Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Good morning. I'm Tony Cruz. Michael Washburn is the executive
(00:03):
director of the Kentucky Waterways Alliance and he joins us
this morning. Mister Washburn, good morning.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Good morning.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
I'm doing just great. You're not doing so great because
Centerbill eighty nine passed overwhelmingly in the Senate and is
now a bill. Governor Bisher tried to veto it but
was al maneuvered there. So what do you think about
this bill? What is first of all, define it for us?
(00:29):
And then what are your concerns?
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yeah, yeah, it is. It's bad news for all of us,
I think so. Senate Bill eighty nine was a bit
of a legislation now law that was going to redefine
what is known as waters of the Commonwealth to be
in alignment with what is known as waters of the US.
Those are two rules that governs what lake, streams, ponds,
rivers are deserving a protection. Water is the US is
(00:55):
a federal rule, what is the Commonwealth of the state rule?
That sounds kind of jargoning, belong and sort of it is.
SB eighty nine effectively pulls all of the ground water
in the state out of environmental permitting and protections, which
puts at risk the drinking water supplies of well over
a million Kentuckians.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
So why doesn't the why don't the federal laws pertain here?
And what's what did they not have or do that
now has been taken away or not been t away,
but the state law made it a little tighter.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
I guess, yeah, yeah, it's uh, well it actually it's
a good question. The federal waters, the US Rule and
the Clean Water Act are there to protect what are
known as navigable waters. And in the context of that law,
what navigable waters means are interstate waters waters that are
considered federally navigable. We're talking to Ohio River, the Salt River,
(01:50):
the Green River, the Big Waterways. Everything else was left
for the states to protect. So what spaighty nine effectively
does is by saying that, oh, the waters of the
are now the same as waters of the US. It
has the effect of saying, well, our police can only
affect the only enforce the laws on our interstates, leaving
the back roads, the two lane roads. The surface treats
(02:13):
all out of protection. That's the difference. It doesn't frinkson
or narrow state protection so much as entirely seed jurisdictions.
The state has actually now become the only state in
the country to offer up the control over its own
waters for an overall controlling federal rule. It is disempowered
the state from controlling.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
So with that, this was Senator Scott mad and Madam
who from Pineville, who brought this out. He says, this
law ensures that Kentucky maintains authority over how we regulate
and protect our water while aligning our statues with long
standing federal standards. It does not diminish safeguards for drinking water,
ground water, or floodplains, which will remain fully protected under
(02:56):
state and federal law. So what's the beg.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
It's that it's categorically untrue the senator's misunderstanding the plain
language of his own bill. There, you cannot have the
protection on groundwater, for instance, in the state by adhering
solely to the Waters of the US, because the Waters
of the US rule, which is now the law throughout
(03:19):
all of Kentucky, does not protect groundwater. I mean, it's
you can't even I don't need to elaborate on anymore.
That's just an incorrect statement. It isn't tightening regulation. It's
entirely letting regulation goal is what it's doing in effect,
And this is going to sound like a theoretical argument,
but what it's it's very real and very very dangerous
(03:39):
for folks. It has defined groundwater of thermal streams, intermitten
strings outside of what it can even be considered the
environment in the state. So now there can be I
know that sounds like a legal but that's what the
law is. The law of defining things. SB eighty nine
does not include groundwater or affrimal strains under the state's
definition of the environment. Okay, for those don't, there can
(04:02):
be no pollution there. So therefore the crazy thing to.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
Say, well, so groundwater. Let's face it, I had no idea,
but apparently over a million people that still drink water
that they have to purify themselves and or have wells
or something of that nature, and you're concerned about what
poisoning these waters.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
Yeah. Yeah, there's absolutely no protection for private wells. I
believe there are four hundred and sixteen thousand families in
the Commonwealth that rely on private wells which pull from
groundwater for their drinking water supplies. There are no protections
for what happens for the headwaters of streams or for
the groundwater. Now, the Senator and his allies have said, well,
there are other protections, such as the Safe Drinking Water Act.
(04:45):
What that really regulates is the water as it comes
out of your tap and into your glass. If you're
pulling from a well, there are no protection. Or a
stream which a lot of rural water utilities rely on,
is groundwater from streams. The Safe Drinking Water Act has
control over effectively what comes from the tap and end
of your glass. It has no jurisdiction over what happens
(05:07):
before it gets into the pipes of the water utility.
And so if you're dealing with something like headwater, streams
and groundwater in a place like eastern Kentucky or in
the western coal fields places like that, if there is
runoff or the byproduct of certain sort of industrial production
that ends up fouling the groundwaters in the headwaters, then yeah,
(05:28):
you can use the jurisdiction of the Safe Drinking Water
Act to fix it. But it's going to be astronomically
more expensive and never entirely complete to clean the water
after its fouled.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
I'm going to ask you, why would anybody want to
endanger that kind of water. I mean, if what you're
saying is accurate here, I mean, I understand water runoff
we see down in Florida, for example, the algaie blooms.
