like ~100,000 innocent children being killed for nothing. It's all in a days work for the modern GOP.
21
@Chicago Guy - Modern birth control and population
control by the Modern GOP. Health care? Forget
about it
2
We're going right back to where we were in the 1960s before the EPA. Young people think the air and water were always like they are today. I well remember when the Cuyahoga River caught fire. More precisely, the garbage and oil floating in the river caught fire because Standard Oil and Republic Steel dumped their waste into the river.
Do not be fooled by the Republican lie that state and local governments will take care of this. They didn't before the EPA and they won't when Trump gets through with it. People better pay attention or you won't have to worry about your student loans. You'll die before you have to pay them off.
28
What Trump is doing is tantamount to criminal negligence. It will end up injuring people and the environment. Its that simple.
14
Trump continues to promote pollution instead of environmental protection, just as he did when he rolled back the 2015 Waters of the United States rule that prevented companies from dumping chemicals and refuse near streams, wetlands, and other waterways. It's truly indefensible, and I would like to see him confronted with this abominable behavior during the presidential debates.
13
This is very disheartening. November can’t come fast enough
11
If your sole objective was to cause as much needless harm and suffering as possible to the greatest number of people in the United States you could do a better job than the modern GOP. And that's a fact.
11
To recap. An administration that the majority of the population did not vote for, is now changing regulations that can poison everyone.
23
Am I crazy or doesn’t the “P” in “E.P.A.” stand for “protection”? Under Trump, this agency’s mandate has become precisely the opposite of what it was originally intended. I’m sure glad Trump doesn’t run my local fire department. If he did they would be setting buildings on fire instead of putting fires out.
10
It’s a shame that downstream people will have to deal with this sewage. Perhaps the real fix is that the polluting cities should be required to draw their drinking water from the waterways that they have polluted. A second possible fix is for the residents of downstream cities to go potty in the water supplies of the polluting cities.
3
In some industries regulation blocks progress, innovation and growth. In other industries regulation blocks poisoning our natural resources, immoral business people and making us sick. Not all regulation is good. Not all regulation is bad. DT wont be in office forever so his rollback of EPA regulations are not permanent. I am a capitalist but we need to protect our environment. The question is - who benefits from this and how will they pay Trump? Follow the campaign money/donations or the lobbyists...why would he do this unless he gets some personal benefit? We all know he doesn't care about anything unless it lines his pockets.
13
@Y
Thanks to Citizens United, good luck following the money.
12
The degradation of life in these United States continues apace, albeit under the radar, by trump and the republicans.
And solely to line the pockets of a precious few.
29
Could anyone please recommend a book on your system of government that explains what powers reside in each level of government ?
From Australia, without an elected president, I am flabbergasted that just one individual has the power to make or overturn such important regulations. (even if that person is elected)
30
@Guy From the United States, with a president who is supposedly answerable to two other government branches and 330 million American people, I am flabbergasted also.
11
Easier? I thought that the pipes were already running to the rivers.
4
We are at a crux: do we make the necessary investment to protect our environmental resources including repairing/replacing our antiquated infrastructure, or; do we stay with the status quo, deregulating current environmental protections and allowing continued environmental impacts that create irreversible resource degradation. It is up to us to voice our opinion for the desired outcome of leaving our environment in an improved status over our lifetimes and protecting and preserving a healthy environment for future generations. We are not going to get to a better place without stopping industrial greed, approving corporate tax cuts, reorganizing bureaucratic agencies, stopping industrial lobbyists, and telling the decision-makers to stop making political decisions founded in personal and party ambitions. This is yet another a reckless decision by the Trump Administration. Write your legislator and vote for the environment.
21
Anybody not familiar what DuPont did several years ago should go and brush up on it, because this exactly the kind of pollution we are welcoming into our worlds. It's absolutely abhorrent that politicians would side with big companies just to create less red tape. People complain about big government and regulations, but who do you think cleans your city water? I just don't understand people. Vote for what someone stands for and what they can do for you! Not for their political alignment!
15
Cost of pollution will be much higher than mitigating it now. Think superfund sites and water for drinking, manufacturing, and recreation polluted.
Do red state voters really want this or are they just voted for their "family values" ...
20
@ Innovator
In Texas, Big Oil owns the state government. Excellent air, water and pollution laws are on the books. But Big Oil lobbyists make sure the number of state regulators needed to oversee and enforce these laws are woefully inadequate. The local news media owned by big corporate media also make sure their coverage avoids any direct connection between those two facts. The general public has no idea how poorly the state manages this important state oversight. And, the Texas Governor is “owned” by Big Oil and can be expected to always protect and defend Big Oil. That’s why they get away with it.
14
Am I mistaken, or are many of these cities who are renegotiating their agreements with this new “flexibility” Democratically run enclaves? Nobody is forcing anyone not to meet their Obama era agreements, however costly or unrealistic they may be. Democratic voters in these locales should force their elected officials to comply with original guidelines, or vote them out for people who will... This is a two sided story that requires both the EPA and local officials to creAte more pollution, and local officials can likewise decide not to.
7
The problem is not that voters in these areas are unsupportive of less pollution. Rather they are strapped by having to pay the increased costs for water and wastewater services proved by the cities who sign a consent decree with the EPA/DOJ. As you can imagine, the near doubling of a utility bill hits very many people quite hard. The cities are heavily monetarily penalized by the feds for each day they are not in compliance, so to meet those obligations enormous amounts must be spent within a short time and the burden of that cost is on those who are served by a city’s utility system.
It should be noted here the evil doers that want these modifications are not Daddy big bucks but your local authorities that have to pay for these projects with your tax money. There is nothing to prevent these cities from acting on the full plan other than a reluctance to raise user rates.
Imagine that.
5
@Dennis it’s not so easy for poor communities to raise water and sewer rates. If you had to choose between food, heat, or reducing CSO’s what would you choose?
1
I thought "pro-life" Trump wanted to protect future generations. I guess not.
27
@Linda
The occupant is only interested in promoting himself and his financial interests. He knows how to manipulate his loyal followers with hot button social issues so as to give him camouflage for doing his dirty work to advance himself.
It works.
4
@Linda Only before they're born. After that, they're on their own.
@Linda
The new borns babies will take one breath and be very sick from it . Blame Trump and the GOP.
People forget that “centrists” (actually “rightists”) are what gave us Trump in the first place. The neoliberals stopped supporting working class issues and so the working class drifted away. I’m one of them. Trump lied. He’s the worse. But “I’m not Trump” is setting the bar awfully low.
