Last week, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to undermine the efforts of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Army Corps of Engineers as the two federal agencies seek to clarify which waters should be protected under the Clean Water Act and which waters should not be regulated.
In the face of an aggressive lobbying campaign from opponents of the so-called Waters of the United States rule the EPA and the Corps have drafted for public review, the House took up the “anti-government” torch and carried through its chambers in a vote that is largely symbolic, yet wholly troubling. Here’s the gist of this situation, and as anglers, it falls to us to put our politics aside and instead focus on what’s best for our fish—and our fishing, today and for generations to come:
When the Clean Water Act passed in 1972, it protected from unpermitted development the “Waters of the United States,” and those waters included headwater streams, wetlands and other naturally occurring waters—even those intermittent and ephemeral streams that run dry at certain times of the year, but are hugely important for spawning and rearing for trout and salmon.
