CEEI

Center for Environmental Education and Information

P.O. Box 1778 e-mail: ceei@cox-internet.com

web site: www.ceei-climate.org tel and fax 208-578-1557

Sun Valley, Idaho 83353

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Dear Viewer

While the media has heard of the Clean Water Act and the EPA, they have probably have never even seen the polluted streams lists that have been documented by the states themselves to comply with the Clean Water Act.(CWA)

CEEI has been documenting on the net for 12 years all 23,000 polluted streams in the United States. and get out to approx. 12,000 high

schools and 3,400 colleges and universities.

CEEI contends that by design the EPA has severely compromised the polluted stream documentation by simply not publishing on the internet at <http://www.epa.gov/waters/tmdl/expert_query.html> 38 state lists for a period of three years now . SEE the states that are not on the list (76%) <http://www.apsrs.org/cover.html#indexes>

These streams average of 400 streams per state with high numbers over a thousand and lows around fifty. It is wise to realize that these streams as submitted by the states are first reviewed by state legislatures ( committees) before they make their way to EPA and then submitted to congress as a report. ( this report usually ends up in a circular file). All this information is listed on the CEEI web site and is organized by each state.

The grand total is over 80,000 line item polluted stream entries (if you count the 1996.1998, 2000, and 2002 surveys. these files

includes file #, name, water shed, reason for listing). The reasons range from chemicals to high temperatures. The criteria for the CWA (fish can't reproduce, and people cant swim in these streams because of potential health problems), The GAO reports that only 19% of the total streams have been surveyed.

What is between the lines is that all the press in 30 years has never published even a county level EPA polluted stream list, ( Which CEEI has on its web site of 22,000 line items for 12 years <www.apsrs.org>.

The congress has had no notion that the list was reduced 78% by the Bush Ad ministration for the last 3 years, and that 3400 colleges and universities and 12,000 high schools are completely in the dark about this in the United States . ( all documented on the CEEI web site).

It will be easy to compare the official Clean Water Act 303(d) report to Congress for calendar year 2000 and 2002 with the current CEEI web site index page that lists all the states that were missing.

Please call me at 208-578-1557 or e-mail me if you have any questions.

Best Regards

Max Casebeau

CEEI Exec Director

Post Script. As of May 15, 2004.

The EPA has added 21 more names of states that appear on the EPA web site. (from the 12 to 33.) CEEI has linked to about 20 more state web sites for the same information that was missing. At the moment CEEI advises its viewers to contact

directly either with the EPA or the individual state for specific information. (See the directory at <www.apsrs.org>) The CEEI state index page shows the number of states that were missing from the EPA web site from approximately March 2001 to April 2 2004.

CEEI has to assume that the EPA have cut back their "level of effort" because of budget considerations since Jan 2001 and apologizes for the lack of information .We will work also with state environmental agencies to supplement our existing state pages

with direct state information. We will post this new addition EPA information as it becomes complete.

May 23, 2004

For immediate release

"Enviro Ed Group Rattles Press, Congress, and EPA"

Sun Valley, Idaho

The Center of Environmental Education and Information (CEEI) of Sun Valley Idaho, charged today that the EPA has put the Clean Water Act (CWA) on the back burner since 2000, when the Bush Administration took over. 38 states or seventy two percent are no longer listed as having polluted streams, and they were not aware that the EPA had dropped them from EPA web site at<http://www.epa.gov/waters/tmdl/expert_query.html>

In 1998, all 50 states submitted polluted stream status lists and were published on the EPA website <www.epa.org> a year later as required by the Clean Water Act. But in year 2000 and 2002 only 14 and 12 states were published. These stream reports list an average of 400 stream names per state though many are over a 1000 streams . See <http://www.apsrs.org/cover.html#indexes> Why has the EPA withheld 38 state reports and not published them on the EPA website for 3 years ?

"This is serious .The EPA has stated that the river and stream pollution is increasing every year. The public should have access to this

information, before any restoration or prevention can be done" . "The EPA has not responded to CEEI's inquiries" said Max Casebeau

CEEI's director. When asked about why the list was so small in 2001 "the EPA advised that they were waiting for the Bush

Administration to get direction." Casebeau added.

The states that are non compliant or missing are cited on the CEEI web site at <http://www.apsrs.org/cover.html#indexes> Nation wide,

CEEI lists 23,000 streams that fall into 6 categories of pollution that being, caused by nutrients, sediment, high temperature,

chemicals, pesticides, turbidity and other causes . These are all the streams that the states themselves have certified as meeting the

criteria of the Clean Water Act. (CWA) . (People shouldn't swim in, nor can fish reproduce in polluted streams or rivers).

The most recent EPA 2002 polluted streams report was submitted by Arizona, District of Columbia, Delaware, Georgia, Maryland,

North Dakota, New Mexico, Pennsylvania, Port Rico, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

When CEEI checked with California's Dept. of Water quality, we learned that they submitted their 2000 report on time. Yet, not only is

the data absent from the EPA web site, the California Dept. of Water had no knowledge of it. Twenty other states have confirmed that

they weren't aware that they were no longer on the EPA web site. The EPA had stated to the NRDC that they are simply behind in their

work.

According to the General Accounting Office, (GAO Reports, RCED 00-54 and 99-45 ) only 19 % of U.S. streams have been surveyed.

In 2002 the John Heinz Center (www.heinzctr.org) a Washington DC environmental, science, and economic think tank ,

released a report commissioned by the Clinton Administration.( Over 150 of the nations leading scientists contributed to this report.)

The report The State of the Nations Eco Systems said, "the U.S may not have any streams left that

are not free from chemical

contamination " . Certain chemicals even in minute quantities, have been shown to mimic hormones and have been connected to bird

and fish population collapse, and with humans reduction in sperm count though it is uncertain why exactly this is happening.

CEEI estimates that there may be 200,000 to 400,000 streams that are polluted and are missing from these lists that are now published

on our web site or the EPA's . "We simply don't know ." says Director Max Casebeau.

CEEI announced that they would gladly post these 38 state stream lists that are missing also from CEEI’s web site "All these 38 states

can send these files to ceei@cox-internet.com in html or send the hyper link" said Casebeau.

CEEI gets out to middle schools, 12,000 high schools, jr. colleges and 3400 colleges and

universities in the United States.

The last complete survey was in 1998 and is listed at <http://www.apsrs.org/cover.html#indexes>

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CEEI has been nominated as having the most important environmental web site in the United States three times !The first nomination was for

the Sunset Magazine award 2001 and the second is for the United Nations Environmental Programme Global 500 award in 2002, and

the third was for the United Nations Champions of the Earth Award in 2003.

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