Americans need Medicare for All and free community college or vocational education. These investments will bring far greater dividends to our nation than continuing to throw trillions at our bloated military industrial complex. And endless wars for oil.
But the Dems listen to the lobbyists. Big Insurance. Big Pharma. Big Banks. They are not listening to the American people—or they would understand why Sanders and Warren are so popular.
9
Welcome back to the 50s; gotta love progress under these leaders.
13
Fellow Americans-Wake up. To allow this and all other reversal of previous EPA laws to protect our children and our planet needs to stop.
I don't get the apathetic response to what has been happening since Trump got in.
24
I thought the EPA stopped this in the '70s after our streams got polluted? What's next, asbestos is coming back and mercury?
28
I work at the sewer district in Cleveland, where we are working under a consent decree to spend $3 billion over 25 years to deal with combined sewer overflow into Lake Erie. One issue everyone needs to consider is the impact of climate change on the frequency and severity of storms. We are already experiencing 100 and 200 year storms on a regular basis. These will only become more common, straining the stormwater management system and posing an even greater threat to the environment.
31
@Burning River
That is helpful information in consideration of the problems. That is also a context in which extra time is indicated.
Giving farmers permission to again dump fertilizers and pesticides is obscene.
Fitting that the person who pollutes everything he touches would unleash more pollution. He also seems to relish offending as many people as possible.
15
Raise taxes and spend the needed money to fix the problem. It is a local problem and not a national problem.
3
@DEBORAH
Thank trump he cares for business over the American people. We voted politicians into office it is about time we hold them accountable.
Enough going backwards
2
Why is this good for ANYONE? I truly don’t get it.
35
We are fast becoming a third world country.
61
Put yourself in the position of the rich and the poor living at sea level in the eastern US. Your only affordable protection from waves and storm are wetlands and reef. Both of those are degraded by our polluted water.
Next time you find yourself in the Hamptons or Norfolk, VA, take a look at the water’s edge and imagine a class 3 hurricane. What would you want out in the water protecting you—a quarter mile of oyster reef and grasses or mud?
Clean water upstream protects downstream communities by enabling a healthy ecosystem to be the protective barrier. In the Chesapeake Bay, if the water were just a little cleaner, the 450,000 acres of pre Colombian oyster reefs could return. Their shells, being made of cement (calcium carbonate), naturally protect whatever they attach to. So along a shoreline, they prevent property from eroding.
Without oysters to protect them, wealthy land owners dump construction-waste concrete rocks along their shoreline. Along the 3,000 miles of mostly rural and sea-level shorelines in the Chesapeake, construction waste is cost prohibitive.
So, either the water quality improves fast enough to rapidly restore the whole Chesapeake ecosystem or they must migrate to higher land.
The payoff to clean water is breathtaking-at 2$ an oyster, the 450,000 acres of oyster reef in the pre-Colombian Chesapeake is worth trillions. That’s why it was over harvested in the first place. There’s more value in oysters in the Chesapeake than oil in Saudi Arabia!
46
Great! Spend local tax dollars to take care of your local problems. Then locals can profit from the solution.
@Walter Holemans
Plus, you can't eat oil.
one more example of IT and his business partners in crime, against the will of the people
12
Why are Americans willingly destroying themselves? So previous generations build the infrastructure and our greed, poor management and short sighted thinking can’t even properly maintain it.
We are not a very intelligent country. The fact that we are in the top tier of the planet with this flawed thinking is an indictment on mankind as a species.
30
Shameful deed, as a complicit E.P.A., faithfully directed by weasel Trump, denying the science of Climate Change, seems happy to pollute our rivers as if there was no tomorrow. This may be as important, or more, than the reasons for Trump's impeachment (abuse of power and obstructuion of congress), as it tries to ignore our steady, and unforgivable, destruction of the environment we depend on, and are part of. No humility, if not repentance, for this unconscionable 'evil'?
20
If only there was a river flowing by his properties that industry could use.
18
Relaxing this EPA rule isn't an issue of "flexibility" but rather reckless behavior. Everyone knows what raw sewage contains. Why in the heck would anyone want THAT in their rivers, on their beaches or backing up in their basements?
Instead of spending money on that silly proposed wall notion of Trump's, the federal government should help finance various cities' upgrade and/or replacement of their aging sewer systems in ways like low interest loans with a 30 year re-payment plan.
If there is one thing that has been a constant for the past few decades, it's the extreme intense storm systems in this country and the world that is not relenting.
22
Under Trump, taking away the environmental protections we have come to expect over the last half-century has been paired with the firing and ignoring of scientists reporting to our federal agencies. There is no longer any reason to believe the EPA when it proclaims the lack of toxicity in a substance, or an Interior or Agriculture Department pronouncement that a land- or water-management action will have no impact. In short, we are no longer free to assume that our water is safe to drink, our air is safe to breathe, or our food is safe to consume. And, it is all destined to get worse over the lifetimes of coming generations.
15
Pretty soon we may begin to see cases of cholera in the US if the carney king and his minions continue to disembowel (no pun intended) civilized environmental practices to protect the public health and the environment. The carney king's actions are despicable and continue to erode the years of good science and common sense that everyone should be able to see and be repulsed by,
25
@Unbelievable!
Then let us get active. There are many more of us than Trump's inept Cabal and Weak Leadership.
Write Letters to your Newspaper, Wake up your fellow American's. Form a Local group of concerned citizens.
"We can apsolutely change the future!
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world;
Indeed, It's the only thing that ever has". -Margaret Mead
Please.... let's just take the word "Protection" out of the name. Trump is letting business be business so that the rich will get richer while our country falls from being first world.
24
@Diane L.
So we all are at risk, our children don’t deserve a life per Trump and major corporations. Still going to vote for the monster again if you have half a brain you will vote these GOP haters of human beings out of office to stop the madness .
Welcome to the Orwellian United States of America where the Environmental Protection Agency does anything but.
29
The Trump administration's enlightened social policy initiatives include completely banning abortions but allowing municipalities to pollute public water systems with human sewage and other harmful and toxic substances from which innocent children born into poverty are least likely to be protected. Such initiatives bear all the markings of a Steven Miller-inspired policy to reduce the surplus population of color. Meanwhile, the wealthy in their gated communities live lives increasingly oblivious to America's gradual descent into second-world status as they build portfolios on the rewards that flow from restricting wage growth and retracting benefits from the working classes while engaging in complex schemes to evade their fair share of taxes. Yet Trump cleverly deceives working class voters into thinking that he is their advocate and protector. Astonishing!
56
fantastic summation of a desperate situation.
