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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

REGION 1

In the Matter of:

PUBLIC HEARING:

RE: REGULATORY LISTENING SESSION

EPA New England Headquarters

5 Post Office Square

Boston, Massachusetts

Monday

March 21, 2011

The above entitled matter came on for hearing,

pursuant to Notice at 1:05 p.m.

BEFORE:

MATTHEW HOAGLAND, Moderator

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

New England Region 1

5 Post Office Square, Suite 100

Boston, MA 02109
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PANELS:

Panel 1

SUSAN STUDLEIN, Deputy Director

Office of Environmental Stewardship

JAMES OWENS, Director

Office of Site Remediation

STEPHEN PERKINS, Director

Office of Ecosystem Protection

Panel 2

CARL DIERKER, ESQ.

Regional Counsel

ROB MAXFIELD, Director

Office of Environmental Measurement and Evaluation

New England Regional Laboratory

SHARON WELLS

Office of Civil Rights and Urban Affairs

Panel 3

KEN MORAFF, Deputy Director

Office of Ecosystem Protection

PAM HILL, ESQ.

Deputy Regional Counsel

SAM SILVERMAN, Deputy Director

Office of Ecosystem Protection
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SPEAKER PAGE

Michael Keyworth 12

Jim Mullowney 13

Bruce Maki 16

Jane Madden 19

Valerie Nelson 22/62

Tom Walsh 25

Joe Favaloro 28

Seth Kaplan 31

Cynthia Leibman 35

Tom Gumbart 38

John Woodsmall 40

Rozalyn Frontiera 43

Tom Burke 44

Roger Frymire 46/67

Tom Balf 53

Tom Philbin 58

Todd Dresser 70
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1 P R O C E E D I N G S

2 (1:05 p.m.)

3 MR. HOAGLAND: Welcome to our newly renovated

4 McCormack Building here at Post Office Square. My name is

5 Matthew Holgren and I work in the regional office here at

6 the EPA, also known as EPA Region 1, and I work in the

7 Regional Administrator's office as a regional strategic

8 planner. I'll be moderating today's listening session. 

9 Joining me here are Curt Spaulding, our Regional

10 Administrator for the New England office, Kate Rennihan and

11 Kelsey O'Neil, who I believe you met at the table coming in. 

12 And they will be here throughout today's session. Jeff

13 Mocanu is our transcriber today. And we also will have

14 three office directors in a minute. Currently, Stephen

15 Perkins is here. We're also expecting Jim Owens and Susan

16 Studlein to join us. There they are, right on cue.

17 Our office director panel will changing throughout

18 the day's hearing and I'll be explaining how that will be

19 working in a couple of minutes.

20 This listening session arises out of a recent

21 Executive Order for improving regulations and regulatory

22 review, formally known as Executive Order 13563, issued by

23 President Obama. When we're referring to the Executive

24 Order during this session, we'll mean Executive Order 13563. 

25 I'm going to let Curt say a few words and then I'll provide
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1 more in the way of background, ground rules and expectations

2 for the hearing today. And then, I will start talking and

3 we'll start listening to you. So, Curt.

4 MR. SPAULDING: Thank you, Matt. I want to thank

5 everybody for coming. Obviously, this has been put together

6 on fairly short notice, but the fact that you're here and

7 you made the effort to come in to see us and speak with us,

8 I'm very appreciative of it.

9 Executive Order 13563 calls on every federal

10 agency to consider how best to promote retrospective

11 analysis of rules that may be outmoded and ineffective,

12 insufficient, or exceed or excessively burdensome. 

13 Specially, the EO calls on every agency to deliver a

14 preliminary plan consistent with law and the resources and

15 regulatory priorities under which the agency will

16 periodically review its existing significant regulations to

17 determine whether such regulations should be modified,

18 streamlined, expanded, or repealed to make the Agency's

19 regulatory program more effective, or less burdensome in

20 affecting our mission.

21 EPA shares the President's commitment to using

22 common sense and transparency to review our regulations. 

23 So, a listening session like this is the way we start this

24 process of understanding how our regulations can be

25 improved. Your comments today will help in our plan
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1 development and decision making process regarding rules that

2 should be considered for review. And, I want to say up

3 front that you are all part of a national process. Every

4 EPA region is having a similar listening session.

5 In addition to soliciting nominations for specific

6 regulations that should be reviewed, we are seeking your

7 input into ways we can make our regulatory programs more

8 effective. So, from the standpoint of just understanding

9 what doesn't work, we want to hear what you think might work

10 -- might help us work better. We want you to look at how

11 our rules could be strengthened and complimented, or even

12 modernized. This isn't just about what's not working, but

13 tell us what you think would work better.

14 The Executive Order presents EPA with an

15 opportunity to improve our regulatory program in a manner

16 that ensures continued economic growth, job creation and

17 enhances the Agency's ability to accomplish its mission to

18 protect human health and safeguard the natural environment. 

19 I guess the idea here is where we can find the nexus that

20 will accomplish the greater good of full prosperity and

21 sustainability and economic well being, that's the hot spot

22 we want to hear most about.

23 So, again, I thank you all for coming and making

24 this part of your day. I can assure you and I'm going to be

25 very clear about this, what happens here will be submitted
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1 over to OMB. What happens here and what I mean here, the

2 greater Agency, I think it's compiled and sifted through. 

3 This Agency will send to OMB its serious thinking or serious

4 reflection on the suggestions you give us today. So, I want

5 to make sure that you know that your time is being well

6 spent.

7 I don't want to spend any more time. Our time is

8 tight. And, I have to run off to Rhode Island to Senator

9 Reed and Senate White House are holding a hearing today on

10 what's happened since the flooding that occurred in Rhode

11 Island, in fact, there's common ground for this process. 

12 They want to know how the federal agencies are going to do a

13 better job going forward on responding to issues like the

14 flooding that happened in Rhode Island. So, there's common

15 ground. So, I have to run out to do that or I'd stay today.

16 But, I also want to thank the fact that our office

17 directors are taking up their time to listen today and I

18 also want you to know that our deputy of many, many years

19 here at EPA, the deputy administrator, Ira Leighton. So,

20 again, you're speaking to the best within this region and

21 appreciate the fact that you've come in to spend time with

22 these folks and put forth your view.

23 The last point I want to make is, I've empowered

24 these people to ask clarifying questions. So, if there's a

25 matter that we're not getting completely in what you're
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1 saying, they will -- they will be ask -- they may be asking

2 a question or two. Again, this is not meant to in any way

3 challenge what you're saying, but it's meant to give us

4 clarification, so that the input is taken and taken forward

5 in the best way we can. Again, I thank you for your time

6 and I guess I have to run pretty quickly. So, I will be

7 looking at all of this and getting report from Matt and

8 everyone involved. Thank you very much.

9 MR. HOAGLAND: Than you Curt. Today's event is

10 intended to be an informal, non-adversarial listening

11 session providing interested parties with an opportunity to

12 make comments both orally and in writing pursuant to the

13 Executive Order. There will be no cross-examination of

14 either the panel or you, the commentors, and if we do like

15 Curt just said, direct a question to you, it will be for

16 clarification purposes only.

17 The session is being recorded. The transcription

18 and any written comments that you provide will be sent to

19 our headquarters office in Washington, D.C. All comments

20 will be reviewed and considered as the Agency develops a

21 retrospective plan. That plan will include an initial list

22 of regulations for review and will be available at

23 www.epa.gov/improvingregulations. We strongly encourage you

24 to provide us with written statements in addition to any

25 verbal comments made today. You can provide us -- You can
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1 provide those comments to us here, or you can send them in

2 electronically. And, if you do go to

3 www.epa.gov/improvingregulations you will see that there are

4 several options that you take to make sure that your

5 comments are pointed in the right direction. You can share

6 your ideas by issue or impact. For example, innovation,

7 environmental justice or science. Or, you can share your

8 ideas by program area. For example, air programs, water

9 programs, pesticides. Or, you can share your ideas on

10 general category and you can use that category if you don't

11 know what other category to use. This information's also

12 spelled out in the fact sheet that we have made available at

13 the table today.

14 The public comment period will close on April 4th,

15 2011. And, I know that you didn't come in here today to

16 listen to me, but I just have a couple more things.

17 We will hold today's hearing in three one hour

18 segments. Our office directors who will be seated up front

19 will be changing about every hour. So, we'll take a short

20 break between commentors at approximately 11:00 a.m. and 12

21 noon as they switch, then, we'll promptly resume. Restrooms

22 are located right outside the door on the right and on the

23 left. If that door closes for some reason, just knock and

24 we'll let you in. We have a very good cafeteria located on

25 the third floor. You can take the stairs or the elevator to
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1 get there. And, there are also restrooms located outside

2 the entrance to the cafeteria upstairs on the third floor.

3 If an alarm sounds, please follow the exit signs. 

4 It's very easy to get out from this first floor and we will

5 resume then it's safe to do so and everyone appears to be

6 back in the room.

7 I have index cards for each person who is

8 registered and expressed a desire to speak. I'm going to

9 call on commentors generally in the order in which I

10 received these cards. I may give some preference to those

11 who appear to have traveled the farthest to get here. 

12 Please let Kate, or Kelsey, or me know if you have an

13 extreme time commitment and we'll do what we can to give you

14 a chance to get your comments in and get you on your way.

15 Just a couple more things. To help with today's

16 -- to make today's hearing as fluid as possible, I ask that

17 before you begin your statement, please identify yourself

18 and your affiliation, if any, for the record. Please speak

19 clearly into the microphone, there are two here, for the

20 transcript. And, when you use your name or anyone else's or

21 any abbreviation, please spell them out loud for the

22 transcript. Please focus your comments on the topic of

23 improving regulations as set out in the Executive Order.

24 And, please remember that this is an opportunity for you to

25 state your comments and that EPA will carefully consider
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1 everyone's comments after the close of the comment period. 

2 This is intended to be a listening session, not a two-way

3 conversation and, so, you will not be receiving a response

4 to the comments today.

5 Finally, I ask that you limit your comments to

6 five minutes, so that as many participants as possible are

7 allowed to express their views. To assist you with this, we

8 will provide signals as time is running out and when it's

9 time to wrap up. I think Kate's got control of the timer. 

10 When you see this timer hit yellow, it means that you have

11 one minute left. If you are asked to stop, but have not

12 finished, I may ask that you defer the remainder of your

13 comments until each person has had an initial opportunity to

14 comment. Then, if there is time later, we will give you a

15 short opportunity to finish your comments. If you have a

16 written statement, you may read it, if it can be done in

17 five minutes. If not, I ask you to summarize the statement. 

