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Public Lands Council disappointed in WOTUS news

The executive director of the Public Lands Council says she’s disappointed in the EPA’s decision to revise the definition of ‘waters of the U.S.’ 

Kaitlynn Glover says the Navigable Waters Protection Rule helped provide the industry with clear and concise clean water rules.

“Yesterday’s news that they intend to revise the Navigable Waters Protection Rule is concerning because we’ve seen what the alternative could be,” she says. “The 2015 WOTUS rule was both ill-advised and far too expansive. It didn’t provide clarity and was federal overreach.”

Glover says National Cattlemen’s Beef Association and the Public Lands Council were instrumental in the 2015 repeal of WOTUS and fought for workable solutions for cattle producers in the 2020 Navigable Waters Protection Rule.

“The administration is going to move forward through the regulatory process,” she says. “We don’t quite know what that draft revision is going to look like, but you can be sure we’re going to be engaged in the process as we have been all along.”

On Tuesday, the EPA and Army Corps of Engineers announced plans to initiate a new rulemaking process that restores the protections in place prior to the 2015 WOTUS implementation. EPA Administrator Michael Regan say the agencies determined that the 2020 Navigable Waters Protection Rule is leading to ‘significant environmental degradation.’ EPA is requesting remand of the rule after a broad array of stakeholders reported seeing destructive impacts to critical water bodies under the rule.

She says livestock producers nationwide remain dedicated to clarity and good environmental stewardship. 

Brownfield spoke to Glover during the Nebraska Cattlemen’s Midyear Meeting in Fremont.