U.S. Congress - S.787 Clean Water Restoration Act
S.787 - Clean Water Restoration Act
A bill to amend the Federal Water Pollution Control Act to clarify the jurisdiction of the United States over waters of the United States. view all titles (3)
All Bill Titles
- Official: A bill to amend the Federal Water Pollution Control Act to clarify the jurisdiction of the United States over waters of the United States. as introduced.
- Short: Clean Water Restoration Act as introduced.
- Short: Clean Water Restoration Act as reported to senate.
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Displaying 1-30 of 49 total comments.
This is a terrible bill that would give the Federal govt. jurisdiction over anything that is wet including seasonal mud flats. This means that the Feds could enter into your property and dictate what you can do with your land.
It also means that the Great Lake States and Provinces could not protect the Great Lakes from being pumped dry to feed the growth of California and the Southwest. In particularly that area, Feingold has sold out his own state: Wisconsin.
trying to squeeze out farmers and ranchers?
This stinks of big business funding
How about large corporations pumping toxins into waterways?
This bill to me is about controlling pollution from large industrial companies more than small farms and ranches.
Maybe that is what it is intended for but what I don’t think that you understand on the farmer/rancher’s part is that the change in this bills wording,(changing the word navigable to US Waters), would allow the EPA to have control of basically all waters in the US, including farm ponds or cattle watering ponds. And what worries us about that is the fact that the EPA is basically unregulated, I am meaning that there is no one that really controls them. This means that the EPA could require every pond, slough, stream, creek, basically every body of water to have buffer strips, setbacks of so many feet, etc. They could do almost anything that they want, and quite frankly I do not think that many at the EPA have any idea what some of these things could mean for farms and ranches.
Jason
Agronomist/Farm Supplier
This is very dangerous legislation. I am appalled this was even introduced.
This is Federal Land Grabbing…Trust the Goverment,Ask the Native Americans.
http://www.brasschecktv.com/page/625.html
About regulation, not ownership.
You own the water way, but you do not have the right to do as you please to the water. Eventually that water will end up in other waterways. This bill is about pollution and polluters and regulating what they can do to waterways, not a land grab.
Bills such as these are why we need term limits on senate and representatives. Also random drug testing every quarter. I really think that senators and representatives should not be full time work. Part time have another career in the private sector. Too much time on their hands, too much tyranny.
THIS BILL IS PROOF OF A BLATANT TAKEOVER! how can this be introduced!!??!?!?!? everything “wet” (even on your own private property) is handed over to the fed as control? are you kidding? what about the right to property? this is COMMUNIST & TOTALITARIAN.
PLEASE spread this bill to everyone you know and advise them the impacts. vote NO!
this is not a joke!
Having worked in industry for many years I have noticed the expansion of federal jurisdiction from “navigable waters” to all waters of the United States. The bill further sanctions the expansion of powers. The Army Corps of Engineers has become a major obstacle for any use of lands that are even near a stream or a mudflat. This bill would make the situation worse by increasing delays for new projects whether they be industrial, commercial, agricultural or residential. The Corps is understaffed for even the current workload. The bill is shaping up to be another unfunded mandate and an unnecessary expansion of federal powers.
To all who have commented,
I must agree with you. Recently I have woken up to things that are truly scary for Americans. This Bill being one of them. Its shows you that America is not America anymore. Its becoming a Corporation more and more every day. Soon because of Bills like this we will not have control over anything we own or have worked hard for. I completely oppose this Bill and hope that it is rejected.
You need to be responsible for your runoff and pollution. This bill is very much needed. @Dcoery33 not voting for this bill is voting for Corporations. So many companies are getting away with polluting our waterways. They will say to vote no on this bill. They do not want to put in the measures needed to control their pollution. We need to protect fresh water, our wet lands and habitats from pollution at all cost.
One has to be in a state of wonderment as to how our elected officials continue to churn out one abomination like this after another. On top of that they pass these things without even reading them. This leads me to say, “kick them all out”. 2010 can’t come soon enough….
This is one of the biggest bureaucratic land grabs EVER! This infringes on personal property rights… Federalizing ALL water in the United States! With the bill giving the FDA regulatory power over small farmers and now this… very scary stuff.
By the way… does this include the water in my pool? If so, will the federal government sent a bureaucrat to clean my pool? I hope they don’t wear thongs! (I watch C-span- I’ve seen those guys)
What an insane bill!!! Mr. Feingold and co sponsors needs to retire – time for term limits – long over due! Also subject congressman and senators to same tax and health care costs as rest of America. Things would be very different!!!
There are already laws regarding pollution. This is a law designed to further regulate small farmers and personal property out of existence. It is designed to ENHANCE the consolodation and incorporation of large farming operations at the expense of the small traditional family farms. Despite the sunshine being blown up everyone’s pants, the ABUSE of the law has to be considered because THAT is how it will be enforced when politics become involved. Low income, effectively defenseless, farms and other small struggling businesses will be run out of business by these regulations because they will not have the income and resources to accomodate and incorporate them inth their operations. Large corporations have been hiding behind these same sorts of regulations for years to create an unfair environment that prevents new competition from being created or growing to become a threat.