18 In either case, I encourage you to submit the written

19 comments today.

20 Are there any questions on how we'll be proceeding

21 this morning? Okay. Well, then, let's begin. I'll call

22 out names based on the cards I have in the order that I

23 discussed. Michael Keyworth from Rhode Island.

24 MR. KEYWORTH: Thank you. My name's Michael

25 Keyworth and I represent the Rhode Island Marine Trade
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1 Association. I have been with that organization for about

2 20 years.

3 FEMALE: I don't think that microphone's working.

4 MR. KEYWORTH: Again, my name is Michael Keyworth

5 with Rhode Island Marine Trade Association and I've been

6 with them for over 20 years. In general, the Rhode Island

7 Marine Trade Association and the marine industries in Rhode

8 Island have had a very good relationship with EPA,

9 communication has flowed back and forth.

10 In principle, our major concern is the -- Rhode

11 Island is one of the state's that's been delegated to

12 administer several programs, including stormwater discharge

13 and underground storage tanks and above ground storage

14 tanks. With several examples of where the staff at RIPBM is

15 not trained well enough to really articulate regulations

16 that have promulgated tend to exacerbate a confusing

17 situation. And, it would be very helpful, I think, for a

18 representative of EPA to help them in that mission.

19 A couple more quick comments. The Rhode Island

20 Marine Trade Association firmly supports not going to E15

21 for gasoline as our customers and our facilities, most of

22 the engines that are in service have not been designed for

23 the higher amounts of ethanol.

24 That's about all I have. I'll be submitting some

25 more formal comments within the time frame. Thank you very
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1 much.

2 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Keyworth. Jim

3 Mullowney.

4 MR. MULLOWNEY: Good morning. Can you hear me? 

5 I'm Jim Mullowney with Cytotoxic Research Corporation. We

6 research the relationship between cytotoxic drugs and

7 children. I'll give you my card a little bit later.

8 Cytotoxic toxic drugs, cytotoxic chemicals have

9 two uses. They're used as chemical therapies and chemical

10 weapons. Because they're highly regulated as chemical

11 weapons, we don't see them in the environment. But, on the

12 converse of that as chemical therapy, more specifically

13 chemotherapy, there is no regulation on it. I think that

14 stems from the EPA's hands off approach to any drug-related

15 chemical, that's taken care of by the FDA.

16 The problem is, the exposure to these drugs comes

17 from direct patient excretion. So, effectively, we have a

18 chemical that's used as a chemical weapon, that countries

19 are restricted from having access to over chemical warfare

20 treaties and it has the same CAS number as a therapy that we

21 give mostly in this area in Boston, where we'll take a

22 cyclophosamide or Doxorubicin, a chemical made by a guy in a

23 space suit because they're so dangerous, they're so

24 carcinogenic, teratogenic, which means affects future

25 generations and mutanagenic which means that mutate human
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1 genes.

2 While we perceive these chemicals going into

3 someone's body, we perceive that they're gone. The analogy

4 that I'd like to use is, you take a vitamin, a couple of

5 hours later, you go to the bathroom and you look into the

6 toilet, it looks like you ate your highlighter. That's the

7 vitamin passing through your body. Same thing happens with

8 any sort of chemical you take. The problem arises when we

9 have 1.5 million people in the United States on these

10 therapies, where we inject them with a highly toxic material

11 and send them home. Just where you have that vitamin

12 passing through your body, you have it pass through your

13 skin, your pores, you breathe it out and it comes in through

14 your hair. They drug test people for illegal drug use by

15 testing their hair. The same thing with legal drugs.

16 This is an issue that I can see the EPA having a

17 hand in the waste part of it, there is no regulation. So, I

18 think what we need to do is look at not just drugs in the

19 water but chemicals in the water. Cause most drugs don't

20 have any effect at low levels and there are ones that do. 

21 OSHA was nice enough to compile the list for 64 of these

22 chemicals and NIOSH, was nice enough to put a list of

23 another 160 and combined, that's 222 of these highly toxic,

24 cytotoxic chemicals that we're turning a blind eye to the

25 environmental impacts, that's well known that these
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1 chemicals once they pass through someone's body is still

2 chemically active. It's well know that they'll wipe out a

3 septic system. You want to know who's on chemotherapy drug

4 in your neighborhood, call the local septic hauler and

5 they're going to tell you. Where's it going to go once it's

6 in the septic system? So, it kills the bugs, the chemical's

7 still there, they're not alive, they're chemicals. They're

8 designed to mutate the human genes. If it's in your septic

9 system, it's going right back into your water supply.

10 The other issue with a lot of these cytotoxic is

11 the dose response. We think of parts per million being in

12 the environmental business as being very, very small. When

13 you go to a pharmacist, ask him if he's ever made a drug in

14 a nanogram per liter, it's a part per trillion. The analogy

15 I like to use is, if you take a trillion one dollar bills

16 and you stack it like a deck of cards, it will go from

17 Boston to the middle of Ohio. When you take one of those

18 dollar bills and you inject it into a patient and 99 cents

19 of it passes through his body unaltered, that one cent from

20 here to Ohio makes his hair fall out. We really should care

21 what happens to these drugs and it's something that I don't

22 see the EPA looking at and I think it's a perception that

23 because of there being a drug that it's off limits and I

24 think that's just wrong.

25 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Mullowney. We'll
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1 take your business card, once we have it for the record.

2 MR. MULLOWNEY: I'll submit some comments on line,

3 too.

4 MR. HOAGLAND: Okay. Appreciate that. Thank you. 

5 Bruce Maki. And again, if you can spell your name for us

6 and your affiliation.

7 MR. MAKI: Good morning. My name is Bruce Maki,

8 M-a-k-i, from Who Decides in Gloucester Massachusetts. And

9 what brings me up here today specifically is that recently

10 in New York Times there was an article about the EPA

11 ignoring 25 years of their own scientific evidence in favor

12 of policy decisions that contradicted their own science. 

13 And, I see this as a problem for the credibility of the EPA

14 and, then its continuing mission.

15 Stemming from that also, now, we have an instance,

16 this wonderful document, the Gloucester NPDES permit. Very

17 pretty looking but it's all fluff. It's like a PR piece

18 with incredible spin on supposedly facts and they're not

19 accurate. What this is doing is casting the EPA in a light

20 of taking bad science and using it to make policy decisions. 

21 There is no justification, scientifically, for the policy

22 decisions that the EPA is using on this NPDES. I don't need

23 to go into the detail on this, because it's on line on the

24 permits from -- by the EPA. And Gloucester's response to

25 that, also. But quite briefly, one of the biggest things
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1 was the F1 toxicity test. You don't even have to be in high

2 school to read the results of that test, to realize that

3 it's totally worthless.

4 According to parameters used by the EPA on that

5 testing, if I fill this room with water and everybody died,

6 the logic you people would use is, you would conclude that

7 water is toxic. And, that's exactly what you did on the wet

8 testing. You've taken effluent out in inaccurate

9 concentrations, put it into test tubes with different

10 temperatures, not aerated and you made some conclusions. 

11 When, in fact, that's -- you're using that one little text

12 in your own laboratories that you use, you use several

13 different laboratories, the results of those testings were

14 off the charts. One said it was okay; one said it was a

15 hundred times bad. So, obviously, there's a problem with

16 the test.

17 But, yet, you go ahead with that one test

18 specifically to say, this is not good in Gloucester. Two

19 communities to the left and the right of us do not get any

20 measurements for total petroleum pollutants. And, yet,

21 Gloucester has to be measured. They stopped measuring

22 Gloucester's petroleum discharges about 15 years ago, ten

23 years ago, something like that, because there wasn't any.

24 So, now the EPA wants the citizens of Gloucester

25 to spend over 60 million dollars. They want a secondary
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1 treatment plant like the one up in Hookset that just blew

2 out those toxic disks all the way down the river, the

3 Merrimack River, all the way down to Gloucester by the way. 

4 They want us to put in a plant like that and there will be

5 no improvements in the quality of the water up there,

6 because the water is fine. Twenty years of scientific data

7 show that there's been no degradation to the sea life around

8 that discharge pipe, ever. They had a couple of minor

9 incidents where something went wrong mechanically with the

10 treatment plant. The treatment plant is being updated. 

11 And, this is why they want to go against their own

12 recommendation of the affordability in this.

13 I think if we put this -- it's going to require

14 two or three times their own recommendation of affordability

15 for the citizens of Gloucester and they kind of fluff it up

16 by saying, well, this may lead to water conservation by the

17 citizens. Well, people are already worried about their

18 water and sewer bills in Gloucester, they're exceedingly

19 expensive. So, now, we want to spend 60 million dollars,

20 roughly, a thousand or 1,500 hundred dollars per family to

21 fix something that's not broken. You cannot fix the problem

22 that's not there. And what do we get? You know, where's

23 your science? Where's your science? Who's making these

24 policy decisions? That's what I would like to know. Thank

25 you.
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1 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Maki. Jane Madden.

2 MS. MADDEN: Hi. Thank you everybody for having

3 us today for this listening session. My name is Jane

4 Madden. I'm a vice president at Camp, Dresser & McKee, an

5 environmental engineering firm, also secretary of the

6 Massachusetts Coalition for Water Resources Stewardship.

7 I've been in the business for about 27 years and

8 it has certainly seen a lot of good things come out of the

9 work of EPA and the programs that you have. I guess, more

10 and more I feel like I'm scratching my head wondering,

11 sometimes, what you guys are thinking. And, there's three

12 points that I'd like to make here.

13 The first is, I think the EPA is beginning to

14 alienate folks that were once your allies and that's a very

15 tenuous spot to be in, especially given today's politics. I

16 think the EPA needs to move forward on an incentivizing

17 program rather than a penalizing program. And, I think the

18 EPA always needs to keep the entire environment in mind. So,

19 let me just focus on some examples of these.

20 How you guys have alienated folks. I'll speak

21 generally to the NPDES permit program because that's where

22 my familiarity lies, but I think it may extend to other

23 programs that you guys are involved in. Issuing permits

24 with reduced nutrient limits, specifically, I guess -- Let

25 me back up. NPDES permits are issued in five year cycles,
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1 typically. And, I've seen a number of communities be issued

2 a permit in one permit cycle with specific limits. Then,

3 the second -- The renewal period comes along and these

4 communities or entities are issued a second more stringent

5 permit when they haven't even had time to implement the

6 improvements necessary to meet the first permit. So, that

7 just seems crazy. When somebody is moving forward, moving

8 in the right direction and, then, they get a more stringent

9 limit which would have potentially changed the improvements

10 they made five years ago, is just not right. So, either

11 think about extending the NPDES permit term, 10 years, 15

12 years, 20 years, or if somebody is in the process of making

13 improvements to achieve one permit limit, let them at least

14 finish that job, see how the river responds, before making

15 any further reductions.

