IV 

116TH CONGRESS 

2D SESSION H. RES. 797 

Encouraging the Environmental Protection Agency to maintain and strengthen requirements under the Clean Water Act and reverse ongoing administrative actions to weaken this landmark law and protections for United 

States waters. 

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

JANUARY 14, 2020 

Mrs. DINGELL (for herself, Mr. PAPPAS, Ms. NORTON, Ms. KUSTER of New 

Hampshire, Mr. ROUDA, Mr. LOWENTHAL, Mr. HUFFMAN, Mr. 

ESPAILLAT, Ms. TLAIB, Ms. MOORE, Mr. MORELLE, Mr. GRIJALVA, Mr. 

GARCI ́A of Illinois, Mrs. NAPOLITANO, Mr. LIPINSKI, Ms. BLUNT ROCHESTER, Mr. CARTWRIGHT, Mr. RUPPERSBERGER, Mr. CLAY, Mr. CASTEN

of Illinois, Mr. MALINOWSKI, Mr. DANNY K. DAVIS of Illinois, Mrs. 

HAYES, Mr. COHEN, Ms. HAALAND, Mr. JOHNSON of Georgia, Ms. PINGREE, Mr. FOSTER, Mr. KHANNA, Ms. CASTOR of Florida, Ms. 

BROWNLEY of California, Ms. MCCOLLUM, Mr. SOTO, Mr. BLUMENAUER, 

Mrs. BEATTY, Mr. VARGAS, Mr. POCAN, Mr. SUOZZI, Mr. QUIGLEY, Mr. 

MCGOVERN, Ms. SLOTKIN, Mr. CONNOLLY, Ms. JAYAPAL, Mr. CARSON

of Indiana, Ms. ROYBAL-ALLARD, Ms. VELA ́ZQUEZ, Mr. CASE, Mr. LARSEN of Washington, Mr. TAKANO, Mr. SMITH of Washington, Mr. HASTINGS, Mr. NEAL, Mr. LYNCH, Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi, Mr. COOPER, Mr. KENNEDY, Mr. KILDEE, Mr. MCEACHIN, Mr. DEFAZIO, Ms. 

STEVENS, Mr. RASKIN, Mr. NADLER, Mr. HIGGINS of New York, Mr. 

SCOTT of Virginia, Ms. BARRAGA ́N, Mr. NEGUSE, Mr. PRICE of North 

Carolina, Mr. MOULTON, Mr. SIRES, Mr. BROWN of Maryland, Ms. 

WILD, Ms. WEXTON, Mrs. TRAHAN, Ms. MUCARSEL-POWELL, and Ms. 

MENG) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the 

Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure 

RESOLUTION 

Encouraging the Environmental Protection Agency to maintain and strengthen requirements under the Clean Water 


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Act and reverse ongoing administrative actions to weaken 

this landmark law and protections for United States 

waters. 

Whereas access to clean water is a fundamental human right; 

Whereas the Federal Water Pollution Control Act was enacted into law in 1948; 

Whereas the Federal Water Pollution Control Act Amendments of 1972 were enacted with bipartisan support and 

significantly reorganized and expanded the law, from 

then on commonly known as the Clean Water Act; 

Whereas the Clean Water Act is one of the most important 

laws in the United States and the Nation’s principal safeguard against unregulated pollution or destruction of 

United States surface waters; 

Whereas the Clean Water Act’s objective is to ‘‘restore and 

maintain the chemical, physical, and biological integrity 

of the Nation’s waters’’, and it declared national goals of 

eliminating the discharge of pollutants into the waters of 

the United States by 1985 and, wherever attainable, ensuring that waters were fishable and swimmable by 1983; 

Whereas the Clean Water Act provides strong and comprehensive requirements for the control of pollutants in 

the Nation’s waters; 

Whereas the Clean Water Act authorizes Federal financial 

assistance for building and upgrading municipal sewage 

treatment plants and other types of water quality improvements projects; 

Whereas rivers, streams, lakes, ponds, wetlands, and other 

waters have enormous public health, community welfare, 


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economic, and ecological importance to the United States, 

considering— 

(1) one in three people in the United States receives 

drinking water from systems that draw supply from 

headwater, intermittent, or ephemeral streams; 

(2) according to an Environmental Protection Agency report, streams provide the majority of water to most 

rivers and ‘‘transport sediment, wood, organic matter, 

nutrients, chemical contaminants, and many of the organisms found in rivers’’; 