This Bill is not constitutional.
That is why Dr. Ron Paul is NOT a co-sponsor.
This Bill is a piece of trash, just like the cap-and-trade/tax bill is a piece of trash.
Whoever votes for this Bill is a Marxist.
Measure every Bill against the Constitution and the way to vote will be VERY easy…..NO
Start supporting and following the Constitution.
Throw this Bill out the window.
I would be really impressed if Ron Paul sponsored a Senate bill. Also, I would appreciate you defining what a Marxist is. I don’t recall there being anything about clean water in the Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844 or his German Ideology of 1845. Certainly, the environment didn’t make it into Das Kapital. As for why you think this bill is unconstitutional, I would love to hear more.
This Bill is laughable. This is either another attempt to stifle our property rights or an attempt to put more unenforceable legislation on the books. Either way, the Bill sponsors should be ashamed of themselves.
If they want my rainwater, come and get it! They won’t have my vote……or my water in the end!
Before you panic, or pass on the received wisdom from some politician or PAC, read the darn bill, and look over the history. Have you read sections 3-13, 3-14, and all of section 6? If so, you’ll see that existing agricultural use is exempted from this bill (and regulated, as always, by a different set of regulations). And the states retain control over the land and the waterways—they can meet federal standards as they (and their citizens) see fit.
This bill resets the status quo to the way it was from 1972 through 2000 (or really, through 2005, when the Rapanos / SWANCC decision upset 30 years of interpretation and introduced an entirely novel redefinition of the law as applying only to navigable waterways).
If you feel we were a Communist nation until 2000, your inflated rhetoric about this “land grab” is consistent. If, like most US citizens, you feel that the USA was the USA during this period, you might want to moderate your reactions.
BTW, This bill is not an anti-rain-barrel bill. It’s not about the low spot on your back 40 (which is already exempted under the “pre-existing agriculture” clause). The wording about seeps and intermittent streams exists because there are states where the land is so dry that basically all ponds and streams dry up for at least a few weeks of the year—or even a few months—yet those streams and ponds are the key water source for people and animals.
If you want to improve this bill, ask your legislator to include further clarifications, so that legitimate protections for wetlands and for “resource” intermittent streams and ponds is even more clearly NOT directed at every low spot that briefly holds water in a moist area of the country.
I don’t know if anyone has ever heard of a watershed but every little river and stream that some of you folks think it is so dangerous to protect eventually flows into a larger body of water, soaks into an underground aquifer, reservoirs, etc where we get our drinking water… or it runs into the Ocean where we fish and swim. This bill will benefit public health and the health of the environment. We only have so much water on this earth and we cannot create more. In NJ, for example 3 out of every 4 bodies of water are too polluted to fish or swim in. Thank God Obama is fixing all of Bush’s dangerous and scary environmental policy by reinstoring the initial intention of the Clean Water Act.
This is absolutely critical legislation. Businesses continue to exploit the language of the Clean Water Act by dumping their waste into those areas undefined by the original bill. All of this ends up in our drinking water.
If you think this is irrelevant to you, the New York Times released a feature on toxic water in the US. Please read it, and use the interactive feature that will show you exactly what businesses are responsible for contaminating the water in your community.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/us/13water.html?_r=1&hp
http://projects.nytimes.com/toxic-waters/polluters
I don’t think many of you understand the intent of the bill.
Many of the corporations you are blaming for this bill are getting away with environmentally destructive practices because the government only has jurisdiction over “navigable waters” and so they can dump their mining waste and other harmful materials as “fill” into areas where it can flow into a larger water source.
The government neither cares about controlling homeowners property or that of small rancher nor does it have the resources to do so.
This bill was introduced as a method to curb mountaintop removal, which is a very destructive form of mining which ruins the natural beauty of the appalaichians and I support this bill.
You call it a corporate interest bill or a marxist landgrab but that is just retarded. It doesnt GIVE all water to the federal govt, just the right to make laws regarding that water.
The bill is alone is prima facie evidense of how corrupt our ‘representatives’ are for it is unconstitutional at its very foundation. Similar to the concept of eminent domain, it is nothing more than the government attempting, once again, to take control of private property.
The government does NOT have the constitutional right to make laws regarding water, kbthiede! The very act of introducing this bill is an act of treason (read Constitutional law Title 18, US Code Sec.2381)
“In the presents of two or more witnesses of the same overt act, or in an open court of law, if you fail to timely move to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States and honor your oath of office, you are subject to the charge of capitol felony treason.”
The sponsor of this bill has done just that!
Yes, the congress has the power to regulate water, as it can have a cumulative effect on the interstate commerce. Throwing loaded words like “treason” around because you disagree is simply dangerous hyperbole designed to incite. Buy a constitution and a dictionary before you accuse our duly elected representatives of fabricated crimes.