From: Susan Hansen
Sent: Tue Jul 11 12:18:51 2017
To: COLE David
Cc: YELTON-BRAM Tiffany; DECONCINI Nina; jason.miner@oregon.gov; Richard Whitman; BACHMAN Jeff
Subject: RE: Permitting process questions.
Importance: Normal
Mr. Cole,
To help Bear Creek Recovery understand DEQ processes and legal requirements, here are the questions we wish to have answered, along with requests for examples:
Please send examples (if any exist) of revised wastewater permits where DEQ allowed backsliding to allow discharge into waters of the state at times an existing permit prohibited discharge; and/or backsliding to permit discharge onto land when land was too wet to allow discharge; and/or backsliding that allowed more contamination to occur in waters of the state because a city was not capable of processing its wastewater to standards in an existing permit. Please, in relation to that, send any DEQ / State of Oregon rules/statues related to wastewater permit modification rules/ rules on backsliding.
Please send any recent wastewater MAOs between DEQ and Oregon cities - we are most interested in seeing ones written in the last several months since the EPA audit challenged Oregon DEQ to produce stronger MAOs. Or direct us to any DEQ site where such MAOs are provided so the public can read them. Or provide the names of cities that have entered such agreements so we can seek them via public records requests if they are not posted freely by DEQ.
Please send links or examples of cities in your territory or in the state who have done recent upgrades because they were moved into the major facility category.
Please send any info related to DEQ/ State of Oregon assessment of the environmental health of the Molalla River and any rules that govern the use of the Molalla River for wastewater discharge. We are especially interested in the rules that govern temperature of the Molalla River.
Please send any guidelines/rules/statues that govern the establishment of wastewater MAOs, including if any guidelines that exist for the length of time DEQ may postpone enforcing Violations/ PEN notifications / Civil Penalties during the time DEQ seeks to establish an MAO.
Please send any examples of enforcement when a city has failed to prove whether or not a sewage lagoon is leaking - if any exist, cases where test wells were done to track the groundwater to see if contamination was caused by leaking sewage lagoon. In other words, provide cases where DEQ needed to proceed beyond lagoon leak tests if lagoon leak tests did not provide adequate proof of whether or not sewage lagoons were sound. If statutes exist about sewage lagoons, send those so we can understand the rules/statues that govern open sewage lagoons and the rules that govern how they must be maintained.
Please supply any information about how a MAO established by DEQ with a city takes into consideration any existing Clean Water Act lawsuit settlement or if there is no such consideration by DEQ of any existing Clean Water Act settlements.
Thanks for you help in understanding the processes available for bring cities into compliance with their permits and the Clean Water Act.
Sincerely,
Susan Han
Bear Creek Recovery
-----Original Message-----
From: david.cole@state.or.us
Sent: Tue, 11 Jul 2017 18:33:01 +0000
To: foxglovefarm@inbox.com
Subject: RE: Permitting process questions.
Hello Susan. I have a number of commitments through the rest of the day, but I do want to help answer your questions. So please send me a list of your questions in writing and I will get to them as soon as I am able. Thank you.
_____________________________________________
From: COLE David
Sent: Tuesday, July 11, 2017 11:19 AM
To: 'Susan Hansen'
Cc: COLE David; YELTON-BRAM Tiffany; MRAZIK Steve
Subject: Permitting process questions.
Hello Susan. I understand you left a voice mail message for Jon Gasik with some questions about the permitting process. I am a permit writer and compliance person for National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System water quality permits. Please let me know what your questions are and I’ll do my best to answer them.
David Cole, R.G.
Water Quality Specialist
DEQ - Northwest Region & Western Region
700 NE Multnomah Street, Suite 600
Portland, OR 97232
503-229-5011 (P)
503-229-6957 (F)
DEQ has a new website. Please update your bookmarks and check out the new site here: http://www.oregon.gov/deq/pages/index.aspx