16 I also see that some of the nutrient limits are

17 being pushed to the limit to sort of the point of diminution

18 return where it costs an awful lot of money to achieve the

19 really, really low limits, sort of limit of technology, and

20 the improvements to the river really are inconsequential. 

21 And, this is, I think, similar with the CSO programs, where

22 communities do an awful lot of work to limit to minimize,

23 combine sewer overflows in their communities. They have,

24 you know, had 90 reduction of CSO's, but getting that last

25 ten percent can be oftentimes, you know, hundreds of
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1 millions of dollars and may be dollars not well spent.

2 I think in general, again, in terms of alienating

3 folks, you have many individuals in this community who've

4 dedicated their lives to collection systems and waste water

5 treatment plant work and they've been on the front line. 

6 But, with some of these regulations that have come out

7 lately, you know, people are throwing their hands up. 

8 They're ready to throw in the towel and say, you know, this

9 is too much. Can't do it. So, be cognizant of that.

10 The second issue -- Oh, gosh, I'm running out of

11 time. Moving towards an incentivizing program versus a

12 penalizing program, I guess I would take a page out of the

13 parenting handbook and you do a much better job in rewarding

14 good behavior than penalizing poor behavior. Certainly, if

15 you see poor behavior, you need to nip it in the bud

16 immediately. But, I think there could be opportunity,

17 again, speaking in the NPDES world, if communities were able

18 to achieve excellent standards that were better than what

19 their permit says, they could be incentivized with

20 potentially grants or something to take the next project and

21 to achieve better limits.

22 And, then, with respect to sort of looking at the

23 whole environment, the Agency needs to be very aware of the

24 unintended consequences of the very low nutrient limits

25 because of issues with the power that you need, the
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1 chemicals you need, the submissions that you will generate

2 from achieving these very low limits needs to be balanced. 

3 Thank you very much. I will submit my comments.

4 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you. Thank you very much. 

5 Next up, Valerie Nelson.

6 MS. NELSON: Thank you very much. I'm the

7 director of the Water Alliance. Actually, I live and work

8 out of Gloucester, Massachusetts, but the Water Alliance is

9 really a national or even international alliance of multiple

10 stakeholders, engineers and academics and civic activists,

11 et cetera. And, I think we're looking at this question of

12 regulations as really a very important and very complicated

13 issue, because fundamentally, the entire model of how

14 infrastructure is built in this country has to be changed in

15 a very dramatic way. And, you see this kind of acceptance

16 for the need for paradigm shift right in EPA's own ORD water

17 review, as well an the NES report that's been accepted in

18 the water environment research foundation, IWA, the same

19 thing that's emerging is, we have to have a paradigm shift.

20 And, I think the question that EPA needs to deal

21 with from a regulatory and enforcement standpoint is your

22 regulatory approach is the biggest impediment to the kind of

23 changes that need to be made for sustainability in this

24 country of anything. And, it's a complicated matter. To

25 unravel that and create incentives to start shifting and
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1 transitioning to sustainability.

2 So, what is this paradigm shift? Essentially, the

3 model that we do infrastructure now started in the 1800's,

4 linear, siloed, big pipe industrial kind of model. And,

5 interestingly enough, the critics of these big water and

6 sewer lines that are now all over the country, said at the

7 time there were severe problems with this. And, it's great

8 to look back. Jill Tarr (ph.) from University of

9 Pennsylvania has recorded this. They said three things that

10 were the problem with the current approach the U.S. uses.

11 First of all, we not be affordable of

12 regeneration. It would cost too much to keep replacing and

13 rebuilding the infrastructure under this centralized deep

14 water line treatment plan approach. Wow, has that happened. 

15 Number two, they said, you're just shifting the pollutants

16 and the toxins somewhere else out of the city. The whole

17 field of extranalities now, the water commons, I think it's

18 widely understood that our infrastructure is increasingly

19 disruptive in the ecosystem. It is not doing the job that

20 we expect for environmental protection in this country and

21 internationally. And, number three, they said, why would

22 you do this? You're throwing away the resources that are in

23 this sewage and, in particular, cause up to then, centuries

24 of recycling of organics and nutrients in sewage back on the

25 farm field were disrupted and these became pollutants or
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1 waste and not resources.

2 These three points that they made a 150 years ago,

3 I think, are coming home to roost. And, the new paradigm is

4 about reaching affordability. I do a lot of work on Cape

5 Cod, where this old approach of $60,000 a house for a

6 central system is not affordable. Number two, the

7 extranalities of climate change and the water system as a

8 whole, which I think, generally, EPA is recognizing, we need

9 to look at the water system and the whole impact of toxins,

10 for example. What are we doing with our infrastructure in

11 terms of not protecting adequately ecosystems. And, number

12 three, huge potential in the economic value of recovering

13 those resources. In British Columbia, they're finding if

14 you get the energy out of the sewer lines, or at the

15 treatment plants, you can more than pay for both energy and

16 water and waste water infrastructure. There's nutrient

17 value in there.

18 So, one could go on and on and if there's time, I

19 could certainly try to draw this out more and more. But,

20 the regulatory system was built up in accretion on an

21 infrastructure model that said centralize and silo

22 everything. The problem we have now is there's a pent up

23 demand in this country, it's being built overseas. We're

24 ten years behind. There's pent up demand in this country to

25 build integrated systems, resource recovery systems, systems
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1 that, by the way, create lots of green jobs. You see this

2 in Philadelphia for stormwater. The same applies in waste

3 water opportunities, et cetera.

4 Regulations are severe impediments to unleashing 

5 that kind of creativity and ultimate sustainability. So, I

6 think the challenge of EPA is in how to introduce

7 innovation, how to get multiple benefits, and how to do

8 integrated system design. And, those three things, I could

9 talk about later, if there's more time. Thank you.

10 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you very much. Tom Walsh.

11 MR. WALSH: Thank you for hearing us today. I

12 would point out that I'm commenting primarily for Blackstone

13 Water Pollution Abatement District. I'm also a member of

14 Massachusetts Water Pollution Control Association and

15 Massachusetts Coalition for Water Resources Stewardship, in

16 part, my comments also apply to them.

17 First, I'd like to say that many speakers have

18 indicated that we need more open discussion and I think that

19 that is true. I'd like to get back to a time when we were

20 really working collegially and I think it would be great to

21 be able to get in rooms without our attorneys to talk about

22 our goals and objectives and be able to work on them that

23 way.

24 In these difficult economic times, we must try to

25 be certain the water quality investments will produce
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1 equivalent environmental gains. To ensure this, our

2 decision should be founded on applications of sound

3 scientific assessments and cooperative watershed based

4 planning that considers the full range of water management

5 needs and fiscal constraints of communities involved. This

6 is particularly true in development of nutrient criteria in

7 that regard and a novel approach to developing and

8 implementing nutrient criteria to the U.S. is badly needed.

9 Unique and complex relationships between nutrients

10 and their potential impacts on any given water body require

11 that we use new approaches to establish nutrient goals and

12 control nutrient impairments. Reduced nutrient levels are

13 not always better for aquatic ecosystems which need some

14 level of nutrients to sustain life. And, there are numerous

15 compounding factors that impact our particular organism or

16 ecosystem response. These issues are even more complex when

17 evaluating nutrient impacts on flowing waters, such as

18 rivers and streams, or on coastal areas. Understanding the

19 biology of waterways, we all want to protect --

20 Understanding that the biology of waterways that we all want

21 to protect is essential to develop essential effective

22 nutrient goals and controls. Unlike the contaminants we've

23 dealt with in the last decades, nutrients rarely

24 demonstrated bright line level below which aquatic

25 ecosystems will be protected.
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1 If current approaches continue to attempt to

2 define use of such bright line levels could result in

3 undesirable impacts on organisms that may thrive under

4 different conditions. Other environmental stresses

5 including sediment flows, habitat destruction, hydro

6 modification resulting from dams and channelization can have

7 as much or more of an impact on the health of aquatic

8 ecosystem than nutrients. It can strongly affect how these

9 systems respond to varying nutrient loads.

10 EPA and the states should establish a clear causal

11 link between nutrient concentrations and water quality

12 impacts on the watershed before establishing a water quality

13 criterion and before imposing nutrient control requirements. 

14 We don't want approaches that do not account for the varying

15 ecological effects of nutrient pollution, including

16 misguided criteria development efforts and the one-size fits

17 all technology fixes will result in major expenditures for

18 point and nonpoint sources with minimal or no improvement to

19 water quality for many waters.

20 And, this is true not just for dollar costs, but

21 also for resource cost and for the environmental cost that

22 come along with some of the nutrient control technologies

23 that we're required to into. Because nutrient removal

24 systems are very costly, clean water agencies should be

25 given expanded periods of time to come into compliance and
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1 permit term should be extended to at least 20 years, in

2 which stringent nutrient limits are imposed.

3 EPA should rethink its approach to nutrient

4 regulations to encompass the spectrum of regulated issues,

5 using and adaptive science bases watershed management

6 approach includes all stakeholders and in its aim in

7 establishing coordinated and prioritized cost effective

8 goals that have a straight benefit.

9 I'd like to also just comment quickly on sewage

10 sludge incinerator standards. EPA has chosen to regulate

11 waste water treatment plants sewage sludge incinerators

12 under Section 129 of the Clean Air Act, which covers

13 combustion of solid waste. Sewage sludge incineration

14 should be covered more appropriate under Section 112, which

15 covers emissions from waste water treatment facilities. 

16 Further, EPA has promulgated sewage sludge incinerator

17 regulations under Section 503 of the Clean Water Act some 20

18 years ago and these have turned out to be very effective. 

19 So, it seems more appropriate that the regulation be done

20 under Section 112. Thank you for hearing.

21 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Walsh. Next is Joe

22 Favaloro. And, if you could spell your name, I would

23 appreciate that. I'm not sure I got that right.

24 MR. FAVALORO : Good morning. My name is Joe

25 Favaloro, F-a-v-a-l-o-r-o. I'm the executive director of the
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1 Massachusetts Water Resources Authority Advisory Board. 

2 First and foremost, I want to thank you for giving us this

3 opportunity to speak and hopefully you guys all listen to

4 some of our concerns.

