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WaterNews for April 6, 2004Benjamin Grumbles WaterNews is a weekly on-line publication that announces publications, policies, and activities of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Water. In This Week’s WaterNews:
Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies Awarded $2 Million to Enhance Water Security InformationEPA Administrator Mike Leavitt announced a $2 million grant last week to the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies (AMWA) at its Legislative Conference in Washington, D.C.. This grant will help support the on-going efforts of Water Information Sharing and Analysis Center (WaterISAC), a state-of-the-art, secure information system that shares up-to-date threat and incident information between the intelligence community and the water sector. Information about water security including links to the Association of Metropolitan Water Agencies and links to the WaterISAC is available at: http://www.epa.gov/safewater/security/index.html. Final Action on Construction and Development Effluent GuidelineEPA issued a final action that relies on a broad range of existing programs and regulations at the federal, state and local level to control stormwater runoff from construction sites in lieu of a new national effluent guideline. EPA recognizes that stormwater runoff threatens water quality but believes existing authorities and tools, supplemented by additional guidance, workshops, and resources provide a more effective and flexible approach. Almost every state and many local governments already implement requirements that are equivalent to or more stringent than those contained in a regulation proposed in 2002. All 50 states require sediment and erosion control measures at sites during construction. In addition, in 2003 new National Pollutant Discharge Elimination Systems regulations went into effect for stormwater discharges from construction sites that are one to five acres in size (larger sites were regulated previously). Over 5000 municipalities are also developing or upgrading their programs to control stormwater runoff from construction sites. These new requirements along with other federal, state and local programs, will yield significant environmental improvements by controlling polluted runoff from construction sites. In addition, about 16 billion pounds of sediment will be prevented from entering the nation's waters each year due to these new stormwater regulations. Information about today's action is available at: http://www.epa.gov/guide/construction. Information about existing programs, requirements, and EPA support for state and local stormwater programs is available at: www.epa.gov/npdes/stormwater. Still Time to Sign-Up for Water Efficient Products (“Water Star”) MeetingEPA's Water Efficient Product Market Enhancement Program is conducting a series of stakeholder meetings to work toward approaches and partnership opportunities that promote water efficient products, including product labeling, modeled in part on the successful Energy Star Program. EPA invites your participation at the upcoming stakeholder meeting: Location: Seattle, WA Register at http://www.epa.gov/owm/water-efficiency/products_program.htm. If you are not already an identified stakeholder (see stakeholder list on our website) and would like to become one, please send an e-mail to Water Efficiency@epa.gov 2004 National Wetland Award Recipients AnnouncedSix wetlands educators, scientists, and conservationists were selected as recipients of the 2004 National Wetlands Awards for exemplary contributions in conserving or restoring the Nation’s wetlands. They will be honored at a presentation on May 20th in the United States Senate Caucus Room in Washington, DC. This year's awardees are: Peg Bostwick (Michigan), Jack Branning (Mississippi), Norman Brunswig (South Carolina), Francis Golet (Rhode Island), Sky Lewey (Texas) and Barbara Salzman (California). "These awardees, at the forefront of America's wetland protectors, provide a sense of confidence that we have the leadership, talent and commitment to achieve the challenging goals that we have set for the nation’s wetlands," said Benjamin H. Grumbles, Acting Assistant Administrator, Office of Water, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The National Wetlands Awards Program celebrates individuals who have demonstrated extraordinary dedication, innovation or excellence in wetlands conservation. The program co-sponsors at the Environmental Law Institute, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, USDA Forest Service, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, NOAA Fisheries and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. For more information on the National Wetlands Awards Program, the 2004 awardees, or for information on the awards presentation, please contact Erica Pencak at the Environmental Law Institute at (202) 939-3822 or wetlandsawards@eli.org or Judy Bailey at the Environmental Protection Agency at 202-566-1380 or bailey.judy@epa.gov .You can visit the NWA website at www.eli.org/nwa/nwaprogram.htm. Subscribe to WaterNewsPlease forward this message to your friends and colleagues who share an interest in water-related issues and would like to hear from EPA's Office of Water. To subscribe to the WaterNews listserv: Send an email message, leave the subject line blank, and address it to: In the body of the message write: Subscribe WaterNews firstname lastname (Please leave one blank space between each word, do not include any other message, and use your actual name- i.e. Subscribe WaterNews Robert Jones) A welcome message will appear in your email box once you are officially subscribed.
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