9
@Schopenhauer Excellent analysis. Thank you.
6
In a not-so-distant future, on a not-so-distant planet, aren't we talking about ecological/economic dead zones? Who would want to build or live in an area where the water is known to be polluted? Or an area where the soil is full of toxins. This move to easing pollution rules will make Chernovl (spelling, sorry about that) look like a small amusement park, as its impact is on whole water ways and large urban populations.
My mother used to tell me how the Chicago River smelled and bubbled (ca. 1920).
13
@Nancy L. Fagin I am old enough to remember when the Cuyahoga River burned in 1969. Also, I remember visiting my grandmother, who lived in an apartment overlooking Lake Erie, and taking walks along the shoreline in the morning amid the stench of rotting fish that washed up overnight, killed by the polluted waters. I really thought we had learned something from that episode in American history. Sadly, it seems I was dead wrong.
8
Meanwhile, another article in today’s NYT reports on Democrats who won’t vote or will vote for Trump if their chosen primary candidate isn’t the nominee.
Please - you don’t have that luxury. The Trump administration is evil (no, that’s not too strong a word), and its negative impact is felt globally - especially in the environmental field. The world will struggle to meet any meaningful carbon reduction targets anyway, but if Trump is re-elected, and America doesn’t step up and lead on the issue, that’s a certainty.
So, as a concerned foreigner who lived in the US for six years and have a great love of the country, please, please make removing Trump - regardless of who the Democrat nominee is - your only priority in November.
49
Change the name to EDA -- Environmental DESTRUCTION Agency.
28
This could become a public health disaster. Raw sewage can contain viral and bacterial agents that can be harmful.
12
We have been lead to believe the USA is the richest, most affluent well educated society in the world. Where does the money go, what is it spent on why are you regressing in just about every way possible? The current situation in your country is deplorable. People who have the least are those that blindly support those that have the most and take the most. There is no benefit for anybody else at the end of all of this except for the few.
Taxes are a good thing, they make it possible to improve standards for everyone. Why is it always about cutting taxes in your country? Perhaps the rich should pay their fair share and stop pretending that they are benefitting society by providing "company store" remuneration.
The game of politics swallowed your country decades ago. It has nothing to do with governing it has everything to do with winning and power. Trump and his cult are nothing more than a natural extension of that perversion. The two traditional parties are so far removed and out of touch from American reality that it would be hilarious if it wasn't so crippling. How can we expect someone like Mitch McConnell to represent his constituents in this day and age.
It is more than time for you to embrace new leaders new philosophies and new ways of doing things. Turn out the old guard and go forward to a bright new future with innovative thinking and emphasize what's best for all not just the few. Your future depends on it and so does the rest of the world.
16
I don’t disagree with your description, but I take great exception to the claim that “both parties are the same” and that both are equally responsible for our problems and our successes.
Trump is the “id” of conservative/Christian policy, the personification of privilege and a pious patriarchy. Those of us who remember Vietnam, and Nixon, and Reagan, and both Bushes, have seen this movie many many times.
But never have we seen this tribal disconnect, (fed by Twitter, Fox and FACEBOOK) from facts .
It’s astounding. And continues undissipated each and every day.
15
Dirtier rivers, air and drinking water seem to be appreciated by Trump’s people. That’s an easy target for Trump. It takes a lot more thought and effort to clean it all.
11
Trump won't be happy until the Cuyahoga burns again. His environmental policies will set us back decades.
15
It's telling about the current affairs of the country to read this article while at the same time keeping constant updates on the number of fatalities in China from the coronavirus outbreak. I wonder if Americans will later ask the government to act to stop other outbreaks and diseases.
7
Gosh, this is so interesting for us in the UK. Here we are, seemingly poised to be trashed by Donald Trump’s superior trade negotiating skills, only to learn that we are dealing with an underdeveloped country that can’t afford to treat its sewage. Maybe we could share our expertise? I’m not saying we are perfect but I do believe we are doing our best to protect our fragile environment. Isn’t that what all progressive economies aim for?
36
The issue is at the municipal and county level, not Federal. Lots of our cities do not have the problems of antiquated sewer systems.
That said, Republican opposition to taxes, capital investment and federal infrastructure projects definitely has an adverse effect.
4
Instead of bailing out the financial industry on a regular basis, the US SHOULD be rebuilding infrastructure.
If the TRILLIONS that went to Goldman Sachs et al in 2009 went to rebuild bridges, roads, mass transit, sewers and water lines, we'd all be far better off.
Many older communities have common waste/storm sewer systems. Many of those systems have seen the sewage load increase dramatically as housing density has increased. You have also seen small local sewage treatment plants replaced with larger regional sewage systems. They function fine under normal loads but see huge increases in volumes when shared storm sewers are overloaded by heavy storms.
The problem is money and money is a problem because corporations and the wealthy are not paying their fair share. Local communities are getting hit with more and more financial burdens which their residents can't afford. Work that had been largely funded by state and federal money isn't getting done because the money isn't there.
24
As long as this happens in trumpy-friendly regions, it may not be viewed as a bad thing. After all, trumpy voters implicitly wanted this for themselves.
12
@Cynical
Mark Fiore has Three Eyed Billy as a foil for environmental action in his political cartoons (I like Dogboy the best) so now we know where Three Eyed Billy got his 3rd eye.
I wonder whatever happened to the drinking water in Memphis, where I was born. It was once really good as it came from deep limestone aquifers. On the other hand the Wolf River on the north side of town was known for pollution and the fish was shunned by most all the way back in the 1960s. Probably earlier.
The problem is that letting the rubes drink tainted water is they get health problems that aren't caused by large doses of alcohol, tobacco, soda pop and fried foods.
Then they go to the emergency room when their livers, bladders, goiters, arthritis, and GI tracts get painful, if they have a hospital.
There's a new article on the effect of soybean oil (fried fast foods) causing "obesity and diabetes, but could also affect neurological conditions like autism, Alzheimer's disease, anxiety, and depression." published this week.
Anxiety, depression, and Alzheimers sounds a lot like my relatives in Tennessee and I thought it was just all those temp jobs they were working.
Stay away from that chicken fried steak and gravy! OK!
1
Not only is this administration corrupt, but it's now impacting the nutrition of school children (food stamps and rescinding Ms. Obama's guidelines), as well as general public health by allowing the release of contaminated water into rivers? What has this government come to? With regards to school lunches, for example, I've witnessed as a public school teacher how fries and fried cinnamon sticks have overtaken veggies/fruits for breakfast and lunches. For some kids on the meals program, that's their only plentiful, nutritional meal of the day. Granted I know not all kids like plant based meals, but it's not like it was the whole meal! Reading an article like this just dashes any sense of optimism for the future I have.