5 It's not surprisingly that these are difficult

6 times we live in. Or maybe better put, challenging times we

7 all live in from EPA down to the communities that I

8 represent, the 60 communities that are part of the MWRA

9 water resource systems, the MWRA, itself. My cities and

10 towns are getting it from all directions. They have less

11 and less dollars and more and more work just from EPA they

12 deal with the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act. 

13 You have SSO, CSO, stormwater which is the new -- the new

14 big issue that's coming down the pike. Clean water, dirty

15 water, clean air. Each of them, unfortunately, we come

16 across as being -- as each of these different directories

17 come down as the most important priority that we must deal

18 with.

19 But, each of them must be looked at, you know,

20 maybe, in a different way and that's really the point today. 

21 It's not to speak on any of the specifics, but to talk about

22 the mentality, to talk about the philosophy and what needs

23 to happen as we all move forward, is that as others have

24 said today, it isn't one size that fits all. You need to

25 almost reinvent yourself. You need to look at, you know,
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1 dealing with solutions and approaches and problems that we

2 need to prioritize.

3 As much as everyone of us would like to do

4 everything, we can't do it. We need to prioritize which is

5 the most important, which is the best way to do it. We need

6 to look at cost benefit analysis. You can't -- You may want

7 to get to zero discharges. We may want to get to the

8 Utopian end, but you can't do that. It doesn't make

9 financial, logical sense to do it. We need to begin to

10 embrace cost benefit analysis. You need to look at your

11 communities as a partner. We're not the enemy. As others

12 have said, the role has become more adversarial than it has

13 been as partnering.

14 You need to do all of these different things. You

15 need to set those priorities. You need to do cost benefit

16 analysis. You need to do all of them. And, that way, the

17 solutions that come forward serve the environment and allow

18 communities who are really and truly hard pressed at this

19 time, to kind of work with you in cooperation. I will be

20 sending written comments and want to thank you for the time.

21 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you. And, for those of you

22 that might have come in that didn't stop at the desk, if

23 you'd like to make a comment, please see Kelsey and Kate at

24 the table and, also, I don't know, do you have any cards? 

25 No? Okay.
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1 Next is Seth Kaplan.

2 MR. KAPLAN: Good morning. My name is Seth

3 Kaplan. I'm the vice president for Policy and Climate

4 Advocacy at the Conservation Law Foundation. This is what

5 I'm supposed to say, so I'll summarize. And, with me today

6 is Cynthia Leibman, a staff attorney who works in our Boston

7 office, who focuses on water issues, who I'm really glad

8 came with me today based on prior comments and she's

9 available to answer any questions on water issues and may

10 offer come specific comments on that.

11 We appreciate the opportunity to comment and say,

12 personally, that over ten years ago I had the opportunity,

13 through our affiliate, CLF Ventures, to to work on a project

14 Excel Process, looking at opportunities to -- with a similar

15 mission and we did actually work on what I believe was the

16 only successful communities project in all of EPA, regarding

17 revision of solid waste disposal regulations to allow for

18 increased deleading of homes. That's when science indicated

19 that dirt and architectural debris with lead paint could be

20 safely disposed of in dry construction demolition landfills. 

21 But, I think the major lesson if you look back at the record

22 of Project Excel was, there were surprisingly few

23 regulations that could be relaxed to greater environmental

24 benefit. I think looking back at that, it would be a benefit

25 to EPA looking back at the Excel experience.
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1 But, to get to what I'm supposed to be talking

2 about. We are truly at a critical moment in terms of

3 addressing the environmental -- the environment and

4 environmental health. And CLF wanted to take a fairly

5 affirmative message here. We're going to stress where

6 progress is needed, where what the EPA is doing is doing

7 right and offer some critical comments, but mostly stressing

8 affirmative.

9 We need to understand that addressing climate

10 change in terms of the dramatic shift towards clean energy

11 resources, like renewal energy and energy efficiency and

12 away from dirty and damaging fossil fuel derived energy must

13 be a loadstar and must be a primary value. We need to

14 better protect water resources from polluted stormwater

15 runoff and we need to focus on ending dead zones caused by

16 nutrient pollution. We need to protect against the very

17 direct threats to the public health and environment from

18 dangerous air pollution.

19 We need to ensure there are sustainable patterns

20 of development that foster less energy intensive and less

21 polluting transportation systems. EPA must maintain its

22 existing regulatory programs that have proven effective and

23 necessary to ensure that business and other activities in

24 our communities are carried out in a way that protects the

25 air, water and land. Very simple.
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1 Here are some specific recommendations. EPA must

2 take a broad view of the benefits that are generated by

3 environmental protection, including its regulatory decisions

4 and it must communicate its decisions on regulations and

5 permits in that language. Environmental protection, clean

6 energy, for example, investments in water infrastructure can

7 produce tremendous economic gains and job production. The

8 public needs to have a full and free access to information

9 that enables the citizens to evaluate whether regulated

10 facilities and public agencies are in compliance with EPA

11 regulations. EPA's been moving in this direction, but it

12 needs to -- its resources need to be devoted to being

13 clearer or more transparent in providing information to the

14 public.

15 EPA should continue to require monitoring and

16 sampling as a fundamental component of its permit programs,

17 look for every opportunity to do that.

18 Clear expectations need to be set for regulated

19 entities, so they can plan and manage compliance with

20 regulatory programs. This goes for not only national

21 regulation of greenhouse gas emissions now being put in

22 place. And, where general permitting and self-certification

23 is used as in the NPDES stormwater permitting program, the

24 standards for compliance must be objective and clearly

25 expressed.
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1 Health benefits must meet the statutory

2 requirements. Maximum achievable control technology must

3 mean maximum achievable control technology. There is a need

4 for scientific integrity to be at the core of EPA decision

5 making and that means grasping some nettles, for example,

6 looking at the question of biomass emissions, looked at a

7 whole and avoiding very cursory decisions like regarding

8 them as blanket carbon neutral, for example.

9 And, on the water side, the hallmark must be

10 performance standards that reflect the limits of technology

11 for removing nitrogen and phosphorous and are focused on

12 achieving the standards that are set forth in law. I will

13 leave the rest of the water for Cynthia there.

14 Transportation, I would just urge in terms of

15 transportation, that you look at two very key questions. 

16 You look at -- In these written comments, you will see a

17 strong discussion of the role that transportation

18 infrastructure planned and paid for by the government has on

19 the design and form and shape of our communities, EPA can

20 play a key role both as a regulator in terms of regulating

21 the building of transportation and the operation in terms of

22 issues like stormwater runoff. But, most importantly, as a

23 key voice in the NEPA process and ensuring that

24 environmental values are at the absolute forefront when the

25 federal government plans and when local communities and the
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1 federal government spend federal funds. There are further

2 written comments. Thank you very much.

3 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Kaplan. Cynthia

4 Leibman, also. Do you care to add to that? You're on the

5 same card, but I'll give you five minutes.

6 MS. LEIBMAN: Good morning. I'd like to build on

7 what my colleague, Seth Kaplan, offered by way of

8 recommendation on water policy and permitting. CLF and our

9 members urge EPA to maintain a strong national pollutant

10 discharge elimination system or NPDES program. This program

11 has brought about dramatic improvements in water waste

12 nationwide, including our own Boston Harbor, which is really

13 a prime example. In carrying out this program, EPA should

14 continue to require robust monitoring sampling, as my

15 colleague mentioned, to verify the quality of effluent that

16 is going into our waterways and the resulting condition of

17 these waterways over time, as well, to make this data and

18 information accessible to the public in real time.

19 CLF and our members strongly support EPA in moving

20 forward with guidance that will clarify the appropriate

21 scope of EPA's jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act. 

22 EPA's approach will correct what's become a burdensome

23 regime that has hindered protection of wetlands under

24 Section 404 of the Clean Water Act. And, that immeasurably

25 impacted the Agency's ability to enforce the law.
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1 As my colleague, Seth, mentioned, despite the

2 progress that has been achieved through the NPDES programs,

3 that the nutrient pollution continues to cause dead zones in

4 waterways in New England, including Narragansett Bay, along

5 Cape Cod and Lake Champlain. And, we recommend that EPA

6 employ performance standards, that reflect the limit

7 technology for removing nitrogen and phosphorous. Polluted

8 stormwater runoff from paved surfaces is another leading

9 cause of degradation in urban and suburban areas all around

10 New England, as EPA has well documented and as the National

11 academy of Science has documented.

12 This is an opportunity, stormwater treatment is,

13 to get it right, to clean up our waterways, but also

14 deploying green technology in creating green jobs. There's

15 some specific examples of green jobs as a result of

16 stormwater treatments that are actually pointed out in EPA's

17 own recent guidances on the low impact development website

18 on EPA pages.

19 As my colleague, Seth Kaplan, mentioned, since the

20 1990's we've seen that in many cases a flexibility and

21 verification of approach EPA used in its Phase 1 and Phase 2

22 stormwater program has been abused and as a result

23 compliance rates are low. We recommend clearer standards

24 and limitations and more consistent enforcement. And, in

25 particular, we recommend that EPA underscore that water
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1 policy standards are the driver and the bottom line for all 

2 stormwater permitting. We urge EPA to include performance

3 standards based on low impact development and green

4 infrastructure technique for all NPDES stormwater permit

5 programs. We encourage EPA to establish uniform

6 requirements to control stormwater discharge from new

7 development and redevelopment. This will take advantage of

8 the time when it's most opportune to install stormwater

9 treatment and will create a level playing field for

10 development.

11 We encourage EPA to expand permitting to include

12 commercial, industrial and institutional properties that

13 contribute significant amounts of pollution into our

14 waterways, so that they can assume their fair share of the

15 solution. In the municipal stormwater context, EPA does not

16 actually do cities and towns any favors by issuing

17 stormwater permits without performance standards, because as

18 you've heard, objective and clear criteria are needed in

19 order to budget and plan for compliance. Thank you.

20 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you. I think we'll come to

21 our first break. We'll give the panel up here a break. And,

22 we have three more office directors that are going to come

23 forward. Carl Dierker, Sharon Wells and Rob Maxfield. And,

24 then, we'll continue on with Tom Gumbart So, why don't we

25 just take a couple of minutes.
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1 (Whereupon, a recess was taken.)

2 MR. GUMBART: I'm Tom Gumbart from the Town of

3 Lincoln. G-u-m-b-a-r-t. Actually, I filled out a card when

4 I came in, because that's what I was asked to do. I didn't

5 know I was actually going to speak.