(3) chemical, physical, and biological processes in 

streams can convert nitrogen and other nutrients, preventing them from causing downstream harm; 

(4) wetlands prevent and minimize flooding by storing as much as 1,000,000 to 1,500,000 gallons of water 

per acre; 

(5) wetlands and other waters in the floodplains of 

rivers and streams help prevent pollution from reaching 

downstream waters; 

(6) three-quarters of fish harvested commercially depend on wetlands; 

(7) the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 

report that ‘‘[a]bout 91 million people over the age of 16 

swim in oceans, lakes, and rivers each year in the United 

States’’; 

(8) approximately 37 percent of water withdrawals, 

or 118,000,000,000 gallons per day, are used for irrigation, with 52 percent of that amount being taken from 

surface waters; 

(9) a recent study estimated that wetlands worldwide provide ecosystem services, like flood prevention and 

pollution filtration, worth more than 

$47,000,000,000,000 per year; 


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(10) fishing and other water sports contribute 

$175,000,000,000 annually to the American economy and 

support more than 1,500,000 jobs; 

(11) companies often need clean water in their industrial processes or as a component of their end product, such as craft beer brewers that depend on a reliable 

source of clean water and add approximately 

$76,000,000,000 annually to the national economy while 

supporting more than 500,000 jobs; 

(12) according to one study, the ecological restoration economy, which includes mitigation for harms to 

waters due to discharges of dredged or fill material, ‘‘directly employs∼126,000 workers and generates∼$9.5 billion in economic output’’ per year, which ‘‘supports an 

additional 95,000 jobs and $15 billion in economic output 

through indirect (business-to-business) linkages and increased household spending’’; 

(13) over 318,000,000 people visited United States 

national parks to recreate and be inspired by thundering 

waterfalls, streaming geysers, desert springs, ocean 

beaches, and jeweled lakes, generating $40,000,000,000 

for the United States economy and over 330,000 private 

sector jobs; 

(14) Environmental Protection Agency reports that 

the Great Lakes contain ‘‘84% of North America’s surface fresh water’’ and ‘‘about 21% of the world’s supply 

of surface fresh water’’; 

(15) restoring and protecting the Great Lakes and 

their tributaries also protects a $6,000,000,000,000 regional economy and the 1,500,000 jobs and 

$62,000,000,000 in wages directly connected to the Great 

Lakes; and 


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(16) the Great Lakes and their tributaries also facilitate nearly $16,000,000,000 in annual spending by 

residents and the 37,000,000 hunters, anglers, bird 

watchers, and other tourists who visit the region for 

recreation; 

Whereas water pollution and the loss of water resources can 

cause catastrophic harm to communities’ health and economic strength, for example— 

(1) a harmful algal bloom in western Lake Erie in 

2014 prompting a three-day shutdown of Toledo, Ohio’s 

drinking water supply, affecting approximately 500,000 

people; 

(2) a spill of a toxic chemical into the Elk River in 

Charleston, West Virginia, causing drinking water for approximately 300,000 people to be cut off for several days; 

(3) outbreaks of blue-green algae and red tide in 

Florida causing widespread harm to businesses, and have 

killed substantial numbers of aquatic animals over multiple years, with 2018 being particularly severe; 

(4) the Tennessee Valley Authority’s coal ash waste 

pit near Kingston, Tennessee, experiencing a mammoth 

structural failure and releasing more than a billion tons 

of waste into the Emory and Clinch Rivers in 2008, and 

a 2019 analysis found that similar pits around the country routinely leak and contaminate nearby groundwater 

and surface waters; 

(5) beaches in multiple States, including Mississippi, 

New Jersey, Washington, and New York, being forced to 

close this year due to outbreaks of algae that are commonly fueled by nitrogen and phosphorus pollution; 

(6) intense flooding occurring in places, like Houston, Texas, where wetland destruction is believed to have 

contributed to the severity of the flooding; and 


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(7) many areas of the United States are expected to 

experience worsened drought conditions with climate 

change, making preservation of water resources more 

critical; 

Whereas the Clean Water Act dramatically slowed the rate of 

wetlands loss in the United States, from more than half 

a million acres annually in the 1950s to approximately 

80,000 acres annually in the late 1990s; 

Whereas the quality of numerous water bodies has substantially improved since the adoption of the Clean Water 