It's part heat from the golf and all that kind
of thing. But now it's expanded. They've talked about agricultural
things that are making these plumes, the red tide and
(06:00):
all that kind of thing happened. Is this kind of
an effective way of kind of looking at it from
you know, if you went down to Florida for example.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, I mean it's all connected. So what happens with
the algebra, the agricultural impact on algae blooms, the sort
of nitrogen and phosphorus pollutions running off off the ground
into the water. Yeah, it's some ways. It's basically it's
a very basic principle. Everyone is downstream from something, and
hydrologically speaking, everything is all connected. The main emphasis behind
the bill was to loosen whatater known as buffer zone,
(06:31):
which is how much you can effectively do a bunch
of coal mining near headwater streams and epheral streams. So
they were wanting to reduce the size of buffer zones.
That was the impulse behind it. It isn't to poison people.
But the implication of the bill as it was written
and as it was passed, is that we are imperiling
the drinking water supplies of millions of Kentuckians.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
So have you had this becomes a political hot potato,
as you know, and I'm getting tired of just yeling
the political I mean, is that what's behind here? You think,
you know, are the coal miners behind it?
Speaker 2 (07:01):
For anyone?
Speaker 1 (07:02):
But that are the coal miners behind it?
Speaker 2 (07:05):
The coal companies are behind it. You know, Kentucky Waterways
Alliance is a member organization. You know, the only our
mission is to protect, for store and celebrate. So when
we were making a bunch of noise about SB eight nine,
we're really doing that response to people who live in
eastern and throughout the state. You know, we have members
throughout the entirety of the commonwealth, and a lot of
our folks who are members and support our organization, they
(07:28):
are coal families. They were not behind the bill. You know,
coal companies in some industry is behind the bill because
you know, deregulation and loosening rules is always is often
better for the bottom line, and perhaps some cynical, but
it seems to me that there's been very few times
in history where an industry or a polluter has been
given the right to pollute something and haven't exercised that
right when it's going to help their bottom line or
(07:48):
make things more convenient.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Well, I've done family in Somerset that they are very
much Republican, but they've complained about it and concerned. They're
concerned about this as well, just so you know. So
there's conservatives that are that are very concerned about this,
you know, because it becomes you know, a progressive thing
and conservative and yeah, it's it's interesting how this happened. Michael,
(08:13):
I gotta go, Thanks for your time this morning. Appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Thank you. Talk to you all right.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Michael Washburn, executive director of the Kentucky Waterways Alliance. Gotta
get to a break. We're coming back. Scott Fitzgerald has
sports coming up.
Good morning. I'm Tony Cruz. Michael Washburn is the executive
(00:03):
director of the Kentucky Waterways Alliance and he joins us
this morning. Mister Washburn, good morning.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
Good morning.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
I'm doing just great. You're not doing so great because
Centerbill eighty nine passed overwhelmingly in the Senate and is
now a bill. Governor Bisher tried to veto it but
was al maneuvered there. So what do you think about
this bill? What is first of all, define it for us?
(00:29):
And then what are your concerns?
Speaker 2 (00:32):
Yeah, yeah, it is. It's bad news for all of us,
I think so. Senate Bill eighty nine was a bit
of a legislation now law that was going to redefine
what is known as waters of the Commonwealth to be
in alignment with what is known as waters of the US.
Those are two rules that governs what lake, streams, ponds,
rivers are deserving a protection. Water is the US is
(00:55):
a federal rule, what is the Commonwealth of the state rule?
That sounds kind of jargoning, belong and sort of it is.
SB eighty nine effectively pulls all of the ground water
in the state out of environmental permitting and protections, which
puts at risk the drinking water supplies of well over
a million Kentuckians.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
So why doesn't the why don't the federal laws pertain here?
And what's what did they not have or do that
now has been taken away or not been t away,
but the state law made it a little tighter.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
I guess, yeah, yeah, it's uh, well it actually it's
a good question. The federal waters, the US Rule and
the Clean Water Act are there to protect what are
known as navigable waters. And in the context of that law,
what navigable waters means are interstate waters waters that are
considered federally navigable. We're talking to Ohio River, the Salt River,
(01:50):
the Green River, the Big Waterways. Everything else was left
for the states to protect. So what spaighty nine effectively
does is by saying that, oh, the waters of the
are now the same as waters of the US. It
has the effect of saying, well, our police can only
affect the only enforce the laws on our interstates, leaving
the back roads, the two lane roads. The surface treats
(02:13):
all out of protection. That's the difference. It doesn't frinkson
or narrow state protection so much as entirely seed jurisdictions.
The state has actually now become the only state in
the country to offer up the control over its own
waters for an overall controlling federal rule. It is disempowered
the state from controlling.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
So with that, this was Senator Scott mad and Madam
who from Pineville, who brought this out. He says, this
law ensures that Kentucky maintains authority over how we regulate
and protect our water while aligning our statues with long
standing federal standards. It does not diminish safeguards for drinking water,
ground water, or floodplains, which will remain fully protected under
(02:56):
state and federal law. So what's the beg.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
It's that it's categorically untrue the senator's misunderstanding the plain
language of his own bill. There, you cannot have the
protection on groundwater, for instance, in the state by adhering
solely to the Waters of the US, because the Waters
of the US rule, which is now the law throughout
(03:19):
all of Kentucky, does not protect groundwater. I mean, it's
you can't even I don't need to elaborate on anymore.