20
@JM
The only food stamp reductions out there are for able bodied childless adults. How many school children are able bodied childless adults?
Did you notice that every one of the cities mentioned has been governed by Democrats for decades? Even those in red states.
1
@ebmem I'm not politically inclined in my expression of pessimism here. I'm just expressing what I see on a daily basis. I teach in an urban school where poverty is rife and the quality of federally sponsored meal programs has been reduced over the past years. That's what I mean when referring to food stamps for school lunches (SNAP is something else) It's getting worse under this administration. I can't help who governs the municipality, state, or federal government, but I can try to help the children I teach.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/education/2019/10/27/school-lunch-free-trump-food-stamp/2457920001/
4
Hold on, it’s not just the school lunches or antiquated sewer systems. Trump is rolling back regulations to allow industrial waste to pour into our rivers and streams. Further, he’s relaxing regs on meat production! Novelist Sinclair Lewis laid open unsanitary meat processing conditions in the early 1900s. His expose brought protective change. If he were alive today Lewis would be astounded by this backward step. All of these developments show total disregard for the the well being of the American public. The $11 billion wall being built along our southern border has more priority.
5
In response to a lawsuit and public pressure, startimg in 1991 Portland, OR spent 20 years and $1.4 billion to address combined sewage overflows. Overflows occurred 150+ days a year then occur only a few days each year now.
Construction costs continue to rise. Because Portland initiated this almost 30 years ago Portlanders pay much less for sewage treatment than if the city waited or dragged its heels. The longer other cities delay upgrading their sewage systems, the more it’s going to cost rate payers. To elected officials of cities with sewage overflows I say: Don’t try to save a dime now to spend a quarter later. You’ll regret it if you do.
33
People keep repeating that worn-out phrase about what we owe future generations, how about the here and now, people living in the here and now are entitled to clean air and water too.
Why isn’t more money being allocated for designing and installing better sewage treatment plants, or is that another option “the American taxpayer can’t afford”?
For many years I have boiled my tap water and store a regular supply in Nalgene bottles in the refrigerator. Infrastructure for delivering drinkable water seriously also needs a serious overhaul.
27
The issue is that the volume of stormwater that goes into a sewage treatment plant is too great in a short period of time so both sewage and storm water are released. These projects simply hold the water so they can treat it later before discharging it. May cities try to infiltrate the storm water as it replenishes groundwater and does not need to go to the ocean.
If the storm water and sewage systems are separate (MS4) it can be easier to avoid more serious releases of sewage, but those have their own rules. https://www.epa.gov/npdes/stormwater-discharges-municipal-sources
8
Why do you do that? SF has very good water.
Cities would actually save money in the long run by separating their storm water systems from their sewage, since by doing so would eliminate the need to treat rainwater that has been contaminated by sewage. That would require an adequate investment in our infrastructure and Americans can no longer muster the will to do this most basic and essential task.
28
@Kevin McKague
Seattle is treating runoff in some places and it really can't be avoided if you want your local body of water to survive.
The first big rain is so toxic that it kills salmon smolts and research has shown that the young salmon survive the pollution unless coliform bacteria are present along with the runoff.
The local orca population, one carried her dead calf around for 16 days while grieving, isn't likely to survive the growth in the population of people here but the Gov is going to try and the local tribes are using casino money to push for it.
If we don't try then we're doomed as well. Not just the orcas who live on salmon.
4
@Kevin McKague
The investment needed to upgrade all of Detroit's water handling system to separate storm water from sewage over the next decade (rather than the 2-3 decades currently planned) would require approximately doubling the already high water rates charged by the GLWA. Spread that requirement to completely split storm and sewer water handling to all the suburbs and exurbs served by GLWA and you might have to triple water rates to pay for the project, even in the current low-interest rate economy.
Many Detroit residents already complain that they can't afford their water bills. Activist rally every spring and summer to claim that access to clean, fresh water is a human right. Many Detroit businesses cannot afford the current, lower charge for sewer service that was imposed back in 2015, which is based on the percent of their lots that do not absorb rainwater, i.e. impermeable surfaces. That charge directly funds GLWA's upgrade their water treatment plant to better handle storm surges.
Water quality in the Great Lakes deserves protection. But the cost of the massive infrastructure upgrades needed to meet the best-available technology requirement of the EPA (which is also a moving target) will fall most heavily on the people and firms who remain in hollowed out Rust Belt cities.
And once that issue is fixed, what are we going to do about PFASs in the Great Lakes and the ground water?
1
Bring it on - clean, fresh water is over-rated anyway. Thank you Mr. Trump for making America great again - well, at least, smellier . . .
25
A "flexible approach" is not a good thing when it will result in making people sick. That would be a stupid approach.
This is why we need taxes, people. To fix things; to train people; to educated children; to have safe planes and food; to have healthcare.
64
@Nancy G
Explain why Taxachusetts doesn't have decent infrastructure despite high taxes. And why it demanded the federal government pay for the Big Dig.
1
If this headline isn't a perfect parable for the Trump / GOP years I don't know what is.
81
The political appointees allowing this to happen at the EPA and the city leadership participating are committing crimes against their fellow Americans.
Disgusting.
109
Back to the Middle Ages. Next will be throwing the content of bedpans into the streets.
70
Hey America does not need clean air or water. Just ask Trump.
39
We need to thank the current occupant of the WH and the spineless Republican base and their political puppets.
41
This is a “boarder”wall of different proportions!
Slap 25 cents per gallon of gasoline as a tax to pay for clean water. problem solved!
3
After a long fight, Chicago was forced to upgrade its sewer plant to stop discharges into the river.
Now it is a leading attraction for the city:
https://www.choosechicago.com/articles/parks-outdoors/7-things-you-didnt-know-about-the-chicago-riverwalk/
Dirty, polluted cities are not attractive or good economics. Trump is merely delaying true prosperity and condemning many to lead a second-world lifestyle.
30
He is no longer a New Yorker, so urban problems at the street or sewer level are not concerns. May his private pools be the new home of the Red Tide.
1
Trump's family obviously doesn't live down river from one of these polluting cities. He has no thought for other people or future generations. He doesn't believe in science so air pollution can't hurt him either. (sarcasm intended) What other nonsense will pop into his vacant brain?
43
@S.L. Well, not so fast, having now moved to Florida, things flow from the north to the south. I would say he will be mired in it eventually and rightfully so. Is some reason to be living near the Canadian border......