Act, including the Charles River in Massachusetts, the 

Chesapeake Bay, and the Great Lakes; 

Whereas despite the improvements brought about by the 

Clean Water Act, the United States still faces major 

water resource and pollution challenges, including— 

(1) according to the most recent State data submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency— 

(A) 53 percent of assessed rivers and streams 

do not meet one or more water quality standards, 

which are established to ensure waters are clean 

enough for specific uses like fishing and swimming; 

(B) 71 percent of assessed lakes, reservoirs, 

and ponds are impaired; 

(C) 80 percent of assessed bays and estuaries 

are impaired; and 

(D) 72 percent of assessed coastal shoreline 

waters are impaired; and 

(2) the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 

report that the increasing frequency of harmful algal 

blooms is associated with increasing temperatures and 

levels of nutrients in United States waters; 


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Whereas the American Society of Civil Engineers’ 2017 Infrastructure Report Card gave the Nation’s wastewater 

infrastructure a grade of D+; 

Whereas the most recent Clean Watersheds Needs Survey report to Congress identified at least $271,000,000,000 in 

capital needs for wastewater, stormwater, and other clean 

water infrastructure; 

Whereas concerns about the condition of the Nation’s waters 

consistently rank as one of the most acute environmental 

worries, with 80 percent of respondents in a March 2019 

Gallup Poll indicating that they worry a great deal or a 

fair amount about pollution of rivers, lakes, and reservoirs; 

Whereas the United States Commission on Civil Rights recommended further study and analysis of Federal laws including the Clean Water Act to analyze gaps in civil 

rights protections, and found, ‘‘EPA’s definition of environmental justice recognizes environmental justice as a 

civil right, fair treatment and meaningful involvement of 

all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation, 

and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations and 

policies’’; 

Whereas Federal and State agencies have detected per- and 

polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), man-made chemicals 

that have known risks to human health and the environment, in tap water and groundwater in 49 States; 

Whereas experts estimate that more than 100,000,000 Americans may be exposed to drinking PFAS in their tap 

water and it continues to be a growing emerging contamiVerDate Sep 11 2014 20:53 Jan 14, 2020 Jkt 099200 PO 00000 Frm 00007 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6300 E:\BILLS\HR797.IH HR797

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nant nationwide that threatens clean water in the United 

States; 

Whereas the Environmental Protection Agency has initiated 

numerous administrative actions that collectively would 

eviscerate the Clean Water Act and other safeguards for 

clean water, including— 

(1) repealing science-based protections for streams, 

wetlands, and other waters, and excluding millions of 

miles of streams and tens of millions of acres of wetlands 

from the Clean Water Act’s pollution control programs; 

(2) easing restrictions on wastewater plants to authorize them to release partially treated sewage during 

rainstorms; 

(3) refusing to develop regulations mandated by the 

Clean Water Act aimed at avoiding and minimizing spills 

of hazardous substances; 

(4) weakening rules about siting, operating, monitoring, and closing pits where coal ash and other coal 

combustion waste is dumped; 

(5) exempting polluters who harm waterways if their 

discharge first travels through groundwater from the 

Clean Water Act’s discharge permitting program; 

(6) restricting Environmental Protection Agency experts’ authority under the Clean Water Act to stop 

dumping projects that cause unacceptable harms to water 

bodies; 

(7) delaying and weakening toxic pollution discharge 

limits for powerplants; and 

(8) curtailing States’ and Tribal Nations’ rights 

under the Clean Water Act to review federally permitted 

projects and impose conditions or reject the project, as 

appropriate, to prevent harm to their waterways; and 


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Whereas the United States remains far from achieving the 

objective of the Clean Water Act, putting at risk critical 

resources that provide enormous value to the country, 

and the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed actions would substantially worsen those conditions: Now, 

therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That the House of Representatives encour2 ages the Environmental Protection Agency to— 

3 (1) maintain and strengthen, not attack, re4 quirements that keep United States waterways 

5 clean; 

6 (2) end any ongoing administrative actions to 

7 weaken existing Clean Water Act regulations and 

8 other requirements protecting the Nation’s waters; 

9 and 

10 (3) initiate actions to reverse any already-com11 pleted administrative actions that weaken the Fed12 eral Government’s implementation of the Clean 

13 Water Act and other requirements protecting the 

14 Nation’s waters. 

Æ 


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