water pollution

Water Pollution Regulations Ignore Native Community Fish Consumption

Adrea Korthase

Huffington Post article is here. An excerpt:

For many communities, the consequences also go beyond just health concerns.

“Traditional families are still very active in the smokehouse. They are still fishing for their primary source of living,” says Jamie Donatuto, an environmental specialist for the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, in La Conner, Wash. “Fish are not just a source of nutrients, they have cultural and spiritual meaning for these people.”

Donatuto has been working with the Swinomish tribe for more than a decade on the issue. She recently conducted a survey and found that if tribal members had access to as much safe seafood as they wanted, they would consume more than 100 times the state’s estimate.

“In the Pacific Northwest, fish consumption is a way of life. It’s an important cultural hallmark of tribal nations that live here,” adds Elaine Faustman, a professor of environmental and occupational health studies at the University of Washington.

In fact, as she points out, it’s not uncommon to find kids “teething on salmon jerky.”

Oregonian: “Oregon legislative efforts to undermine more protective water quality standards, tribes’ treaty-secured rights”

Matthew L.M. Fletcher

Here is the article (hat tip to Catherine O’Neill).

An excerpt:

Legislative bills seek to minimize the economic hit of the new rule, help ensure that paper mills, factories and sewage treatment plants can get variances and cement the Department of Environmental Quality’s second-fiddle role on ranches and farms.

The Legislature’s moves signal that DEQ’s nation-leading standards, in the works since 2004, could end up not doing much.

The new standards, set for Environmental Quality Commission approval in two weeks, would dramatically tighten pollution limits for a host of pollutants, including metals, flame retardants, PCBs, dioxins and plastic additives.

They come amid mounting evidence of toxic pollution in the state’s rivers and nearly two decades after studies showed tribal members along the Columbia River eat far more fish than the general population.

Bills “at the 11th hour” could undercut the standards, said Carl Merkle, environmental planning manager for the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation.

“We want to see fair implementation (of the new rule) and we know that will occur over a long period of time,” Merkle said. “But we also want to see it effectively implemented, so it’s not just a paper exercise.”

Industry and cities say the uniquely tight standards — in some cases below natural levels in river water — would be impossible to meet without millions of dollars worth of treatment. The rule could discourage new industries from moving in and boost sewer rates, they say.