1
Great compliment to the way the rest of the country smells...
4
Yes I pay more for Cleveland water due to EPA compliance; however, clean water is paramount; after all, we are approximately 60% water. One of the major reasons life expectancy increased was due to better sanitation and the reduction of infectious diseases. This administration is so short-sighted it is difficult to keep up with their stupidity.
62
Filling the swamp, quite literally.
28
Trump speaks at the Right to Life Anti-Abortion rally. We must protect all those unborn babies, right? With what? Filthy chemical ridden waterways, polluted air, plant life and our food
supply sprayed with chemicals? Who does Trump think he’s fooling?
101
@Cass 40 percent of the voters.
7
@Cass
He already fooled them when he got elected. And will again in the next election.
We really are a Third World nation in so many respects.
Please let’s vote this - - destroyer out of office.
11
‘Before,’ said the corporate executive, whose company dumps toxic waste into public rivers and waterways, ‘I couldn’t walk into the EPA without being treated as evil’.
This, amazingly, is because what you are doing *is actually* evil.
Not only that, it is stunningly short-sighted and one of the most egregious ‘externalising of costs’ (in this case the cost of other people getting cancer, the death of wildlife, the degradation of your shared environment) that this hyper-idiot-capitalism allows.
71
@Jens Jensen
Actually, what is 'evil' is turning precious potable (i.e. 'drinkable') water into 'blackwater' (i.e. water contaminated by fecal coliform bacteria, among other things) by using potable water to 'flush away' our bodily discharges in the first place. Those same discharges could be used for urea fertilizer (urine, which is generally sterile) and for generating energy (feces, after being fed into a methane digester).
Everyone reading these comments probably uses flush toilets. They are convenient and, for the person using them, mostly sanitary. But the 21st century is going to demand that we do things differently, and conserving potable water is one of those things. It's time to rethink our entire human 'waste' disposal system.
3
Which is why it is wrong to force septic tank dwellers into sewer systems. The sewers always overflow with a little extra rain and they alway break and dump raw sewage.
4
@Rich Murphy Unfortunately, a lot of septic systems are not properly maintained. There’s a lot of leakage in older systems. It’s true that septic systems work well if they are well-maintained and on a large enough area of land.
3
Reason you vote so this doesn’t happen.
13
Does the definition of "raw sewage" include those EPA and Executive Branch officials who supported this insanity?? Dump them!
21
I remember standing on the beach in Seabright , NJ, on a hot summer's day when I was a kid. My mother would't let me go in the ocean. It had a brownish tinge, smelled bad, and there was alot of garbage in the water. On the horizon, you could see a barge from New York burning garbage that it would then dump into the New York Bight. The lower third of Manhattan was allowed to release raw sewage into the East River and God knows what was flowing out of the Raritan
and Hudson Rivers from petrochemical companies upstream. Frankly, that part of American wan't so great back then. Why are we allowing politicians return us to that era?
47
Because megacorps are roaring back to life and power, with the help of an outlaw party-cult in our White House, Senate, and courts. One could soon even call this decade the New Roaring Twenties.
We all know what ended the old ones.
9
I remember how bad it got in Sea Bright. There was even hospital waste like needles washing up on beaches. It was disgusting. It took a lot of hard work by citizens and great activists like Clean Water Action to put a stop to this egregious disregard for public health. It’s nothing short of astonishing that some of these battles might need to be fought again. I mean do you trust these bureaucrats when they say more raw sewage being released into public waterways will not cause harm? Remember, we are talking about some cities doing just that more than 100 days just last year. And the rate will keep going up due to climate change. People, we must pay attention. Clean water ought to be a clear line in the sand for everyone. Chipping away at a law (Clean Water Act) enacted in 1972 by a Republican president is not simply foolish. It is dangerous. Contact your representatives and make your voice heard!
5
oh boy...guess the Wabash will stink in Indy like it did when I was kid.
8
This is criminal.
40
If it ain't broke, break it. Once it's broke, blame the Democrats. Fix absolutely nada. Making America Great Again by putting raw sewage in the rivers--
50
I love that we can now swim in sewage. Next let’s start drinking from our toilets, after all Trump thinks of us as dogs anyway.
30
Cities I will NEVER visit, nor do business with:
Cleveland; Seattle; Kansas City, Mo.; South Bend, Ind., Chattanooga, Tenn., Pittsburgh, Louisville and St. Louis,MO.
6
Boy oh boy, what grave mistake this is.
14
Can some Trump supporter explain to the rest of us why you voted for this? Ate we great yet?
12
Send the water to Mnuchin. He deserved a long hard swallow from his interview after deriding Greta and lying that he and Trump support clean water and air.
33
So anti abortion but pro pollution. What a liar.
25
American rivers will become the filth that is the River Yamuna in India, very soon
13
Good thing WDC sits at the end of a river system (correct?). Drink up you corrupt politians.
6
And if our country reelects Donald Trump, his spread of raw sewage will continue to poison everything we hold dear about our country.
18
Make America’s Rivers Dirty Again. #MARDT
9
GOP what’s the matter with you people? Are you insane? Yes! That’s a rhetorical question.
11
Another stinky bolus from Trump. What could go wrong.
5
What can we do in the face of this stupidity? What kind of environment are leaving our children? Trump must go. He is a cancer on this country.
14
Another trump solution
10
Making America great again, one piece of fecal matter at a time.
18
EPA? How about EDA -- Environment Destroying Agency
8
Trump's E.P.A. has declared war on the environment, turning it into the Environmental Pollution Agency.
13
Mr. Trump is making his vision of America Great!
4
Short sighted politicians with only their career security in mind keep winning elections by mining their uninformed constituents who think that the wheels will continue to stay on without appropriate taxation. Guess some citizens think polluted water is a fair trade off for low taxes ... until it’s not. Think Flint Michigan and Love Canal.
12
Oh good. It truly is great again.
2
I suggest we take all of the money being wasted on the border wall and use it instead on these health and safety projects.
13
Since this is what China and India do, I’m OK with it.
8
But Trump is at a "right to life" rally! Right to infuse persons and ecosystems with toxins?? These people do not get it. Slow death is no different.
9
Who in good conscience would ever think this is acceptable? Not trump nor his sycophants but there must be people within the EPA who know better. I can only hope.
5
The Environmental Protection Agency has become nothing but a mockery of the name itself. It’s a joke of a department. An institution taken over by charlatans. The least they could do is rebrand themselves for what they have become.. an outrage towards the environment. Shame.
