New Mexico, Arizona Business Groups Sue To Challenge EPA Rule Defining Waters of the United States

Category: Non-Local News Releases Non-Local News Releases
Published: 03 September 2015 03 September 2015

Albuquerque - The New Mexico Association of Commerce and Industry, New Mexico Mining Association, New Mexico Farm & Livestock Bureau, Arizona Mining Association (AMA), Arizona Farm Bureau, Arizona Chamber of Commerce & Industry, and Arizona Rock Products Association has filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona challenging the U.S. EPA €™s new rule dramatically expanding the scope of federal jurisdiction under the Clean Water Act.

€œACI has been submitting comments and sharing our concerns with the EPA over this issue for months, € said ACI President Jason Espinoza. €œThis misguided rule places farmers, ranchers, miners and other businesses under burdensome regulations that were never meant to apply to them. The result will be countless lost jobs and further hardship for struggling New Mexico families. ACI is proud to take a stand to protect New Mexicans from this reckless overreach. €

"New Mexico farmers and ranchers are already struggling with the effects of a five year drought, a tough economy, and countless other challenges," said New Mexico Farm & Livestock Bureau CEO Chad Smith. "It defies common sense that the EPA now wants to pile on more regulations under a law intended for navigable waters. The massive costs this new rule will impose on the hardworking families who provide our food are simply unacceptable."

€œIn essence, the EPA €™s new rule is based on the concept that it can regulate drought-stricken, arid desert as €˜waters of the United States, €™ € said Mike Bowen, Executive Director of the New Mexico Mining Association. €œWe €™re talking about places where water hasn €™t run for years, decades, or even centuries, and then placing the businesses in those areas under restrictive new regulations. €

The focus of this lawsuit will be the new rule €™s definition of €˜tributary, €™ which expands €˜waters €™ jurisdiction based on the presence of certain topographical features that are ubiquitous in the arid southwest, even in areas where it has been decades or centuries since any water has actually flowed on the ground. Even, under the new rule, an agency official in Washington, DC, can deem an expanse of desert to be a €˜water of the United States €™ even if relevant topographical features do not actually exist.

This broad coalition of affected southwest business groups has come together to ensure that issues important to the arid west are front and center in efforts to rein in EPA €™s dramatic overreach, and to protect southwestern businesses and landowners from unreasonable new regulatory burdens.

The filing is available here.

ACI is New Mexico €™s statewide business advocate, representing hundreds of businesses and more than 50,000 employees from all industry sectors and regions of New Mexico. The organization develops positions through member-led committees, and advocates for pro-business, pro-growth policies for a stronger economy and better opportunities for New Mexicans.

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