That's just an incorrect statement. It isn't tightening regulation. It's
entirely letting regulation goal is what it's doing in effect,
And this is going to sound like a theoretical argument,
but what it's it's very real and very very dangerous
(03:39):
for folks. It has defined groundwater of thermal streams, intermitten
strings outside of what it can even be considered the
environment in the state. So now there can be I
know that sounds like a legal but that's what the
law is. The law of defining things. SB eighty nine
does not include groundwater or affrimal strains under the state's
definition of the environment. Okay, for those don't, there can
(04:02):
be no pollution there. So therefore the crazy thing to.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
Say, well, so groundwater. Let's face it, I had no idea,
but apparently over a million people that still drink water
that they have to purify themselves and or have wells
or something of that nature, and you're concerned about what
poisoning these waters.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
Yeah. Yeah, there's absolutely no protection for private wells. I
believe there are four hundred and sixteen thousand families in
the Commonwealth that rely on private wells which pull from
groundwater for their drinking water supplies. There are no protections
for what happens for the headwaters of streams or for
the groundwater. Now, the Senator and his allies have said, well,
there are other protections, such as the Safe Drinking Water Act.
(04:45):
What that really regulates is the water as it comes
out of your tap and into your glass. If you're
pulling from a well, there are no protection. Or a
stream which a lot of rural water utilities rely on,
is groundwater from streams. The Safe Drinking Water Act has
control over effectively what comes from the tap and end
of your glass. It has no jurisdiction over what happens
(05:07):
before it gets into the pipes of the water utility.
And so if you're dealing with something like headwater, streams
and groundwater in a place like eastern Kentucky or in
the western coal fields places like that, if there is
runoff or the byproduct of certain sort of industrial production
that ends up fouling the groundwaters in the headwaters, then yeah,
(05:28):
you can use the jurisdiction of the Safe Drinking Water
Act to fix it. But it's going to be astronomically
more expensive and never entirely complete to clean the water
after its fouled.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
I'm going to ask you, why would anybody want to
endanger that kind of water. I mean, if what you're
saying is accurate here, I mean, I understand water runoff
we see down in Florida, for example, the algaie blooms.
It's part heat from the golf and all that kind
of thing. But now it's expanded. They've talked about agricultural
things that are making these plumes, the red tide and
(06:00):
all that kind of thing happened. Is this kind of
an effective way of kind of looking at it from
you know, if you went down to Florida for example.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, I mean it's all connected. So what happens with
the algebra, the agricultural impact on algae blooms, the sort
of nitrogen and phosphorus pollutions running off off the ground
into the water. Yeah, it's some ways. It's basically it's
a very basic principle. Everyone is downstream from something, and
hydrologically speaking, everything is all connected. The main emphasis behind
the bill was to loosen whatater known as buffer zone,
(06:31):
which is how much you can effectively do a bunch
of coal mining near headwater streams and epheral streams. So
they were wanting to reduce the size of buffer zones.
That was the impulse behind it. It isn't to poison people.
But the implication of the bill as it was written
and as it was passed, is that we are imperiling
the drinking water supplies of millions of Kentuckians.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
So have you had this becomes a political hot potato,
as you know, and I'm getting tired of just yeling
the political I mean, is that what's behind here? You think,
you know, are the coal miners behind it?
Speaker 2 (07:01):
For anyone?
Speaker 1 (07:02):
But that are the coal miners behind it?
Speaker 2 (07:05):
The coal companies are behind it. You know, Kentucky Waterways
Alliance is a member organization. You know, the only our
mission is to protect, for store and celebrate. So when
we were making a bunch of noise about SB eight nine,
we're really doing that response to people who live in
eastern and throughout the state. You know, we have members
throughout the entirety of the commonwealth, and a lot of
our folks who are members and support our organization, they
(07:28):
are coal families. They were not behind the bill. You know,
coal companies in some industry is behind the bill because
you know, deregulation and loosening rules is always is often
better for the bottom line, and perhaps some cynical, but
it seems to me that there's been very few times
in history where an industry or a polluter has been
given the right to pollute something and haven't exercised that
right when it's going to help their bottom line or
(07:48):
make things more convenient.
Speaker 1 (07:50):
Well, I've done family in Somerset that they are very
much Republican, but they've complained about it and concerned. They're
concerned about this as well, just so you know. So
there's conservatives that are that are very concerned about this,
you know, because it becomes you know, a progressive thing
and conservative and yeah, it's it's interesting how this happened. Michael,
(08:13):
I gotta go, Thanks for your time this morning. Appreciate it.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Thank you. Talk to you all right.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
Michael Washburn, executive director of the Kentucky Waterways Alliance. Gotta
get to a break. We're coming back. Scott Fitzgerald has
sports coming up.
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