Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations EPA Power grab, gone!

Thank goodness all landowners who wish to create a pond or lake on their land no longer has to fear the insane power grab the EPA made, called "The Waters Of The United States" regulation, which made all water, on, under, or above the US geographical borders fall under EPA control. The rule was just essentially eliminated by Executive Order. This was one of the most abused regulations in history!

At least for another 4 or 8 years.

Two downsides to executive orders. One is if the person you did not want in office gets in you may not like the executive orders he implements. Two is when a new president comes in the old orders can be reversed if they were ones you liked.

So the next go round may be a reverse of the reverse, if that makes any sense.

But for today, hooray!

Congress could easily fix this. Lets hope they do so ASAP.

The inevitable has been postponed.

Great news! EPA has over stepped it reach too often recently.

If you get a project done while the rules are in abeyance, if they come back your project would be grandfathered in.

Not really, John. Several people were locked off their lands after the EPA was shot down by SCOTUS, and then got worse when the prior admin re-created the same rule SCOTUS called the Reg, the most outrageous power grab ever and gutted the reg.

Pretty appropriate/ironic that the biggest swamp needing drained, is the EPA, who has loons trying to call a puddle in a yard, a swamp.

Good news.

And rows in a field became 'mini mountain ranges'.
Congress will hopefully begin welding some doors shut.

It is sad that an agency tasked with protecting the environment is so disliked by those who share their mission. I share this dislike due to the bureaucratic mess that has shelved my plans to build a pond/wetland complex. In my case, the county surveyor asked the contractor for several "studies/assessments" that blew the budget. I understand that the environment needs to be protected, but when the process makes improving wildlife habitat too expensive, the result can be counter to the intended mission.

I'm in your corner, RAH. We need environmental oversight, just not to the extreme that WOTUS brought us. But in no fashion should this recent overturn be one a case of throwing the baby out with the bathwater.

And I don't believe it will, as I've said all along what one administration puts up, another can tear down. I do think a variant of WOTUS is unavoidable in our future, but I realized early on that this most recent one was providing little cause for the emotional prophecies that were foretold.

In another couple decades, things will be different. The eventual outcome is seen by me as inescapable.

I am hoping that other Gov. bureaucratic offices will be reduced in size and in there goals of re-distribution of wealth. One comes to mind is the IRS, hoping new tax plan might help me keep some of my money to where I can distribute the cash. I might want to distribute it for a new pond, or a new tractor and etc. And Long live the new President In the past and maybe today, I think some of those gov employees are just jealous of land owners and because of that, they cause the unnecessary. Is that a word, unnecessary

Agree with you RAH, and in addition to that the fine structure that is designed to instill fear in small business and individuals. Often the punishment, or at least the threat of it, far exceeds the crime often times. The fines for multinational corporations is probably fine, but tens of thousands of dollars a day for an individual that cleaned out the ditch on the back of his property from the day he did it three years ago?

When you incent any agency, private or government, to maximize income to perpetuate their own jobs and livlihood, you get what you incent for. Usually this is a good thing in private enterprise. We call it capitalism. But when government agencies have incentives to maximize revenue, they loose sight of the purpose they are supposed to serve, which is the public good.

Policing for profit is another example where in some areas police need to confiscate property to fund salries and pensions. They focus on generating income instead of public good.

This is why I believe no government agency should be able to keep any fine money. All fines should go to whatever the main governing agency is (local, state or federal) and the elected public servants determine agency budgets to live within. This would stop the "government within the government" mission creep because the elected officials could always tighten the purse string to rein in an out of control agency, or give them more money if they wanted them to do more. When they are allowed to create their own income stream, they can become semi autonomous. I think that is where the EPA has been for years.

When a government agency has fear as its main enforcement component, rather than public good cooperation attitude, it is no wonder they are not well accepted.

I think confiscated property and fines should go to a fund that is set up to provide monies for;
- public education
- community welfare (animal shelters, soup kitchens, etc.)
- law enforcement continuing education

That would not be bad. Better than the way it is for sure.
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Anything that would not give the agency reason or finances to grow or get beyond control of elected officials that still have to answer to the public.

To know what to expect it is my understanding that deceased SCOTUS Justice Antonin Scalia Plurality Opinion in Rapanos VS United States is what the current administration feels should be the limitation for guidance.

"The plurality opinion stated that the Clean Water Act confers federal jurisdiction over non-navigable waters only if the waters exhibit a relatively permanent flow, such as a river, lake, or stream. In addition, a wetland falls within the Corps' jurisdiction only if there is a continuous surface water connection between it and a relatively permanent waterbody, and it is difficult to determine where the waterbody ends and the wetland begins."

All very high-sounding but the WOTUS Rule was not about the enviornment or water, only power and control. As ewest said, congress needs to act.

The Scalia Opinion mentioned above is about the limits of Federal Jurisdiction of the Clean Water Act.

Tums the opinion was not a constraint on EPA and they went far beyond. The reason was the opinion provided that EPA or Congress had authority to better define the rule. EPA took the nexus test from the opinion and other prior opinions and broadened the rule to claim authority over any water with a nexus to a navigable water. It includes dry land , small ditches with water only once in a while and more. That is why the lower courts invalidated the rule as beyond their power. The new order I believe instructs the Justice Dept not to proceed with any appeal of the lower courts holding and that EPA has to rewrite the rule. In the meantime Congress needs to greatly reduce the definition of WOTUS and provide that any regulation beyond that is a taking that requires compensation to the landowner.

The only part I am somewhat bummed about is the ability for the EPA to go after gross offenders in farming, such as drain tile dumping into a ditch heavily laden with fertilizers and other farming contaminates. This leads to some pretty bad BGA problems in nearby waterways and Red tide in the ocean. Discharge from farms should have some restrictions on what can enter public waterways, and can be reduced by better (more expensive) practices. From what I understand, local authorities turn a blind eye to these problems as it puts their neighbors and friends in a tough position. That is where the Federal government needs the ability go go in and force change without worry about local retaliation which can ultimately result in improvement in natural resources.

Otherwise I agree, huge overreach of power that I am happy to see go away.

There are plenty of avenues open to EPA and State level agencies to prevent real pollution (waste dumping etc).

I wonder if the definition of real pollution isn't what some, including myself, consider a sticking point. Who gets to decide what constitutes pollution?

If my ponds discharge fish, including non native or even indigenous species not found in local waterways, cutrine, fluridone, watermeal, duckweed, etc, into a neighbor's pond or even public water, isn't that a type of pollution?

The sticking point for me is that no proof of environmental damage is needed to impose fines. The fines are imposed for breaking rules that may be constructed so poorly as to prevent environmental benefit. In my case, the pond/wetland complex that I wanted to build would have had 100 acres of watershed from row cropland. Currently this watershed runs into a creek considered impaired by the US EPA.