16
@Patti Soriano
EPA employees do not agree with the policies being imposed on them by Trump
Support them in their efforts to do their jobs:
https://www.protectepa.org/?fbclid=IwAR2VARHVeADigVU0IDFiZa4UOuv8sZ3DV3vjnPpX3D_6sWzO0t5S9HZJ488
1
the poor, poor river creatures, and all surrounding animals that rely on the water in those rivers for survival ....utterly horrifying !!!
9
Does any of this matter in the face of climate change? Does anyone really care? Sad!
2
"The Environmental Protection Agency has made it easier for cities to keep dumping raw sewage into rivers by letting them delay or otherwise change federally imposed fixes to their sewer systems"
It will only be a matter of time before this reckless and dangerous decision will come back to haunt us. The continual dumping of raw sewage into rivers will lead to various diseases not to mention other harmful side effects to plant and animal life.
If industries and taxpayers think meeting federal requirements is too costly now, the cost of potential health issues resulting from raw sewage will probably dwarf those costs.
Instead of spending billions on that silly wall, the federal government should help with the financial costs of upgrading aging sewer systems in the various cities which will continue to dump raw sewage into their rivers.
But once again, instead of fixing a major problem, the federal government is making it easier for cities to not comply with federal requirement by delaying or changing imposed fixes to sewer systems.
12
The sewerage system comprises sewers (which carry sewage) and other assets such as underground pumping stations (from which overflows to the environment occur when pumping ceases but sewage inflow does not (e.g. associated with power outages or station capacity failure).
Not content with destroying the legacy of Obama Trump has now turned his sights on destroying the legacy of Richard Nixon, the EPA. I can’t help but notice that cities in Great Lakes states are included in those that will be given a free pass on polluting. This will not be well received on this side of the border, if that counts for anything anymore. The International Joint Commission had been doing a pretty good job of cleaning up the lakes and surrounding watershed but now Trump wants to make backsliding easier. Tell you what, take the money earmarked for the “Space Force” and use that for infrastructure. You’ll keep your existing friends and maybe get some thanks from the families who can swim and fish in the lakes rather than have to travel far away to find clean water.
21
@D. Knight
In a listing of the Earth’s greatest natural resources by the National Geographic Society, along with the Amazon rainforest and the great expanses of arable land in the American midwest, Ukraine and east Asia, they listed “the Great Lakes of North America.”
The combined five Great Lakes are the largest body of fresh water on Planet Earth.
That politicians might, for political gain, threaten this precious natural resource is untinkable and unconscionable.
13
@Tom W
Vote them out. All of them.
2
If this president had been serious about passing an infrastructure bill, rather than handing huge tax breaks to members of his own class, we might have been able to make grants to cities and states to upgrade and update sewage and water treatment systems. Pouring raw sewage is to no one's advantage and certainly doesn't make us healthier.
I had been despairing that this administration was taking us back the 1950s, but I'll amend this view. It looks like we'll soon be living in cities with infrastructures, sewage and water treatment systems, that resemble what existed in the early 20th century.
Will we be seeing cholera outbreaks next? This is progress?
100
@historyprof you are not going to see cholera outbreaks. Wastewater facilities do a good job of protecting public health. Actually there are a lot less CSO discharges than there were 20 years ago. A much bigger problem is urban runoff. The cost of eliminating that is astronomical. Whose against clean water? No one. The question is can we afford it.
1
The administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency is a cabinet-level position. As such, it is common practice for each newly-elected president to replace the head of the EPA.
It would be in the interest of the American people and the environment to change this. The EPA should be set apart from executive branch partisan politics.
Consistency and longterm constancy should rule environmental policies.
Presidents should be lawfully discouraged from meddling with environmental regulations for political gain.
32
Remember these agreements are being amended by the request of state governments. The cities listed have both Republicans and Democrats in play.
Call your governors and Congressional reps and protest.
41
America's "Environmental Protection Agency" is anything but that, and this latest action proves it.
How can anyone value money over clean water, and good health?
Considering the recent deadly virus outbreak in China, caused by sewage in livestock Water, one does not have to think too hard to connect the dots of how far and how deadly this action could take us.
The Environmental Rules that Obama put in place are 100% valid and necessary for (a) public health, (b) the good health of the Planet that sustains us and gives us Life, and (c) for the good health of future generations.
But, apparently Trump thinks money is more important. Hey, water just comes out of the faucet, right? Wrong.
We don't need Petroleum Lobbyists running the EPA. And we don't need a lousy Casino owner sitting in the Oval office.
62
@W.Wolfe
EPA employees do not agree with the policies being imposed on them by Trump
Support them in their efforts to do their jobs:
https://www.protectepa.org/?fbclid=IwAR2VARHVeADigVU0IDFiZa4UOuv8sZ3DV3vjnPpX3D_6sWzO0t5S9HZJ488
1
Are we TRYING to become a third world country?? Next thing we should fear rollbacks on - screenings at airports , especially when global pandemics are at hand.
23
This could be the beginning of the end for America. Politics is no holds barred now. It’s everyone for themselves.
Republicans are out to destroy the Middle and lower classes.
They want to destroy our elections via the Electoral College, ...
they want to destroy the environment, ...
they want to destroy our fresh water supplies, ...
they want to eliminate Medicare...
they want to eliminate Social Security...
they want to redistribute all wealth to themselves...
they want to destroy Democrats, ...
and lastly they want to destroy America unless it benefits them to the exclusion of everyone and everything else.
If you haven’t been paying attention, this same mindset, these similar goals, are shared with Russia.
We must dismantle the Electoral College before we do any else. Otherwise it’s all for naught.
116
@PC The Republicans didn't invent the Electoral system.
@Me from PA: You miss the point. Regardless of how long it has been around or who devised it, the EC needs to go. It subverts the will of the voters.
7
There is nothing protective about the United States EPA under Donald Trump.
Our poor future generations. Even getting Trump out of office would not help our environment for a long, long time. The man is toxic and so is everything he touches, recommends, puts into law.
29
Mr. Calamita, I disagree vehemently with your assertion. I have never, ever seen EPA treat local governments as evil. Bellicose, certainly, but not evil.
6
As a voter and a taxpayer that cares about leaving a planet that is habitable for her children and her children's children I am continually disgusted by what this administration has done to gut the EPA, its enforcement, and the protection of our environment.
The multiple rollbacks have increased pollution into our waterways, into our wetlands, into our air, and now more potential sewage into our rivers, which will ultimately pollute the lakes, ponds, and other bodies of water they encounter. I remember the 70's when we had massive fish die-offs in Lake Michigan yearly, when the smog was so thick we couldn't see Chicago from a close in suburb. I remember the super-fund cleanups from toxic waste dumps that poisoned the surrounding land for years.
