[water dripping] Judy Pino: Protecting our natural water resources. Get the 411 on how EPA’s Water Enforcement Division is protecting your H2O. I’m Judy Pino, and this is Green Tips. [music] Through the years, Congress has enacted a series of statutes or laws aimed at protecting our waters. The Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Ocean Dumping Act, and the Oil Pollution Act all provide the primary tools for EPA’s water enforcement efforts. To talk to us about how EPA is enforcing the requirements of these statutes is the director of EPA’s Water Enforcement, Mark Pollins. Thanks, Mark, for being with us today. Mark Pollins: Thank you for having me. Judy Pino: So let’s talk about what the role of your office is at the EPA. Mark Pollins: Well we’re with the Headquarters Office in the Office of Civil Enforcement, and what we do is establish the national policy priority areas for the Water Enforcement program across the country. Judy Pino: Now let’s face it, it’s not just big industries but individuals that make a difference in our waste stream. Give us some green tips on how we can keep our water clean. Mark Pollins: Well these are simple tips, and we were talking about this the other day, how people wouldn’t dream or think of throwing trash from your car window, as was done 30, 40 years ago. In water, I think it’s a matter of people developing a similar type of ethic to not flush things down the toilet that shouldn’t go down the toilet. Judy Pino: A green ethic, you mean. Mark Pollins: Yes, a green ethic, a green ethic. And to not have things drain in places where they will go down a storm sewer and make their way into the streams, the waters that you boat in, the waters that you drink from, essentially. Judy Pino: There is much we can do to make a difference. Let’s say I’m changing the oil in my car, Mark, and some of it drips onto my driveway. Many people don’t know that it could end up in the lake two miles away and contaminate the very water that my family and I drink daily, right? So what can I do to make sure this doesn’t happen? Mark Pollins: Anything that hits the ground is likely to make its way into a storm sewer, whether it’s used oil, grease, solvents, something like that, pesticides. So it’s a matter of just using them, using them as they were intended and being very, very careful with them. Judy Pino: So we have a direct impact on our waterways, don’t we? Mark Pollins: Yes, we do. Every individual does. Judy Pino: Okay. So in the home, we have to do some enforcement of our own. People love to dump things down the kitchen sink, as you said, and the toilet. Let’s talk about some dos and don’ts. You say don’t dump things down the sinks, right? Mark Pollins: Yes. Judy Pino: Most people don’t know what goes down your sink goes directly to the local treatment plant and your local treatment plant can’t handle large amounts of cooking oil, for example. Okay. So what do we do? Mark Pollins: What we do at home is just take an old can or a jar or something and deposit the cooking oil in that. Don’t dump it down the sink. As it will clog your pipes, it will certainly clog your municipal waste system’s pipes. Judy Pino: I love that. That’s true. If it clogs your pipes, it’ll probably -- Mark Pollins: It’ll clog every pipe that it can possibly get to. But just take it, seal it up, throw it in the trash. Judy Pino: Okay. Next don’t. You should never dump hazardous chemicals, such as waste from developing photos for example, down the sink. Plants can’t treat these either. So what do we do then? Mark Pollins: What you can do is take advantage of your local household hazardous waste collection facilities and whatever options a local community might give you. Odds are it’s going to be a local collection system, so keep it, store it safely in your home, and deposit it as you’re instructed. Judy Pino: Now Mark, construction debris is getting plenty of attention with so many markets seeing an increase in development. What should developers be doing to prevent water pollution? Mark Pollins: The requirements or the management practices are actually fairly straightforward and simple. Some of the ones that come to mind immediately are ones that I think people who’ve walked by a construction site can see. They range from silt fencing; those are the black fences that are around the site to keep soil debris from running off. Rocks around a storm water basin or storm water intake, and I think everyone has seen rocks around them with a wire mesh on it to keep them in place, and that too will keep debris from going into the storm water system. And things as simple as laying hay over areas where trucks might come on and off the site, that will have the effect of keeping soil, dirt, on the site itself and from getting in the street and then further down, when it rains, into a storm water collection system. Judy Pino: Now what can we as citizens do if we see any water violations in our community? Mark Pollins: There are really two areas that I think lend themselves to citizen involvement or citizen eyes and being our eyes and ears more than any others. The first one was the construction area that we had talked about before. I think people could just sort of be on the lookout -- or I should say should be on the lookout for some of the simple practices, and frankly you should not be seeing a lot of mud and dirt and things of that nature just sort of flowing off the site, any construction site, and making their way into a storm sewer. If you see something like that, I think it’s important to call the local authorities, state authorities, and you can -- you can call or notify the Environmental Protection Agency via our Web site. Judy Pino: And that Web site is epa.gov/tips. Mark Pollins: There’s another area, too, that I think people might want to stay involved or might want to help us out in, and that is our enforcement program dealing with the municipal wastewater treatment systems, and that is pretty simple. It is not standard practice or good practice for manhole covers to blow off after a rain and for sewage to go spewing out. It is not good practice for sewage to back up into your basement and the basements of your neighbors. And if you see things like that routinely and if there is a basement backup problem on your block or in your community, I think it’s very, very important to notify the state and federal authorities. They often indicate problems in the operation and maintenance of a system, and we can’t be everywhere, and if people notify us of these problems we can hopefully take action quickly. Judy Pino: Okay. And we should note, the Water Enforcement Division in the Office of Civil Enforcement serves as the National Water Enforcement program’s manager, and as such the division provides national direction and leadership in case selection, resolution, and appeals, and it also provides technical and legal support to the development of enforcement actions, and has the lead in developing certain nationally significant cases. For more information, you can visit epa.gov/compliance. Thank you Mark Pollins, Director of EPA’s Water Enforcement Division in the Office of Civil Enforcement, for your green tips.