By PETER HUSSMANN
The Iowa League of Cities is petitioning the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals to take up its lawsuit alleging the Environmental Protection Agency has illegally changed federal rules concerning the operation of wastewater treatment plants and heavy rain-related discharges that potentially expose cities to huge costs to come into compliance.
The lawsuit, filed on Monday on behalf of the League by Hall & Associates of Washington, D.C., claims the EPA has reinterpreted federal rules, without going through the administrative rule-making process, that places more stringent requirements on city operated wastewater treatment facilities. Plants that previously had been in compliance because of the EPA's allowance for alternative approaches to address peak flow periods now find themselves at odds with federal rules, the League assets.
Previously, cities were allowed to use alternative approaches and technologies to handle high water periods, such as the heavy storms that hit northeast Iowa and the Newton area earlier this month. Cities were also given options concerning treatment facility design to safely process high water events.
Now, the League says, the EPA is initiating more stringent federal rule interpretations regarding collection system design, bypass rules and plant design/operations that are placing previously compliant systems into ongoing violation. The result, the League states, is that municipalities could be required to spend millions of dollars to bring their systems into federal compliance.
The lawsuit seeks to overturn what it calls the illegal rule changes, limit the federal authority when it comes to wastewater plant design, require the EPA to follow the requirements for developing rules and allow states to continue to use cost-effective options to safely process peak flows.
You can read the petition for review and the associated documents filed in connection with the lawsuit below:
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