We should not be going backwards, re-entering a time when corporations are able to destroy the world around us, in a time when the world is already suffering from a climate crisis. Shame, shame on our country. Shame on our president and his cronies.
36
In 1971, I lived a block from Lincoln Park in Chicago, which overlooks Lake Michigan. I was appalled to see legions of dead fish belly up, forced by the waves against the concrete curb that formed an artificial shoreline.
"“It’s a very expensive project for very little environmental benefit” sounds about right for everything Trump touches.
10
Sanitary sewers should be completely separate from storm drains. Allowing rainwater to wash raw sewage into rivers is a medieval non-solution.
But then, what does it matter now. Within 200 years our coastal cities will be largely under water and abandoned.
16
In Davos Trump just said he was all about the environment. I misunderstood. He's all about distorting it.
15
@A Whiter Shade Of Pale Remember, EVERYTHING he says is a lie. Everything.
11
Great, just as fish were returning to formerly polluted rivers and streams.
22
Having worked in water treatment plants, nothing is as scary seeing pollution on a grand scale. May I suggest an alternative place to dump sewage: Mar-a-Lago?
75
@ATL thoughts That place is already crammed full of human waste....
20
With the ecological crisis of climate change ion the way in a country becoming majority-minority, Donald Trump along with his angry white base and the big corporations are not going to leave one dollar of profit untouched and not one acre unsullied. Why leave people you hate a viable future?
4
America must be rid of the trump/GOP administration. If they stay in power, there is no hope for the vast majority in our country, not environmentally, economically or politically. Vote blue in November at every level.
16
Seems crazy to think that it's OK to keep relying on a sewer system from 1870 despite population growth and increased loading of sewage into the old pipes. Think I'll pass on seafood next time I visit, and maybe visiting any beaches too. Yuck!
10
Of course there is no money. We basically don't tax the 1% that hold 50% of the money. Too low a tax rate and too many loopholes. Trump paid no taxes for 10 years while flying in his own jet and helicopter. May still pay little to no taxes. We used to tax the 1% at nearly 90%.
This republic is broken and we are left to live no better than people around the Thames in the 1800's. Untreated sewage in a river. Embarrassing. The fact that this country has ridiculous amounts of money and no national health care is embarrassing. We are an embarrassment.
34
Raw sewage is high in what (besides numerous pathogens)? Oh that's right . . . . Phosphorus. What really likes high levels of phosphorus? Can you say cyanobacteria (blue-green algae)? I think you can. For clarification, the cyanobacteria produce cyanotoxin, which are some of the most powerful natural poisons known.
The EPA now apparently thinks cyanobacteria in our lake/river water systems is a good thing. Ask folks in Toledo, Detroit, Grand Rapids, and Ann Arbor if they they want cyanotoxins in their drinking water source.
20
Total regulatory capture.
4
How can you even continue to call this agency "environmental protection"? It's been destroyed with the opposite purpose by this criminal administration.
12
It's hard to plumb the depths of this administration's obscene contempt for working people and the environment.
14
Let’s get all of those st EPA and in the White House who support the policy take a swim in the Potomac River. The poor fishermen in the Chesapeake Bay are about to kill off everything after some progress at recovery.
3
Is there anything, anything at all, that this horror show of an administration does that isn't carefully, correctly wrong?
13
Everyone should read” Our Stolen Future” although everyone should know that this rule is dangerously misguided and that this administration is reckless to say the least.
3
"Christopher Flavelle focuses on how people, governments and industries try to cope with the effects of global warming"
Not exactly an unbiased "journalist".
He loses credibility in paragraph 2 when he states: "a problem (aging sewer systems) that climate change worsens as rainstorms intensify"
Is there any evidence of American cities drowning under "intense rainstorms"?
No, there is not any evidence of such an absurd claim.
And to connect the problems of aging sewer systems with "global warming" is equally absurd.
The cites that are "renegotiating" their agreements appear to be run by Democrats: Washington D.C. Cleveland, Seattle, Kansas City, South Bend, Chattanooga, Pittsburgh, Louisville and St. Louis.
The headline is framed as a "Trump's EPA Is Allowing More Raw Sewage To Flow".
The truth is buried in paragraph 8: "While officials in many of these cities praise the Trump administration’s flexibility"
@John "Is there any evidence of American cities drowning under "intense rainstorms"?"
Ever heard of Houston? Or New Orleans? No?
That's what I thought.
9
@Slann , Don't forget Nashville. Or cities and towns all along the Mississippi River.
5
@John
You must not have seen the past 10 years of news about the CT coast flooding on sunny days (when storms were out at sea).
Why not rename it the Environment Pollution Agency?
19
@Daniel Messing.
Brilliant!
2
I heard someone in government boast of " America's environmental leadership" that the current administration was "being good stewards of our public lands", that we have the "cleanest air" and " crystal clean water".
Australia is literally burning and here California will be again next year; we know many Americans do not have access to clean water and yet this administration is rolling back key EPA measures?
Why are these lies not challenged?
4
I don't get it. Don't we all share this planet? Then why are some eagerly leading the way to its (and our) demise?
5
Environmental regulations that would prevent localities from dumping raw sewage into waterways is “too costly for tax payers”?
Not this tax payer. I suspect most individual tax payers would agree.
Then again, those aren’t the ones this rollback is intended to mollify.
32
Donald Trump’s plan for winning reelection rests heavily on the health of the economy, particularly the stock market index.
To keep that index rising, Mr. Trump;
— endorses the revoking of environmental protections.
— endorses the revoking of laws protecting consumers.
— favors giving the department of defense more funding than it requests, as defense spending raises corporate profits!
— orchestrated a trillion dollar tax cut, primarily benefitting the rich, who will likely reinvest their wind-falls.
Recklessly damaging the environment. Allowing predatory business practices. Building more and more unneeded weaponry, feeding the military industrial complex.
Deficit spending. Increasing the national debt...
But look at the stock market index!
All of this, done by Trump to shore up his chance to be reelected. Because, for Mr. Trump, that is all that matters.
The environment, the consumer, the national debt, the bloated military count for nothing.
41
@Tom W
The people have no voice. Their so-called "representatives" no longer act on their behalf, to insure the "general welfare" of citizens (as dictated in the Constitution)...they only work for rich donors & corporations, for their own selfish lives.
