The Hill.com

RegWatch

By Megan R. Wilson – 05/20/13 06:31 PM ET

Green groups have used “sue and settle” tactics to force more than 100 new rules from President Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency, according to a new Chamber of Commerce study released Monday.

The business group decried the “sue and settle” tactic, which they said occurs when a group files a lawsuit against a federal agency for failing to meet a regulatory deadline or requirement.

Panelists at an event unveiling the report said the lawsuits result in settlements behind close doors — known as consent decrees — that “reprograms the priorities” of federal agencies, according to Bill Kovacs, the senior vice president of environment, technology and regulatory affairs at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

The Chamber is rallying behind legislationfrom Rep. Doug Collins (R-Ga.) to crack down on the lawsuits, which critics say circumvent the rulemaking process.

The study from the Chamber focused primarily on the Environmental Protection Agency, which it said has seen the most economically significant regulations enacted under the sue and settle method.

During the Obama administration, there have been the most successful challenges to the Clean Air Act since the Clinton presidency, according to the report. Sixty “sue and settle” cases have been administered for the Clean Air Act alone since 2009, the study found.

From 2009 to 2012, there were approximately 71 total lawsuits, or intents to sue, resulting in more than 100 new rules, it said. Because agencies are not required to report when they receive a lawsuit threat – or when they reach a settlement – the Chamber study says, “we do not know if the cases… is a truly complete list of recent sue and settle cases.”

Public advocacy groups argue ending the practice would simply “stack the deck in favor of more corporate litigation.”

“By advocating for ‘regulatory reform’ legislation, the Chamber wants to make it easier to legally challenge and overturn regulations they and their big business allies oppose,” said Amit Narang, a regulatory policy advocate at the D.C.-based Public Citizen.

The Chamber’s study identified the Sierra Club as responsible for 34 of the 71 lawsuits against the EPA, with WildEarth Guardians coming in second with 20 suits.

Several of the cases examined in the paper include using sue and settle to designate certain species as threatened on the Endangered Species Act and placing certain species on the list.

In fiscal year 2011, Congress appropriated $20.9 million to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for “endangered species listing and critical habitat designation.” That year, the Chamber cites, the agency spent $15.8 million in response to court orders or settlement agreements.

Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/regwatch/energyenvironment/300851-chamber-greens-using-sue-and-settle-to-coerce-epa#ixzz2TzfQbam4
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A submitted comment that Pie N Politics totally agrees with:

• Snorbert Zangox •

EPA has financed and supported radical environmentalist groups for decades. EPA has periodically met with the groups to collude on strategies for both sides of the suits to find the strategy deemed most likely to generate a court finding that mandates the action that both EPA and the Greenies want.

This was the issue at hand when the Judge ordered Carol Browner to turn over the contents of the hard disc in her computer, which allegedly contained minutes of such a meeting. Unfortunately, it turned out that the EPA computer specialist Ms Browner had asked to delete the computer games that her children had installed on her government-owned computer had made a mistake and erased everything on the disc. At least that was her story and she’s stickin’ to it.

Nobody is coercing EPA to do anything that EPA does not want to do. To believe otherwise is foolish. The Chamber of Commerce is being polite.

The Tribune

San Luis Obispo, CA

                    Published: April 19, 2013

By Matt Weiser — mweiser@sacbee.com

California today was declared to be out of compliance with the federal Safe Drinking Water Act because it is sitting on $455 million that should be spent to improve local drinking water systems.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency submitted the notice after years of fruitless efforts to get the state to document its spending under the program, said Jared Blumenfeld, regional administrator for the agency.

The program is administered on behalf of the EPA by the California Department of Public Health, using funds allocated by Congress. Typically the money is used by cities, counties and other local agencies to improve drinking water treatment systems, usually to remove harmful chemicals or seek a cleaner supply.

“We certainly hear from communities that they need the money and they are not being able to access it,” Blumenfeld said. “The facts speak for themselves. The money is not going out the door as quickly as it should be.”

Blumenfeld said the problem is not unique to California, but the scope of the problem is far larger in California than elsewhere. As an example, he noted the second largest similar problem exists in Texas, which sits on $310 million in funds.

A second problem, Blumenfeld said, is that when California does spend the money, it often chooses projects that are not “shovel ready.” So the money is allocated for a project, but it remains parked for years.

“If you had reprogrammed (the money) more effectively, there could be short-term projects that are ready now that could already be funded, as opposed to funding projects that are not ready to start,” he said.

