THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, July 5, 1995 TAG: 9506290016
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A10 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Letter
LENGTH: Short : 43 lines
A recent poll indicated that a large majority of Virginians do not want the state's environmental laws weakened. That is encouraging news in light of anti-environmental efforts emanating lately from Richmond. But the hope is that the concern for the global system which keeps us all alive and healthy will be expressed by the electorate in the form of tangible action.
We are fortunate to live by one of the world's great estuaries - one which not that long ago was the world's most productive. The Chesapeake Bay's rapid descent from robust to ailing has been well-documented and is widely known. Unfortunately, it is a story that is sickeningly common throughout this nation.
The most important legal tool to stop the befoulment of our country's waterways has been the Clean Water Act of 1972. The act is scheduled for reauthorization by Congress this year, but changes being contemplated for it should outrage anyone for whom the health of nature, our waters and ourselves is important. The amendments proposed to the Clean Water Act (H.R. 961) would virtually abolish the permit process for discharging pollutants into the nation's waters, would render the stormwater program all but useless by making it largely voluntary, would allow many thousands of acres of our already fast-disappearing wetlands to be destroyed even faster, would allow the discharge of barely treated sewerage from a multitude of sources along with that from tens of thousands of sewerage overflows, and would forbid individual states, that wish to keep the present standards, from setting their standards any stricter than these weaker ones proposed.
There is a simple way to prevent this travesty. It's called citizen action. All it will take is for those Virginians who treasure clean, healthy streams, rivers and bays to tell their senators and representatives that weakening the Clean Water Act is unacceptable.
RICHARD CLARK
Virginia Beach, June 23, 1995 by CNB