Director's Blog
Analysis & Opinion
Oregon Zombie Discharge Permits Part 2
Oregon Zombie Discharge Permits Part 2In Which We Experience the Sheer Arrogance of Failing AgenciesBy Nina Bell • November 28, 2020 •
How do you keep an agency from belly-flopping? Well, first off, if the agency has a history of responding to the political pressure to not do its job, trust history. Trust history over the vague assurances of agency officials who hasten to tell you that they have it all under control. And would you please just run along now and leave them alone!
Yeah, ...
Oregon Zombie Discharge Permits Walk the Land
Oregon Zombie Discharge Permits Walk the LandInstallment 1 of 2 In Which Oregon is the Worst in the Nationby Nina Bell • November 20, 2020 •
For many years, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) dealt with its desire to not regulate polluters by simply not issuing the required water pollution discharge permits. DEQ just ignored the Clean Water Act, which requires the permits to be reissued every five years in order to respond to new scientific information on ...
Covid-19 Shines a Spotlight on Government Failure
Covid-19 Shines a Spotlight on Government Failureby Nina Bell • November 20, 2020 •
I stopped writing this blog when the pandemic hit. It was hard to concentrate. And, honestly, it was hard to be comfortable talking about environmental ills when a deadly virus was ravaging the world and our country. Even though environmental ills kill softly.
I truly hate to compare the ravages of Covid-19 to environmental issues but it just cannot be denied that one of my first sad observations ...
Ecology’s Nutrient General Permit for Puget Sound
Ecology’s Nutrient General Permit for Puget SoundChapter 5, In Which the Agency Proposes to Knowingly and Intentionally Violate the Clean Water Actby Nina Bell • April 18, 2020 •
When it comes to agencies’ not doing their jobs, there are two kinds of failures: the sins of omission and the sins of commission. Year after year, EPA and the Washington Department of Ecology give us stunning examples of the failure to take actions to protect and clean up Puget Sound. But today I’m ...
Puget Sound Nutrient Pollution: Chapter 4
Puget Sound Nutrient Pollution: Chapter 4In Which Washington Ecology Refuses to Carry Out a 75-Year Old State Law that Requires Modern Sewage Treatment by Nina Bell • March 14, 2020 •
OK, in chapters 2 and 3 of the saga about the failure to clean up Puget Sound, we saw that the Washington Department of Ecology doesn’t want to carry out the requirements of the federal Clean Water Act. Well, what about enforcing a state law called “AKART”? That’s a 75-year old law established by ...
Actual Leadership
Actual LeadershipA Reader Asks: It’s Missing and Where do We Find it?by Nina Bell • March 7, 2020 •
A kindly Washington reader writes: “What would it take to get some actual leadership on these issues instead of press releases and endless studies?”
I am momentarily struck incapable of thinking or writing. Then the moments drag into hours. This really is the big question.
OK, well, first of all, it’s worse than agencies just issuing press releases and endless studies. And let’s ...
No results found.