Ron Chapman, California public health director, replied to the EPA on Friday with a letter to Blumenfeld.

“I want you to know that I acknowledge the seriousness of the notice,” Chapman wrote, “and will take all steps necessary to address the compliance issues identified in the letter.”

The EPA is giving the state 60 days to submit a corrective action plan. If the state does not or the plan is not acceptable, the EPA may suspend payments to the state under the program.

Read more here: http://www.sanluisobispo.com/2013/04/19/2476727/california-not-complying-with.html#storylink=rss#storylink=cpy

EPA release of CAFO info draws fire

PNP comment: Now California Water Quality Control Boards must do the same! — Editor Liz Bowen

Published January 03, 2013

FoxNews.com

Read more:  http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/01/03/virginia-judge-rules-epa-overstepped-authority-trying-to-regulate-water-as/#ixzz2GyswLJiC

 By Judson Berger

A Washington attorney suing the Obama administration for access to alias emails sent by EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson claims that a recent decision by the Justice Department to release thousands of those emails next month contributed to her resigning Thursday.

Jackson, in a brief written statement, said Thursday she is leaving the EPA after four years on the job, for “new challenges, time with my family and new opportunities to make a difference.”

The agency did not offer an explanation. But Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, said the scrutiny over the alias emails is clearly a factor.

“Life’s full of coincidences, but this is too many,” he told FoxNews.com. “She had no choice.”

Horner and CEI earlier this year had sued the EPA for documents pertaining to Jackson’s use of alias email accounts. She was said to operate under the name “Richard Windsor” — the use of those accounts has since drawn the scrutiny of Republican members of Congress, as well as triggered an audit by the EPA inspector general.

According to court documents, the EPA — represented by the Justice Department — two weeks ago agreed to release as many as 12,000 emails pertaining to the CEI request beginning by Jan. 14, at a rate of 3,000 documents per month. The court accepted the schedule last week.

Horner said the increased scrutiny on the alias account, coupled with what those emails might contain regarding the administration’s alleged “war on coal,” likely contributed to Jackson’s announcement Thursday.

“She, by her action, told us that these are records she doesn’t want the people to see,” Horner said.

President Obama, in a written statement, made no reference to the emails.

“Over the last four years, Lisa Jackson has shown an unwavering commitment to the health of our families and our children,” Obama said. “Under her leadership, the EPA has taken sensible and important steps to protect the air we breathe and the water we drink … I wish her all the best wherever her future takes her.”

Asked for a comment Thursday, an EPA representative referred FoxNews.com back to Jackson’s earlier statement.

In November, when reports of the alias accounts were first surfacing, an EPA spokesman said the agency has for roughly a decade assigned internal and public email addresses to administrators — and that they use the internal ones to communicate with staff because of the massive amount of traffic on the public accounts.

The spokesman also said both accounts are reviewed and made available when a Freedom of Information Act request is made.
Republican lawmakers, though, expressed concern about the accounts, and particularly the use of a fake name.

“While we understand the need for a secondary account for management and communications purposes, your choice to use a false identify remains baffling,” Republicans on the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology wrote to Jackson last week.

Earlier in the month, the EPA inspector general’s office confirmed that it was opening an audit into the agency’s “electronic records management practices.” The office said they would look into whether the EPA was, among other things, encouraging the use of “private or alias email accounts to conduct official government business.”

Horner has said the agency’s use of secret email accounts dates back to the Clinton administration and then-Administrator Carol Browner. He called Jackson’s account a “deliberate, several stage deception.”

Jackson’s tenure was marked by a string of high-profile fights between her agency, and the energy industry along with congressional Republicans. Goals for a cap-and-trade climate bill in Congress were scuttled early on in the Obama administration, but her agency went on to set new fuel efficiency standards for U.S. vehicles, as well as new rules for power plants.

She played a role in pushing for a delay in the Canada-to-Texas Keystone XL pipeline. All along, Republicans in Congress repeatedly tried to block EPA regulations on coal and other industries.

Fox News’ Doug McKelway contributed to this report.

Read more:  http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/12/27/attorney-claims-epa-chief-resigned-over-alias-email-accounts/?test=latestnews#ixzz2GJmSo58a

   Published: December 27, 2012

    By KEVIN FREKING — Associated Press

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration’s chief environmental watchdog, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, is stepping down after a nearly four-year tenure marked by high-profile brawls over global warming pollution, the Keystone XL oil pipeline, new controls on coal-fired plants and several other hot-button issues that affect the nation’s economy and people’s health.