6 So, basically, we came to hear most of your

7 concern with the NPDES permitting. As a small town, I think

8 we've demonstrated that we're very committed to preservation

9 of natural resources, but -- I'm a little nervous I didn't

10 line up anything. But, I think basically we're getting

11 feedback from EPA on doing the new MS4, north coastal

12 communities permit and feeling overwhelmed with the need to

13 do work to the extent that is being portrayed. I think all

14 communities want to be doing their best to promulgate water

15 quality and I think we do that. But, being a small

16 community, it falls on -- I'm the conservation director,

17 comes to us, the DPW Department. We have no engineering

18 component to our town. And, basically, I think we do what

19 we can. We want to comply. But, it's sort of overwhelming,

20 this current climate where we're losing staffing in the

21 town. Even though we're a wealth community, that doesn't

22 translate into being a wealthy town government.

23 So, I would just urge EPA to consider how this big

24 infrastructure on NPDES permits will actually translate at

25 the local level. I think a lot of towns are going to find
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1 it very difficult. I think when I reviewed the comments,

2 virtually every community said the same thing, we appreciate

3 your goals, we want to work hand in hand. But, we can't do

4 some of this where it's estimated that it's going to cost, I

5 believe, at least $60 per capita. A small town like us,

6 it's going to translate to over 300,000 a year to do that

7 compliance. So, we're just not ready to implement that

8 level. So, we do what we can.

9 One of the things that is very difficult is the

10 educational component that we would really hope that

11 stormwater education would be facilitated through EPA and

12 through Mass DEP, so there's -- the burden is eased on local

13 communities. It doesn't really make sense to have, I'm not

14 sure how many in Massachusetts, but it's, I think, somewhere

15 around half the communities that have to do it, to have a

16 150, 200 towns developing their own material doesn't seem to

17 make sense economically. Each town would have to spend that

18 money, when there is some local avenue to get to EPA and

19 DEP to produce some of those materials would help us a lot.

20 Again, I think you hear from a lot of people who

21 want to work with you, who want to be partners, view us as

22 partners and not the enemy. I guess that's all I have to

23 say.

24 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Gumbart. For anyone

25 that may have come in that wants to speak, please fill out a
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1 card. Next up is John Woodsmall.

2 MR. WOODSMALL: Hi. My name is John Woodsmall. 

3 I'm the town engineer for the Town of Southborough,

4 Massachusetts. And, I want to speak primarily about the

5 proposed MS4 permits for Massachusetts.

6 One of the things that the town is very concerned

7 about is that as currently drafted, the permit creates

8 unrealistic goals for small towns and cities. In today's

9 budget climate, these municipalities simply don't have

10 resources available for expansion of services or new

11 operations. Citizens have little to no appetite for new

12 fees. So, a suggestion that everything should just simply

13 be paid for. Stormwater utility is going to be a very tough

14 sell.

15 The citizens just see new fees as new taxes and

16 I'm sure we all know that there is not a very good

17 environment out there for people proposing new taxes and,

18 especially for something that's for the most -- for the

19 greater public, is something that's obscure as stormwater

20 runoff and the quality of that runoff. Just by way of an

21 example, Southborough, we've estimated that it's going to

22 cost between 1.7 to 2.7 million dollars to comply with the

23 full permits over the five years due to the anti degradation

24 requirements and our proximity to the Sudbury Reservoir. 

25 That takes up a large portion of the town and about half of
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1 our outfalls, approximately about half of a hundred outfalls

2 discharge directly into that water.

3 We don't have a million dollars now to fund

4 current town operations. We're looking at teacher layoffs. 

5 For us to be able to go to the taxpaying public and stand up

6 in town meeting and say that we need to get 1.7 to 2.7

7 million dollars for a stormwater utility, it's just going to

8 be laughable. And, regardless of the fiscal climate, many

9 of the proposed regulations within that draft requirement

10 have -- they create data collection activities, but they

11 have no appreciable benefit to the actual environment and

12 are going to be very burdensome for these small towns and

13 cities to implement.

14 I think there's also a sense that municipalities

15 are seen as an easy target, that there's no easily

16 identifiable or powerful constituency group to advocate for

17 the municipalities against these regulations. You know,

18 there's a number of large private, commercial and

19 institutional sites within all of our cities and towns that

20 contribute just as much stormwater runoff to the state's

21 waterways that aren't being regulated by any of these

22 permits. And, I think just in terms of fairness and in

23 terms of getting a greater impact, you know, these permit

24 requirements need to be expanded from just beyond

25 municipalities and put on top with everybody else.
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1 There's an interesting dichotomy at work here

2 between the municipalities and many of the environmental

3 groups in the state. I think you've heard consistently from

4 the draft permit process and here that towns and cities are

5 saying there's too much, too soon being done with this draft

6 permit, where you're hearing the environmental groups saying

7 that there's too little and it's happening too slowly. And,

8 we understand the EPA has to balance these interests and the

9 cities and towns want to protect environment as well. We

10 provide the drinking water to the public. We provide

11 recreational facilities at local ponds and beaches and

12 things like that. So, the town's got an interest in

13 protecting the environment. And, I think EPA needs to

14 listen to what the cities and towns are telling them about

15 what we can realistically do.

16 I don't know if the regulatory process allows for

17 it, but my recommendation is that EPA create a advisory

18 group of cities and towns and environmental groups, other

19 stakeholders to kind of take all this input and try to come

20 up with a fairer process that balances the competing

21 interests better. In the public sector, we heard about

22 public participation now a days and drafting projects and

23 things like that and getting communication at all stages of

24 the permit process. And, from what we've seen with this,

25 it's been EPA is mandating from on high that this is what
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1 we're going to do, without listening to what the people who

2 have to implement these things have to say. Thank you.

3 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Woodsmall. Next is

4 Rozalyn Frontiera. If you could spell your name, please. 

5 I'm sorry. I didn't see the note that you were in a hurry.

6 MS. FRONTIERA: No, it wasn't that, Mr. Holgren. 

7 Thank you. I had signed in on a different sheet. I was not

8 supposed to put it on that. Thank you.

9 I'm from -- My name is Rozalyn Frontiera from the

10 oldest seaport fishing seaport in the country. I'm here

11 with my colleague, Bruce Maki from Who Decides. We're a

12 small community organization seeking to keep water in local

13 control. We're very interested in what happens with

14 privatization of common resources. So, if there are any

15 municipalities here that would like to contact us, you can

16 reach us at www.whodecides.net. Our email address is

17 info@whodecides.net.

18 And, just to add to what Mr. Maki had stated, I'm

19 a layperson, but in terms of engineering or being an expert

20 in anything but being a good citizen interested in civil

21 discourse, so I'm extremely appreciative for the president

22 to offer our community and our region this opportunity here. 

23 And, so, if he's interested in common sense approaches, I

24 would venture to say that integrity is number one on our

25 list in terms of science, good science versus policies that
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1 do not really meet the needs of our community and other

2 communities on the local level. There seems to be a serious

3 disconnect.

4 So, we're here to at least open the dialogue and

5 help President Obama to consider some of those common sense

6 approaches which must include at least trying to find

7 affordable, innovative solutions per community to meet each

8 individual community's needs. That's a tall order, but it's

9 a given that communities are being hammered left and right

10 and that's the least that we can do as citizens, is to

11 listen to one another and to come to some consensus and to

12 go forward with good scientific approaches that are well

13 balanced. Thank you.

14 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you. Tom Burke from the

15 Westborough Waste Water.

16 MR. BURKE: Hi. I just found out about this

17 meeting last week, so didn't prepare a lot of things, but

18 I've been on the Westborough Waste Water Treatment Plant

19 Board now for a little over three years. And, we're in the

20 middle of a 50 plus million dollar expansion in our plant,

21 that's required to meet the phosphorus level of .1ppm from

22 .75.

23 Just a little background on this project. When we

24 first came up with it and went out to bid in 2008, because

25 of the fact that prices were going up at the time, we had to
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1 go back to the drawing board and redesign it, because we

2 didn't have enough money appropriated to finish the job. 

3 So, we are now -- Our permit expired on June of 2010. We

4 have an extension which the EPA has been very, very

5 cooperative in giving us an extension, because there is good

6 faith to do the job and to do it properly.

7 Now, what that brings up to the point is this,

8 here we are. We're going to get it done, hopefully, a

9 little bit before the January 2012 date. It's a 30 month

10 project, once you get started. So, you don't turn these

11 things on and off very quickly. So, one of the concerns of

12 myself and other Board members have is that we're also

13 talking now about maybe some new permitting that might have

14 some nitrogen levels involved. And, it might have been a

15 good thing for all of us if we had known that and known what

16 those limits were going to be in advance. I'm not saying we

17 could have done it all because the monies are tough, but at

18 least we might have been able to give consideration to that

19 point.

20 So, I'd like to kind of reinforce one of the

21 earlier speaker's views about maybe making the permitting

22 for a longer period and, you know, also looking at the

23 results of this current expansion to see what type of an

24 effect we get from what we're doing with the phosphorus. 

25 And, that brings up another point. There's some suggestion
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1 that perhaps some of the dams in the waterways that we are

2 fish dodging in 2007 have built up which also contains some

3 of the phosphorus that we're trying to get rid out of coming

4 out of the Westborough facility.

5 Again, I'd ask you to look at maybe a longer

6 permit and make sure that future permits give everyone and

7 all of the taxpayers the bang for the buck in terms of

8 getting a good environmental impact for the monies that

9 we're spending. Thank you very much.

10 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Burke. I am down to

11 my last card. But, we are going to hold this hearing open

12 until one o'clock. Roger Frymire did make a note to be

13 last. I did see that note. But, if you'd like to speak

14 now, we'd welcome it. If you'd like to wait until 12:55, we

15 can do that too, but I don't think you want to. I'd be

16 happy to listen to you now.

17 MR. FRYMIRE: I'll speak now. Thank you.

18 MR. HOAGLAND: Okay.

19 MR. FRYMIRE: Hopefully, I can go slightly over

20 five minutes, if there's nobody immediately behind me. I

21 estimated when I signed up originally, it would take me six

22 to ten minutes to speak.

23 MR. HOAGLAND: I think that would be fine, given

24 the situation. And, we can certainly open it again for

25 anybody else.
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1 MR. FRYMIRE: I appreciate all the people that are

2 here from EPA, especially listening to me. The director

3 said that you were going to be taking these comments, taking

4 them back and adjusting them so that you could send

5 suggestions on to the federal government, itself, based on

6 these comments. And, I really need that. I don't know a

7 whole lot about the actual regulations, how they were

8 written, how they're applied. But I'm out in the field and

9 I've done a lot of water quality sampling for both bacteria

10 and nutrients and I've been very involved in the NPDES

11 permits for many different facilities and cities and that's

12 where most of my comments will be directed.

