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Last week, I traveled from our Montclair office to the Statehouse in Trenton for a Clean Water Lobby Day. On the way there, the scene that played in my mind mirrored one from House of Cards. I thought of Kevin Spacey rolling his eyes before he opened the door to the hallway and the lobbyists dying of anticipation waiting on the other side of the door. The whole scene was set to some kind of instrumental beat in tune with the fast paced heartbeat of the lobbyists, and the conversation between legislators and lobbyists I imagined just short of fifteen seconds. The reality of the day was

Lisa Plevin, Chief of Staff for EPA Region 2, is one of us – a former door to door canvasser and community organizer of Clean Water Action. Lisa is essentially a Jersey Girl, having moved to New Jersey at age six, graduated from Stockton College in 1981 and immediately started her environmental career.

Right now, over 90 percent of New Jersey's waters do not meet one or more water quality standards. These standards are set by New Jersey under the law and the state is obligated to meet them.

So, one would think that our state government would be doing all they can to improve the quality of our water by ensuring the standards are enforced. Nope. They are, in fact, doing the complete opposite.

The Christie Administration's NJ Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) recently adopted changes to roll back water quality protections in its Flood Hazard Area Control Act (FHACA), putting our