Clean Water Currents|Online, Summer 2009, Volume 37, No. 2

Heather Wylie traded her job for a river. And, given the choice, she'd do it again.

During the summer of 2008, Wylie joined a handful of protestors for a canoe and kayak trip down the LA River, earning the wrath of her employers and the attention of a nation. Why? At the time, Wylie was a biologist with the US Army Corps of Engineers. The agency had just declared the LA River as not navigable--a designation that put the watershed at risk and would have set a.dangerous precedent. Wylie and her compatriots were making their voyage to prove the Army Corps wrong. If their fleet could make the journey, they reasoned, then the LA River must be in-fact navigable, a critical first step in retaining Clean Water Act safeguards for the LA River system.

Heather Wylie

Wylie started on her path towards that kayak as a college student, when she worked as a canvasser with Clean Water Action. "That was really fun," she remembers. After college, Wylie followed her passions for clean water, and went to work at the Army Corps as a biologist. Wylie's enthusiasm for environmental protections eventually matured into opposition with the Army Corps' regulatory processes. By the summer of 2008, she was frustrated enough to grab a paddle to prove her point.

The trip was a success, setting off a series of events that ultimately involved the Army Corps of Engineers, the EPA, the U.S. Congress, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility and numerous other organizations and individuals. By the end of the summer, the EPA had wrested jurisdiction of the LA river system from the Army Corps. Then, in December, Wylie lost her job.

Some people say Wylie lost her job over a kayak trip, but that's not really true. She'd probably still be working for the Army Corps if she'd chosen a different river. No, Wylie lost her job over a word: navigable.

Why all the fuss over a single word? Navigable, according to current interpretation, is the only word that matters to many bodies of water in need of environmental protection. If a waterway is deemed navigable, it qualifies for federal oversight and environmental protections under the Clean Water Act. These protections are not guaranteed for non-navigable waters, which is why the Army Corps was so upset when Wylie proved the LA River-officially declared non-navigable-is navigable.

Despite its importance, there are no clear guidelines to define navigable as it applies to the Clean Water Act. Since 1975, the Clean Water Act broadly defined "navigable" to include all waters of the U.S. -- regardless if water had, or could actually be navigated. For decades, it was presumed that every body of water fit this description, and qualified for federal protections. Now, in the wake of a confusing and ill-defined supreme court ruling, the opposite is true. Now, the federal Clean Water Act enforcers must undergo a resource intensive analysis for every stream, creek, wash, wetland, tributary and river before it can retain protections under the Clean Water Act. The farther away a particular creek or wetland is from a waterbody you can float a boat on, the harder it is to retain protections on it. Thus designating waterbodies as being navigable-in-fact is the critical first step in retaining Clean Water Act protections on the creeks and wetlands that drain to them.

The result of this confusion has been a sudden halt to the permitting process, uniting environmentalists and developers with the bond of frustration. Hundreds of pollution enforcement cases and development applications have been dropped entirely, and thousands more have been indefinitely delayed. These days, it's hard to find anyone-environmentalist or developer-who believes the Clean Water Act's regulatory process is working.

This is the tempest of nerves and regulations that Wylie and her companions paddled through. Ultimately, with a kayak and some personal sacrifice, she proved herself right. The EPA is currently reviewing the LA river system, and Wylie is hopeful that it will soon be officially defined as navigable.

But this story extends beyond LA. This is about our rivers and streams and lakes, and how we choose to protect them. The consequences are felt in our homes and communities, from a glass of drinking water to our favorite swimming hole. We need a water protection process that makes sense, regionally and nationally. The Clean Water Act, that had protected all of our nation's waters for a generation , is now broken and over half of our nation's waterways-and thus our health--may no longer be protected under the Act. It's time to pass the Clean Water Restoration Act, which will restore the original intent of the Clean Water Act.

Wylie has no regrets about her lost Army Corps job, and she insists she'll grab that paddle again if needed. But, we cannot protect our water resources by floating a kayaker down every river. We need to revive clean water protections in our nation. "Our nation's waters will continue to be in a state of crisis until the Clean Water Restoration Act is passed," says Wylie. Once again, she's right.

In this issue of Clean Water Currents|Online:

For California Woman, Protecting A River Can Cost You A Job
Heather Wylie traded her job for a river. And, given the choice, she'd do it again.

During the summer of 2008, Wylie joined a handful of protestors for a canoe and kayak trip down the LA River, earning the wrath of her employers and the attention of a nation. Why? At the time, Wylie was a biologist with the US Army Corps of Engineers. The agency had just declared the LA River as not navigable--a designation that put the watershed at risk and would have set a.dangerous precedent. Wylie and her compatriots were making their voyage to prove the Army Corps wrong. If their fleet could make the journey, they reasoned, then the LA River must be in-fact navigable, a critical first step in retaining Clean Water Act safeguards for the LA River system.

Restoring the Clean Water Act Must Top Congress' Agenda
Restoring the ability of the Clean Water Act to protect water resources must top Congress' water agenda. Supreme Court and agency decisions put at risk Clean Water Act protections for headwater, intermittent and ephemeral streams that supply drinking water systems that serve more than 110 million Americans. In total, 59 percent of the nation's waterways and millions of acres of wetlands are currently at risk.

What You Won't See In Those 'Clean Coal' Ads: Dirty Air, A Wall of Sludge, Poisoned Rivers
Surely you've seen the ads. They are scattered around the internet and splashed across our newspapers and magazines. Their commercials interrupt our favorite television shows and invade our local radio station's airspace. Yes, the ads are everywhere. But that doesn't make them true.

No PR campaign, no matter how well executed, can make coal clean. It's simply not possible.

Advocates for "clean" coal argue that technology exists-almost-that will allow coal-fired power plants to capture their carbon emissions and store the climate-changing gas deep under ground. Technically, this is true. Realistically, this would be extremely expensive, and wouldn't even begin to address most of the impacts felt by water. From mines to power plants, the process of wresting energy from coal is dirty and unhealthy for our waters, our communities and ourselves.

How Safe is Your Bath Tub?
Children's bubble baths should be clean, safe and fun. But No More Toxic Tub, a report published in March 2009 by the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics in partnership with Clean Water Action and other organizations, found contaminants and other hazardous ingredients in numerous popular shampoos, soaps and body care products marketed to babies and children.

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