13 First of all, there is one thing that was said by

14 an earlier speaker about making information more publicly

15 available and accessible and I've seen great strides made in

16 this region already. I used to have to make an appointment

17 about once or twice a month to come in to the EPA offices

18 here and ask to look at files for this city, that city, this

19 permittee and spend hours and hours looking through them. 

20 At least for the first incarnation of the MS4 Phase 2

21 permits, you started putting PDF versions of the annual

22 reports the cities made on your website and that saved me so

23 much going to the cities to look, coming to you to look up a

24 file. They don't have everything. I would actually ask for

25 you to expand on that. Even the annual report you have on
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1 there now often have appendices referenced which you don't

2 put into the on-line files. So, I've had to go to, say,

3 Belmont and ask them, you know, what was in that appendix

4 you sent and can I look at it and see this nice monitoring

5 data.

6 The new permit as I read the most recent draft

7 permit and commented on it, along with all the other drafts

8 that have come out recently, talks about both a annual

9 self-analysis of whether they've adhered to the terms of the

10 permit. And, a lot of the annual permit -- annual report

11 I'm looking at now, really aren't much beyond a single page,

12 a single sentence saying, We believe we satisfied the terms

13 of the permit. Maybe, a few check boxes on other pages, but

14 half of them really don't have much information. But, the

15 latest draft MS4 permit I saw had a requirement not only for

16 a stormwater management plan, but also for a fairly rigorous

17 annual report. And, I'm hoping that instead of simply

18 having an annual, you know, check, yes, we fulfilled the

19 terms of the permit, that you will actually collect these

20 annual reports and put the full report on line.

21 There is a suggestion in the draft permit that the

22 cities make this information available on their websites

23 and, if so, you can simply have a web link to it. But, for

24 the cities that maybe don't have the resources to do that

25 themselves, I'd really like to see a centralized place where
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1 I can find all that information and save a lot of foot work

2 and carbon emissions getting here and there.

3 The real reason to make all this available is,

4 this MS4 permit and even the current one, the old one, is

5 generating a lot of data and I'm not sure -- Well, I'm sure

6 that EPA really doesn't have the personnel to review all of

7 it in detail and compare. You make efforts. You try to

8 look at a few of them to, you know, take samples and see if

9 things are happening, but there are watershed associations

10 out there, there are concerned citizens such as myself that

11 are willing to spend a lot of time reading, analyzing and,

12 essentially, checking to make sure that the permit's being

13 followed, so that we can alert you in case it's not.

14 I think you need all the public help you can get

15 of, what I do out in the field sampling and, also, in

16 monitoring the paperwork. And, the more help you can give

17 us by getting more and more of this on line, the better. 

18 Besides the annual reports, the one thing I'm most

19 interested in is facts, monitoring data, water quality

20 monitoring data, of which a lot more is being required. If

21 the latest draft permit is actually passed, put into effect

22 as I recently saw it and that water quality data is my

23 highest interest.

24 The cities are supposed to be putting all that

25 water quality data for the previous year into their annual
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1 report, that's one reason I want you to get it on line. 

2 But, if that's going to be analyzed to any significant

3 extent, it really needs to be in an electronic format, not

4 just a PDF document. So, for actual water quality data, I'm

5 hoping you can either have cities provide it to you and put

6 it on their website, maybe, in, you know, a simple

7 spreadsheet format, an Excel spreadsheet, or any other

8 simple spreadsheet, so that people can agglomerate the data

9 and analyze it between cities, over entire watersheds, or

10 water bodies that have multiple permitees.

11 Ideally, all this water quality data would be put

12 by the city directly into EPA's water quality exchange

13 nationwide database, WQX. If the cities can't do it, if

14 they can supply to EPA in electronic form, maybe EPA can do

15 it, but if you at least put it into an electronic form. 

16 There's always the possibility that third parties, watershed

17 associations, can use their accounts on WQX and upload the

18 data, making it available nationwide. It's not just useful

19 here, but in understanding stormwater and pollutants

20 nationwide. If we're collecting all this data, let's use it

21 to the fullest extent possible.

22 One thing which I really appreciate that the MWRA

23 already does is that for all of their CSO facilities,

24 they're putting all of their DMR data, true, it's just in

25 PDF form, but they're putting that all on the MWRA's
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1 website, so I can actually go and look up what the Cottage

2 Farm facility, two blocks away from my house, how many times

3 it's activated, what the water quality is coming out of it,

4 since they actually do water quality sampling twice a year

5 on that.

6 So, again, I don't know how to interpret this for

7 the purpose of this particular hearing and how we an make

8 the regulations better, I'm telling you things I'd like to

9 see, things I think you're doing well, right and a few

10 things wrong. And, I'm hoping that you can interpret this

11 and print at the national level in suggestions for actual

12 changes in regulations.

13 Another topic here has to do with how the

14 regulations define things such as SSO's versus CSO's versus

15 stormwater outfalls. And, why you really have to have

16 separate permitting for what's really just dirty water

17 coming out of a pipe. Most, unfortunately, in the

18 metropolitan area where I work, most of the stormwater

19 outfalls I see have some amount of sewage coming out of

20 them. Some of them during rain events have so much sewage

21 coming out of them that I don't see why they're not defined

22 as CSO's. I'd like there to be a definition of a CSO. Once

23 you're passed some bacteria level, or, you know, percent

24 sewage coming out of a pipe, it should be defined as a CSO. 

25 And, there are some CSO's I've sampled that are actually
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1 bacteria wise concentration cleaner than a lot of stormwater

2 outfalls I've sampled.

3 At the same time, I'm looking down the stream, all

4 these NPDES, especially the CSO permit and the whole Boston

5 Harbor clean up, looking at -- There's actually been

6 downgrading of water quality standards. Boston Harbor was

7 redefined from a Class SB to SB sub CSO. Because under the

8 Boston Harbor clean up, it was determined that they were

9 never going to remove all of the CSO's to Boston Harbor. 

10 So, while it's going to meet Class SB standards 98 percent

11 of the time, they've already downgraded it.

12 Two places there that was considered in fresh

13 water downgrading from Class B to B CSO are the Charles

14 River, right here between Boston and Cambridge, and the

15 Alewife Brook and Mystic River in the Mystic River

16 Watershed, where there was such a public outcry to the

17 proposed downgrading of the water quality to B sub CSO, that

18 there was variant put into effect in each of those water

19 bodies. And, still, the Boston Harbor clean up doesn't

20 currently call for closing all of the CSO's there, so I'm

21 afraid in 2020 when all of the CSO projects are finally

22 finished, we're still going to be faced with downgrading the

23 water quality. But, at the same time, there has been so

24 much work done and so much improvement, especially in

25 diminishing the total amount of flow coming out of these CSO
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1 pipes in most cases that there are -- most of the CSO's that

2 are supposed to remain in those two water bodies are going

3 to be at or less than one activation per typical year. And,

4 I'd actually like to have considered -- Yes.

5 MR. HOAGLAND: Excuse me. You're past ten

6 minutes. I wanted to give you adequate time. I have two

7 more cards that have come in. If you'd like to wrap up in a

8 minute or so, we can do that. Or, we can let two people go

9 and, then, come back.

10 MR. FRYMIRE: I can take a break and let everyone

11 else go and, then, come back. Thank you very much.

12 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you. Tom Balf. If you could

13 spell your name, please.

14 MR. BALF: Sure. My name is Tom Balf, B-a-l-f as

15 in Frank, and I'm with a group called C2E2, which is the

16 Campus Consortium for Environmental Excellence. It's a

17 higher ed environmental association representing more than

18 30 colleges and universities, many of them major national

19 research universities in New England here.

20 It's important, I think, to -- Let me just give

21 background in terms of college and universities, cause that

22 will -- it's relevant to my next comments. The C2E2 was

23 involved with Region 1 in a great collaborative relationship

24 called The Academic Research Lab Project Excel. To my

25 knowledge, unless Seth Kaplan is correct, it's the only one
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1 -- the only Excel project pilot project that actually became

2 a final rule within the last three years and it was an

3 innovative approach to regulating management of hazardous

4 waste coming out of academic laboratories. And, so, rather

5 than regulations that were developed for the Ford Motor

6 companies and Bethlehem Steels of the world, the innovative

7 regulation imposes performance based requirements and better

8 supports the research development and training environment

9 of a college/university lab.

10 It's also important to recognize colleges and

11 universities in the extraordinary environmental leadership

12 that they've shown over the last number of years. Nearly

13 700 colleges have signed the President's climate commitment

14 to be carbon neutral. Many colleges and universities have

15 extraordinary sustainability programs coming across all

16 sorts of disciplines. And, it has been my pleasure over the

17 last ten years to work with colleges and universities and

18 it's wonderful in the sense that they are transparent. They

19 are collegial and they want to do the right thing.

20 We'll be submitting specific comments, I guess,

21 electronically. We have a number of specific regulations

22 that we'd like to talk about and I'm going to mention those

23 very briefly. We would like to see an authorized use for

24 PCB's in caulk Under the TOSCA regulations, we have proposed

25 that previously on the advanced notice of proposed rule
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1 making. A lot of these comments came from MACUBO, the

2 business officers association, along with a caulk management

3 plan. So, it's not just that we want authorized use, we

4 would inventory caulk pre 1979. We would do routine

5 inspections. We would manage it accordingly. But,

6 currently, the regulatory requirements and the

7 interpretations simply don't work.

8 We would like to see modifications to the land

9 disposal restriction requirements which don't seem to really

10 provide any value any more. It's a paperwork burden. It's

11 a mechanism for sort of a I got ya, that I think you could

12 argue that the LDR program at EPA has been an extraordinary

13 success. The treatment methodologies are well implements

14 and executed. And, the sort of notification paperwork

15 requirements to some degree have outlived their useful life.

16 We would also like and we've advocated for a long

17 time on the value of a single ID for a university or a

18 college, so that the entire campus would come under one RCRA

19 identification number, rather than the more typical, which

20 is because of public roads, they're making multiple ID's. 

21 It's a pain to administer and organize and, frankly, one ID

22 would more likely impose more stringent requirements on a

23 college/university, rather than being a large quantity

24 generated here, a small quantity generated there. A

25 conditional use generator somewhere else.
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1 We would like to see electronic versions of

2 manifesting. Get away from the paperwork copies which are

3 about done its useful life and we have some specific

4 requirements regarding the inspection of tanks under the

5 SPCC regs. Where you have very large tanks that are above

6 ground tanks, you can see them. We would like to put in

7 place a requirement simply for visual inspections, rather

8 than currently where they're required to do a more thorough

9 engineering evaluation.