Jackson, the agency’s first black administrator, constantly found herself caught between administration pledges to solve controversial environmental problems and steady resistance from Republicans and industrial groups who complained that the agency’s rules destroyed jobs and made it harder for American companies to compete internationally.

The GOP chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Rep. Fred Upton, said last year that Jackson would need her own parking spot at the Capitol because he planned to bring her in so frequently for questioning. Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney called for her firing, a stance that had little downside during the GOP primary.

Jackson, 50, a chemical engineer by training, did not point to any particular reason for her departure. Historically, Cabinet members looking to move on will leave at the beginning of a president’s second term.

Read more here:

http://www.adn.com/2012/12/27/2735464/epa-administrator-lisa-jackson.html

The CEQA Scoping Meetings which were publicly noticed and scheduled to be held on October 30^th (Santa Rosa) and November 5^th  (Fortuna), for the proposed Basin Plan Amendment to the Water Quality Control Plan for the North Coast Region to Update Regional Groundwater and Surface Water Protection Action Plans, are being postponed while staff directs their attention to the completion of Phase 1 of this Basin Plan Amendment.

A revised CEQA Scoping Meeting Notice will be sent out when the meetings are rescheduled.

Regional Water Board staff apologizes for any inconvenience. Please feel free to contact staff with any questions.

Sincerely,

Lauren R Clyde

Sanitary Engineering Associate

North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board

Basin Planning Unit

707-576-2674

Lauren.clyde@waterboards.ca.gov

Hi all,

This program is illegal and unconstitutional and is simply another attempt by yet another agency to gain money and power.

Do people who irrigate their lawns in Los Angeles need permits?

Is there a presumption of guilt which necessitates
the permit to discharge waste from every water user in the water shed?

 Where is the historical evidence to suggest that any one of us is discharging waste at any given moment.  Are we discharging waste all year round, even though we do not receive water for more than a couple of months?

Is rain considered a non-point source pollution now?

Do all of the Tar and Gravel roofs of all of the factories in California have a permit to discharge the rain water which falls upon their properties?

Do all of the people of California have permits for that matter?

The Fourteenth Amendment guarantees us equal protection under the law.  Where in the Constitution does the State have permission to control land which it does not own through a ranch management plan, which by its very existence invites scrutiny and possible modification or disapproval by some appointed body.

 Sounds like Communism to me.

Here is my ranch management plan:  I will do whatever I want on the property, which I own and pay for.
I WILL NOT SUBMIT,  ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!!!

I will not obtain this illegal permit to farm. Nor will I submit any ranch management plan to anyone EVER!!!

Mark Baird

Fort Jones, CA.

October 22, 2012

News in Jefferson Country on KSYC 103.9 FM radio, Yreka, CA.

From Jefferson News Service Editor Liz Bowen

Scott Valley Protect Our Water is once again telling a state agency NO as the Regional Water Quality Control Board is moving forward with an ambiguous discharge Permit that will affect agricultural lands.

Mark Baird, vice president of Scott Valley POW, short for Protect Our Water, asked why the permit only affects farmers and ranchers?

The way the program reads, anyone could have a potential waste discharge — even urban residents with lawns. Under the Fourteenth Amendment, equal protection under the law is guaranteed. All land owners are encouraged to attend the next meeting by employees of the Regional Water Quality Control Board and voice opposition.

The meeting is Wednesday, October 24^th at the new Forest Service office at 1711 Main Street in Yreka. Time is 8:30 a.m.

Jefferson News Service preparedness tip today – pick up an extra bottle of chile powder spice.

 PNP comment: Remember to “Just Say NO.”  — Editor Liz Bowen

Subject: Agricultural Lands Discharge Program Subgroup meetings

Good Afternoon:

This notice is to inform you that the North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board (Regional Water Board) is hosting a round of meetings on the North Coast Agricultural Lands Discharge Program (Program).  A meeting agenda is attached.  Please feel free to contact me with any questions about the meetings.

Ben Zabinsky

Water Resources Control Engineer

North Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board

707-576-6750

bzabinsky@waterboads.ca.gov

Meeting times and location are as follows:

Sonoma, Mendocino, & Marin

Date:        October 15, 2012

Time:        8:30am-12:30pm

Location: Regional Water Board

5550 Skylane Blvd, Ste. A

Santa Rosa, CA 95403

Del Norte, Humboldt, & Trinity

Tulelake & Butte Valley

Scott, Shasta, & Upper Mid-Klamath