The only way to "revoke" theses policies is for a MASS EXIT from the stock market. Perhaps that could send a message?
4
I grew up on Lake Michigan in the 1960s back when every town and city near the lake dumped its sewage into rivers emptying into the lake or directly into the lake itself. To put it mildly, this badly impacted the quality of life for residents of the region.
Where fishing had once been an important source of income and recreation, it was pretty much dead. Where beaches had once defined life in the region, they were now piled with dead fish and lapped by brown waves. Where tourism and summer houses had once mattered to the economy and the vibrancy of the summer months, few wanted to visit any more.
And then the Clean Waters Act was passed. Within 10 years things changed radically for the better. That area is still the most prosperous in the state, and considered a beautiful, interesting place to live and raise a family.
It maddens me that anyone could possibly want to return to those stinking brown waves.
264
It is certainly too bad that the cities and states are so corrupt that they couldn’t do the right thing until the federal government jumped in. Who voted for those guys? States are starting to fix their own roads, maybe they should do sewers also.
10
@Lee
People here in the Seattle area I speak with, mostly other divers, say the same thing about Lake Washington.
UW has conducted studies showing the changes caused by phosphorus in the food web plus the recovery when phosphorus was eliminated.
The studies can be applied to just about every other waterway so send a copy to your representatives and let them know how you'll vote if they go back to the old ways.
There are institutes of Limnology in Michigan and Minnesota that are world class. Ask a limnologist or limnological ecologist to come and speak.
13
Honestly, from what this article describes, it doesn't seem all that bad (esp. compared to the rollback yesterday of CWA rules for wetlands and tertiary streams). The examples they have given mostly address municipalities requiring more time and flexibility in meeting the standards. In order to be effective the EPA needs to be seen as working with cities to solve problems. Wouldn't it be great if Congress actually passed an infrastructure Bill to assist in the construction of these projects?
4
@Erin Oh but they have! And it sits on Mitch McConnell's desk - among the hundreds of bills he refuses to bring to the floor for debate or vote.
And you should revisit this regulatory rollback - it is very bad indeed.
4
@Erin
Have you forgotten what happened in Detroit where the soothing voices of municipal administrators about the safety of public drinking water has resulted in multiple birth defects and cases of arrested cognitive development? What if one of those unfortunate children was yours? Still wouldn't seem all that bad?
3
I grew up in Akron, on the banks of the infamous Cuyahoga River which caught on fire because it was so polluted. After decades of progress and millions of dollars, the River is now sporting fish life and much cleaner. Why American voters would allow Trump and Republicans to now allow more sewage in our waterways is incomprehensible. Flash back moment: We need another Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring, and credited with mobilizing support for environmental regulation in the 1970s under President Nixon.
190
One hears polticians shout about the future and our children and other mumblings of responsibility and governance with regard to our resources such as water and air; further, while Congress may retain advisory or consultancy roles with respect to legislation, keeping the crooks and the polluters out of our futurer water and air is a big problem. I suggest that the Congress appoints an Ombudsman to oversee the enforcement by Government of our obligations to the future. I envision an Ombudsman strictly enforcing all laws in favor of the people and, where a relief is sought by a business, the Ombusdman would interfere between the Governmant Department and the would would be polluter to ensure that the rights of the present and our unborn citizens are FIRST protected.
16
Yes, it's very expensive keep the water and the air clean. But consider the alternative.
225
The mere thought of raw sewage in our waterways is not only disgusting but brings to mind a very third world image. It is n example of the failure of the current administration to address repairs of infrastructure. Instead they come up with a short term fix that loosens regulations. They are allowing other forms of pollution to intensify as well which will impact on our long term health. Air and other water standards have been repealed to the benefit of industry but not public health. There are fewer scientists having input into such standards so it won’t be until a new administration or long term health data shows adverse outcomes that we can expect change. Challenges in the courts are occurring but with a more conservative court the outcome is difficult to predict.
122
@Dawn This administration is not failing, it's doing exactly what big business and the super rich want.
Making it easier to get richer at the expense of the average American.
13
This will help cities save a great deal of money.
This will drive up stocks prices.
This will also increase birth defects, not only in humans, but animal and plant life.
This will further degrade the environment.
Are the trade-offs equal?
170
@john clagett Republican motto: the trade-off is good as long as other people suffer.
3
This is merely one more example of the way Trump creates economic growth which he can brag about that will cost others in the future.
It costs money to run a government and also invest in a better future: environmental initiatives, transportation alternatives, investment into education; these are a few of the ways to invest while creating more employment.
Cutting taxes for the 1% has been tried before in the hope that corporations would invest, creating jobs. In the present version of this 'idea', corporations used that money to buy back stocks, concentrating power.
Eisenhower began the interstate hi way system by raising taxes. It ran for decades, creating growth in many industries.
Somehow in the 80's the idea of investing in the future became unpopular.
'Vision' was limited to the next few quarters. 'If it ain't broke don't fix it' replaced 'Hey, let's try it'.
It's called complacency, a disease which often afflicts successful societies; denial hastens the downward spiral.
50
Once again A PATTERN EMERGES ...on Mr Trump, this Administration and His Supporters choose Greed over Public Health, Clean Environment and Saving the Planet for Future Generations.
Very Sad Day in the History of Our Country.
232
@Martin
Greed Over Public. Yes, that's it.
3
I've always thought that when politicians relax environmental laws for water that they should be forced to drink only the wastewater they have deemed as clean and healthy.
I would start with their youngest grandchild/child having only their "healthy" water to drink, cook with, etc.
Perhaps if their families health were on the line, our politicians wouldn't be so bold with what they say is safe for the public.
317
@galtsgultch
Appealing fantasy, but I don’t believe these people care even about their own families as much as they do the money and power their heinous, insidious acts generate for themselves. Otherwise, why be willing to poison their own kids’ environment? We all share the same rivers.
18
“We will continue to work collaboratively with our local partners to ensure that protecting human health and the environment remains the top priority.”
So, Mr. EPA spokesman, how does one protect human health while allowing raw sewage to flow directly into waterways? Doesn’t sound like human health even matters anymore.
350
@Peter ERIKSON The ONLY thing that matters in this administration is making money which was obvious with the 26 month prison term for Representative Collins for insider trading. Everyone in Trump's administration and many Republicans in Congress are filling their pockets with gold coins. Protecting the American people is the least of their worries. Once again the Republicans are taking Americans back to the 60's.
108
@Peter ERIKSON
Add "across state lines and into ecosystems" since your upstream neighbors may pollute you. This is why federal laws exist in the first place.
38
indeed
5