10 I think the other thing that I would like to talk

11 about is, and this again comes from our leadership in the

12 college/university area and our specific experience under

13 the Excel. I think it's time to sort of blow up the

14 regulatory program and I guess I'm offering the

15 college/university to be a willing partner. So, as an

16 example, there's so many regulations, so many standards --

17 May I go another minute?

18 MR. HOAGLAND: Certainly.

19 MR. BALF: Okay. Is what is happening is, there's

20 conflicts from one requirement to the next, a number of

21 speakers have spoken to the resource burden that it imposes.

22 So, for example, the most inefficient building on a campus

23 where there's tremendous opportunities for energy

24 conversation, efficiency, you may not address because it may

25 open up the issue of it's built pre 1979, there may be PCB
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1 caulk, it's intact, there's no real exposure issue that

2 we're aware of and, yet, you don't want to open that up

3 because it could be a multi-million dollar remediation

4 expense, at what benefit.

5 New standards for NO2 under the new source

6 performance standard as they're affecting at least in

7 Massachusetts, emergency engines running 15 minutes a week,

8 have extraordinary costs that should be seen within the

9 context, well, what can we do at the facility level, at the

10 campus level, to minimize NO2, as opposed to this continued

11 racheting of max standards, following max standards, more

12 stringent standards following more stringent standards. 

13 What I would like to propose and we would be

14 interested in pursuing is a ecosystem systemwide permit

15 approach, you know, whether it's the Holy Grail or not, so

16 that we could evaluate the environmental impacts, other

17 college/universities operations and activities and, then,

18 development management mechanisms to drive down those

19 environmental impacts in a way that most effectively

20 utilizes the resources of a college or university, as well

21 as environmental agencies. I think that -- I'm not sure

22 whether there's at this point legislative authority to do

23 that, but, again, given our experience on the Excel, we

24 would be interested in finding a campus that would be

25 willing to try out that comprehensive model and see how it
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1 might work with a long-range plan of achieving that Holy

2 Grail. Thank you.

3 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Balf. Tom Philbin.

4 MR. PHILBIN: Hi. Thank you for having us. I'm

5 Tom Philbin from Mass. Municipal Association. I also serve

6 on the Sustainable Water Management Initiative and, also, on

7 the Water Infrastructure Compliance Commission. So, go to

8 these meetings three times a week, I think, I'm involved in

9 this. But, I just want to speak generally and, then, maybe,

10 a little bit about some specifics.

11 But, I want to compliment Stephen Perkins and the

12 crew here at EPA for listening to communities working them. 

13 They have -- They're being pushed from both sides with CLF,

14 Charles River Watershed, folks in the environmental

15 community and municipalities on one side. We all have the

16 same goal, however. We all have the same goal for clean

17 water for our communities, clean, safe drinking water. It's

18 how we got there that we have issues. Particularly, let me

19 just start with funding, because I know that's the big thing

20 that's out there.

21 We just had a new Congress come in, drinking

22 water's cut, waste water's cut. The funding is going down

23 and, you know, back in the '80s and the '70s communities had

24 75, 80 percent of their waste water treatment paid for by

25 the federal government, that's no longer the case. Now, you
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1 know, we just heard from Westborough, 50 million dollars. 

2 Mass. Municipal Association has had their number one issue

3 was municipal plan design, because communities are

4 struggling and they can't afford to meet their budgets. 

5 That's a hundred million dollars a year. Westborough along

6 is 50 million dollars. So, the costs of these regulations

7 to communities are huge.

8 The public doesn't understand and I have to fault

9 EPA here. In your MS4 permit guidelines, you have an

10 educational requirement for DPW directors, basically, to do,

11 I think there's six educational outreach. That's 351 cities

12 and towns that are sending 351 different messages to

13 residents, schools, businesses, all about stormwater

14 management. You need to come up with an easier way for

15 communities to do this. You need to have a website. You

16 need to be able to allow these communities to download

17 materials that they can then personalize to their own

18 community and figure out a way to allow them to get that out

19 to members of the community.

20 These guys -- and they're engineers and they're

21 dedicated guys, but they should not be trying to come up

22 with educational materials for sixth grade curriculum on

23 stormwater. It's crazy. It's a waste of their time. And,

24 EPA should have one consistent message about stormwater, and

25 it ought to be done by professionals, not by municipal
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1 folks. So, that's just an easy thing to do.

2 The other thing is lab testing. You're requiring

3 now nutrient testing on stormwater. We do it on waste

4 water. All these communities have to go out there and pay

5 for these tests. They can be literally thousands and

6 thousands of dollars. There should be a more efficient

7 manner for EPA to be able to assist communities on testing

8 those nutrient levels coming out.

9 Other things, dam removal, you ought take a look

10 at a holistic approach here. Communities are being required

11 to in stream meet those nutrient levels. But, there's dam

12 out there -- I believe we have about a thousand dams in

13 Massachusetts that are blocking flow and building up the

14 nutrient level and those need to be looked at.

15 The other thing with the MS4 permits. We've been

16 working on these for a few years now, but you have an NOI in

17 there, a notice of intent that these communities have to

18 start within 90 days. They basically said they're going to

19 fulfill everything in the permit required of them. That's

20 really difficult. You have to go to town meeting and you

21 have to meet budgets. All of a sudden, you're the DPW

22 director or the engineer and you have to sign off saying

23 you'll meet those requirements and you can't even get the

24 funding because you haven't been able to go to town meeting. 

25 So, that's another one and you may have to have have a 2 1/2
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1 override just to get there.

2 You know, there's simple things that can be done. 

3 And, I'm not a scientist on this, but banning phosphorus in

4 fertilizers, there's something that's easy. It could take

5 the burden off municipalities on the nutrient levels. I

6 don't know the numbers on that, but it seems like a simple

7 thing.

8 So, like I said, the efficiencies, the budget

9 limitations and public education.

10 One more thing real quick, I know I'm almost done

11 my time. But, I sat in a Chapter 90 meeting the other day

12 and this is -- this is money for just repaving streets after

13 this horrible winter we had. So, CLF testified, some other

14 folks, the goal here is to take, I believe, five percent out

15 of Chapter 90 money, which is right now just used for

16 repaving streets, to go in and to do the complete streets. 

17 Now, if you take a look at complete streets, they want to do

18 double sidewalks on both streets, so you can have

19 alternative access, I understand that. But, in Franklin,

20 they're actually ripping up sidewalks in order to meet the

21 stormwater permit limits. So, somebody's got to -- EPA,

22 federal designed guidelines, the Federal Highway

23 Administration Authority, you guys need to work together

24 with the environmental community to come up with guidelines

25 that are not juxtaposed to funding that are contradicting
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1 one another. You sit in these meetings and you say, okay.

2 We've got to argue this or that.

3 The other requirement is, okay, we add streets on

4 both sides. Now, the EPA is requiring us to sweep twice a

5 year the sidewalks. So, that was not in the last permit,

6 that's in the new permit. That's a cost. Communities don't

7 even have street sweepers that clean sidewalks. They have

8 to go purchase that equipment, using Chapter 90 money, which

9 should be used for repaving.

10 So, that's my rant. I will do written comments

11 from Mass. Municipal that will be much more concise. But, I

12 just wanted to mention those things real quick. Thank you

13 very much.

14 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Philbin. Are there

15 any other -- anyone else that cares to make a comment? We

16 have Roger on deck, too.

17 MS. NELSON: If I could come up again.

18 MR. HOAGLAND: Okay. How about we let -- Roger is

19 okay, he's deferring to you. If you could just state your

20 name, again.

21 MS. NELSON: Yes. Valerie Nelson, Water Alliance. 

22 Yes. Thank you again for a little bit more time. And, I

23 just have to say that this is such a complicated question

24 that it's hard to try to capture all of it.

25 But, going back to the regulatory impediment in
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1 the United States, I think it's widely understood that

2 that's probably the biggest problem in the inability of this

3 country to move in the sustainability directions that other

4 countries are doing. And, in the State of the Union

5 address, President Obama talked about the challenge and

6 opportunities to the United States to out innovate. And, I

7 think it's widely understood in United States that we still

8 maintain some of the best talent in the science and

9 engineering. But, where we go, you hear that we just can't

10 build this stuff in this country because of the regulations.

11 So, you have these crazy situations where MIT, for example,

12 is getting substantial amounts of money from Singapore,

13 sending faculty over there and it's just one of many, many

14 examples, to build integrated new systems and new

15 technology.

16 So, what is it going to take to out innovate in

17 the water sector in this country as the president put out

18 there for energy and health care and other systems.

19 Is the managing the innovation, the managing of

20 the risk that I think is the challenge to regulators. I

21 have to say I'm not a regulator and I'm not a lawyer, so I'm

22 kind of giving the perspective from other directions, that's

23 how I see the challenge.

24 There's a illusion that regulations and standards

25 and enforcement and money are protecting America and that is
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1 being very much stripped away. It's a high risk approach to

2 continue with the current ways we're doing things. Glen

3 Geiger, who is the senior vice president of CH2 and now the

4 president of International Water Association, has stated so

5 boldly as to say that in the water field, it is far riskier

6 to continue doing what we're doing, than to take on the risk

7 of trying new things. George Hawkins from the DC Water and

8 Sewer Authority, he says, this whole enterprise of trying to

9 innovate is like you're in a 747 trying to change the whole

10 plane in flight. It's not easy.

11 But, I would like to endorse that campus proposal. 

12 I think at a minimum what regulators need to really think

13 about is, how to allow spaces to emerge in this country

14 where innovation can begin to be brought into play. A

15 campus is probably an ideal place. Allow for the hallmarks

16 of this are, again, you know Philadelphia, but it's even

17 larger than that. Integrated systems. Look at water, waste

18 water, stormwater, energy, solid waste, everything, it's in

19 that integrated synergy that the break throughs are starting

20 to appear.

21 Allow for multiple benefit considerations. No

22 more silo regulations. You know, we're getting here for a

23 very broad description of environmental and public health

24 protection. Get those defined and allow those communities

25 to do that.
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1 And, finally, provide for the capability to try

2 out new technologies without penalizing the entity if they

3 don't work. It's that risk avoidance that pervades

4 municipalities and permitted authorities now, where they are

5 unwilling to try these new technologies, because of the fear

6 that there'll be some sort of penalty if it doesn't work. 

7 That has to go away.

8 I'd like to offer that Cape Cod is actually a

9 tremendous opportunity for creating spaces for innovation

10 and regulators have to step up and set the parameters and

11 guidelines for how that innovation can emerge, because the

12 flaws in the current approach are so obvious down there,

13 it's a siloed a conventional technology, minimal science at

14 a huge cost.

