When I ask folks at home in Missouri which federal agency has the greatest negative impact on their lives the answer is always the same: the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Bureaucrats at the EPA have declared war on rural America and are focused on trying to regulate nearly every part of our way of life. This is the agency that wanted to regulate dust on farms and require dairy farmers to have an Oil Spill Prevention Plan because they think spilt milk is an environmental hazard. Now the EPA has their sights set on the Clean Water Act.
Recently the EPA proposed expanding the definition of “waters of the U.S.” in the Clean Water Act to include all man-made bodies of water, ponds, ditches, flood plains and even standing water in potholes. If the EPA is successful in expanding their authority, they will be able to regulate nearly all water in the United States. The EPA wrote their expansion request in a way that would impact every pesticide and fertilizer application and require permits for professionals and homeowners, even on private property. This means that private property owners near any waters would no longer be able to treat their own land unless they obtained a permit from the EPA.
This proposed rule change would have a disastrous impact on the farming community and could pose a public health risk. Farmers in Missouri and across the country treat their crops to protect against bugs and diseases. This intrusive rule change would require farmers to jump through needless regulatory hoops that would cause delays and reduced productivity. Additionally, requiring permits for standing water would make it much more difficult to control mosquitoes and ticks that carry harmful diseases like West Nile Virus and Lyme disease. This rule change is simply too broad, too intrusive, and too ambiguous to stand.
This week I joined with Republicans and Democrats in the House of Representatives to express our concerns about the impact this rule would have on our way of life. In a letter to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, my colleagues and I said this rule change would contradict prior Supreme Court decisions that limit the federal authority within the Clean Water Act. The letter also states that the proposed rule change, “aggressively expands federal authority under the Clean Water Act while bypassing Congress and creating unnecessary ambiguity.”
I will continue to fight the EPA’s power grab of the Clean Water Act. Every American wants clean water for themselves and their families. What we do not need is an emboldened EPA trying to regulate water on private property and against the public interest. The EPA does not need more authority to cause an even greater regulatory burden on private property owners.
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