7795

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 7795
• Author: Natural Resources Law Center.
• Title: America's Waters
• USFW Year: 1992.
• USFW - Doc Type: A New Era of Sustainability, Report of the Long's Peak Working Group on National Water Policy, Objectives and Initiatives.
• Copyright Material: NO

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A cenual objective of the Clean Watlr Act - to
restOre and maimain the chemical. Ptysical and biological
inlepity of the nation's waaers - remains unfulfilled.
Clean water is essential to the health and well being of
people and ecosyswns. It is neceaary for economic security
and sustainability. Despire some progress. many obstaCles
5land in the way of maintaining high quality water. Serious
remaining problems include: poorly controlled pollured
nmotf (nonpoim source discharges) - which accowus for
half of national pollution loads; failwe to inregrate land and
waler management; fragmented regulatory responsibility;
inadequate water quality standards and lax enforcement; and
inadequate attention to ecosystem prorection.

EQUITY AND PARTICIPATION IN
DECISIONMAKING

Federal and state water policy often has exacted
extraordinary social costs. Indian tribes have been prevented
from receiving the benefits of federal water development in
spite of promises made in treaties and die trust obligation of
the United States. Traditional Hispanic communities have
seen their acequias and traditional panems of water manage-
ment and use overwhelmed by Slate and federal water laws
and policies. Millions of people in the South have seen
fishing and hunting habitat vanish as wetlands have disap-
peared. Numerous nual communities. especially in die
West. have had their water supplies tr3nSpOned out of their
watersheds to wban centers.

Much of the citizenry as a whole bas been excluded
from the making of water policy. The key decisions have
been made by large water organizations and their lawyers.
engineers. and lobbyists. The field is widely perceived as
too complex and forbidding for participation by ordinary
citizens. Environmental grouPS. fannworkers organizations.
and advocacy organizations representing poor people have
provided a vital, though incomplete. remedy for this continu-
ing problem of under-representation.

General Principles

· Warer quality problems can best be managed on a
waaershed basis.

. Real improvement of the quality of1he nation's
waters requires aggressive action to deal with pol-
luted runoff.

. Warer quality protection includes and depends on
protection and restoration of aquatic ecosystems.

· Pollution should be prevented at its source.

· EffeCtive water quality management requires actions
based on the essential link between water quality and
water quantity.

· Water quality protection programs should emphasize
integrated resource planning and funding arrange-
ments tied to the achievement of water quality goals.

General Principles

· The federal govenunem should acknowledge and
fulfill the special trust relationship with Indian tribes.

· Decisionmaking should include all affected interest
groups.

· Decisionmaking bodies should provide the public
with readily understood infonnation and analysis.

· Where a tranSition from old to new values demands
reallocation of water from existing uses. ~ equities
of people with existing uses established under lawful
prior policies should be respected.

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