15 That is not the way of the future. How can

16 regulators allow towns where these desires are coming up to

17 take that multiple benefit, integrate its system science

18 based and innovate a technology approach. And, EPA really

19 could step in and provide a regulatory framework and Lisa

20 Jackson has actually called it science based and adaptive

21 management. Your own administrator has said on the record,

22 we can't continue in water doing things the old way. How

23 does EPA propose to have a regulatory framework for a town

24 like Falmouth, where they're having meetings every week now

25 saying, we want to do pilot projects, we want to look at
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1 this in a different way.

2 But, how can a regulation structure their process

3 of adaptive management as Lisa Jackson has said, so that

4 over time there's a continuous learning process and new

5 technologies are streamed in to achieve more benefits. So,

6 I think that kind of pilot. You know, in education, we call

7 it a charter school. How can EPA regulators set the stage

8 for a charter district in the kind of sustainable

9 twenty-first century, out innovate, get with the program

10 that's the rest of the world is on, zero footprint, create

11 value out of waste, integrate what you're after, use solid

12 science. How can the regulators step up to the leadership

13 role and work with those communities and campuses and cities

14 like Gloucester as well, that know that they system is

15 broken.

16 And, it's a little bit like an edifice that's

17 about to fall. I mean, the money isn't there. The

18 willingness to participate isn't there. And, the results

19 are not being delivered. So, the risk, again, of continuing

20 with the illusion that high standards, more money, more

21 enforcement, tight regulations, will protect this country. 

22 It has to be taken away and stripped there and the core

23 question is, how to allow the development of the new vision

24 which will affordably protect public health and the

25 environment by some of these new integrated resource
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1 recovery and other national systems, et cetera, that the

2 rest of the world is rapidly working on and developing.

3 So, that's the challenge for regulators. How do

4 we bring that energy -- And, I'm convinced, if we open it

5 up, this country has the science and the technology and the

6 communities, if the regulators figure this out, to open it

7 up, this country will innovate -- out innovate the rest of

8 the world. I hope you guys think about that and provide the

9 leadership. Thank you.

10 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you. Okay. Thank you.

11 MR. FRYMIRE: I'll try to keep it under ten

12 minutes with the rest of my comments. My name is

13 F-r-y-m-i-r-e, Roger Frymire.

14 I was speaking about SSO's, CSO's versus

15 stormwater. The one thing that I'd like to see, what I

16 think really does -- could have an effect in changing

17 regulations is, I'd like to find away to remove the

18 financial incentive to pollute. However, I don't want to go

19 fining these cash strapped cities for, you know, every time

20 they have a CSO overflow, or and SSO overflow. I don't want

21 that to be a cost to them, cause I want every bit of money

22 they have to be put into fixing the problem, just like you

23 do. But, at the moment, if you fine a city or the MWRA,

24 that money goes into the general fund, as I understand.

25 But, that means that under the current CSO
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1 permits, there's really still a financial incentive for

2 cities to, well, let some of that sewage go into their storm

3 drains, cause that way it doesn't go to the MWRA, they have

4 to pay for it. And, for the MWRA, over the last 12 years,

5 approximately twice a year on average, they've had sanitary

6 sewer overflows in the main MWRA system from rain events. I

7 wouldn't call those SSO's. That's much too often to be

8 called an SSO. Those are CSO's that some how got ignored in

9 the Boston Harbor clean up process and are under some

10 nebular SSO classification. But, there's no financial

11 disincentive for that.

12 I'd like to see -- There's a reporting requirement

13 and they've been very good lately about actually reporting

14 their SSO's. But, if there was some way to charge money for

15 polluting our waters and that money got directly pointed

16 back towards fixing the problems that were the base causing

17 that pollution. For MWRA SSO's, that's inflow way up in the

18 system, up in Burlington and Stoneham. There's so much

19 extra stormwater getting into the separated sewers that

20 before you even get down to the combined sewer areas of the

21 MWRA, there's SSO's occurring. It's just not right. The

22 financial incentive to pollute in both municipal and the

23 authority level that needs to be removed.

24 Another thing that comes to my mind, I was very

25 glad to see the fellow representing the universities. I
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1 live near the Charles River, halfway between Harvard and MIT

2 and they both have a lot of impervious surface. They both

3 have extensive playing fields which I assume are fertilized

4 and lead to a lot of phosphorus going into the river, but

5 they don't have MS4 permits. I would like to see some way

6 for campuses in particular, or maybe anyone with large yards

7 or playing fields, once you get over five acres of flat

8 mowed lawn, whether there is a football field, or a national

9 monument, there should be some permitted way to control the

10 amount of phosphorus going onto that and, then, getting

11 directly, unfortunately, washed into our waterways.

12 The last comment I have here, I'm going to hit

13 under five minutes this time, is, I was very glad to see the

14 ways you were able to work with the power plant next to the

15 Longfellow Bridge. I forget what their new name is. It

16 used to be Mirant, then Exelon and they're something else

17 now. But, you were able to work with them and find a way to

18 use the excess heat which has been driving all that

19 phosphorus in the river, into causing cyato bacteria blooms

20 and they're going to be recapturing a lot of that heat and

21 selling it as steam, so that buildings downtown don't have

22 to burn natural gas for their air conditioning systems. 

23 That's going to be a big win all around. I just wish that

24 one of their earlier plans of using some of their hot water

25 discharge on the bottom of the river to stir the river up,
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1 to circulate it, I wish that could have come to pass,

2 because all the phosphorus in the bottom sediments there

3 need to be washed out into the ocean some how, instead of

4 continually being recycled into the cyato bacteria every

5 year. And, with the dead zone we have along the river in

6 the lower Charles River Basin, because there's not that

7 mixing, we don't have the binals, the mussels and clams

8 which normally populate bottom sediment in a river like

9 that, and would clean it out.

10 Well, thank you very much. I hope you can

11 translate a few of my comments into regulatory suggestions. 

12 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you. We're not at the end of

13 the hearing. We're going to say open till one o'clock, if

14 anybody else has anything to add. We'll keep a panel as

15 well. I guess we'll sit tight.

16 (Whereupon, a recess was taken.)

17 MR. HOAGLAND: We're on for one comment.

18 MR. DRESSER: Can I just stand here and speak on

19 my own?

20 MR. HOAGLAND: Well, no. We'd like you to use a

21 microphone, so that Jeff can hear you. Todd Dresser.

22 MR. DRESSER: Hello. My name's Todd Dresser. I

23 thank you for this opportunity. After listening to the

24 comments this morning, I served as a municipal environmental

25 engineer for nearly 15 years here in Massachusetts. I've
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1 since had the opportunity to work with a number of

2 communities on environmental management.

3 During my time in Burlington, Massachusetts, I

4 work actively with EPA's municipal groups. At that time, I

5 actually did a lot of local potassium build up. Worked

6 together on a lot of training that they did, targeting

7 municipal government, promoting environmental compliance,

8 environmental management. Basically, EPA personnel at that

9 time identified a number of good programs occurring around

10 the region and helped get the word out. It was very

11 effective in promoting synergy, promoting useful,

12 productive, cost effective environmental compliance,

13 pollution prevention strategies.

14 Since leaving the public sector and going to the

15 private sector, I've realized that those same lessons still

16 need to be learned. Municipal government typically could

17 not have compliance staff on board. They don't have a very

18 strong understanding of rules and regulations, or the

19 opportunities for the inexpensive coaches and strategies

20 that exist and have been successful elsewhere.

21 I would urge EPA to consider putting together

22 annual training programs targeting municipalities, teaching

23 public groups how they can work together and assist each

24 other. An example I offer up, I have been helping the Town

25 of Hollis, New Hampshire with their stormwater program. 
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1 Everybody talks about the cost of analysis, sample

2 collection their outfalls. We partnered with the Nashua

3 River Watershed Association. The town had been contributing

4 funds to support sampling of that program for years. 

5 Basically, they just never collected the data which they

6 could then use to comply with their stormwater permit. They

7 were not aware of the connection.

8 But, these are simple things that are occurring. 

9 But, I think EPA could serve as a conduit and point this out

10 and help people out.

11 There's a lot of talk about trying to work at a

12 campus or a watershed strategy. A state like Massachusetts

13 where we have 351 towns that are very proud of their

14 individuality, that's going to be a challenge. We don't

15 have a county system. But, we do have regional planning

16 organizations, MAPC, Metropolitan Area Planning Commission. 

17 You have other ones across the state. You also have them

18 across New Hampshire. Those are potential partners to work

19 with. I would urge you to consider. You have Health

20 Communities Grant Program. There's one coming up right now. 

21 There's one in September. That's an avenue for you to reach

22 out to the public, put together environmental boot camp

23 program, whatever you want to call it, two or three day

24 session. Give incentives for municipalities to send staff

25 to come to a two to three day training course. You do it
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1 for your own staff, provide it to these people.

2 I think you can get improvements in stormwater

3 management, explain and highlight some of the successes that

4 have occurred in our NPDES. You go down to the

5 Mid-Atlantic, there's so much information available there. 

6 A lot of that could be transferred up here. You could look

7 at schools, you could look at EHS compliance at highway

8 garages. I would also look at redevelopment or development,

9 how you can use -- you can use the development process to

10 support stormwater protection, hazardous materials

11 management, emergency planning. I know because I did that

12 in Burlington and it can be done, it can be accomplished.

13 But, the key is, a lot of these people don't know

14 where to begin. They need some help and, yes, they're

15 running around doing a million different things, short

16 staffed, under funded. A lot of things that I was able to

17 accomplish, I did without a budget increase. And, a lot of

18 it is being made aware of information, being provided some

19 helpful tips and education. I would urge you to consider

20 that. Thank you.

21 MR. HOAGLAND: Thank you, Mr. Dresser. Are there

22 any other comments?

23 (No response.)

24 MR. HOAGLAND: I think we'll go back into recess,

25 then. If there are any further comments, we'll reconvene
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1 again.

2 (Whereupon, a recess was taken and the hearing was

3 concluded at 1:00 p.m.)
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CERTIFICATE OF REPORTER AND TRANSCRIBER

This is to certify that the attached proceedings

before: U.S. ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

in the Matter of:

RE: REGULATORY LISTENING SESSION

Place: Boston, Massachusetts

Date: March 21, 2011

were held as herein appears, and that this is the true,

accurate and complete transcript prepared from the notes

and/or recordings taken of the above entitled proceeding.

J. Mocanu 03/21/11

Reporter Date

B. Breen 03/23/11

Transcriber Date