By Cassie Gavin
Director of Government Relations
The NC General Assembly will return on Wednesday (Oct. 4) for a fairly open-ended session during which legislators may take up veto override votes and judicial redistricting.
One of the vetoed bills that the Legislature may consider is House Bill 56 "Amend Environmental Laws," which the Sierra Club has long opposed. The bill appeared to have stalled in the House until the the late August session, when a small amount of funding was added for UNC-Wilmington and the Cape Fear Public Utility Authority to investigate contamination of the Cape Fear River. This new addition made the bill more appealing to some House members and therefore H 56 was passed.
The Sierra Club opposes H 56 because it includes a repeal of the popular ban on single-use plastic bags in the Outer Banks that protects endangered sea turtles, provisions that could endanger water quality, and a change in waste management that takes away local authority.
Opportunity for action
Please thank House members who voted against the bill and ask your representative to vote no if the bill comes up for a veto override vote.
More details about H 56
Plastic bag ban repeal
The Outer Banks plastic bag ban helps protect endangered sea turtles, which can mistake the bags for food, and prevent litter in sensitive coastal areas. Outer Banks local governments passed resolutions opposing repeal, but the Retail Merchants Association, a retail business lobbying organization, successfully pushed lawmakers to repeal the ban.
Small amount of funding for GenX contamination
H 56 directs $435,000 to the Wilmington water utility and UNC-Wilmington to study GenX contamination of the lower Cape Fear River and find a way to clean the water. The Legislature ignored a request from Governor Cooper for emergency funding to investigate not only GenX contamination, but the presence of other unregulated chemicals in drinking water. Cooper requested $2.5 million for the Department of Environmental Quality and Department of Health and Human Services. DEQ has been challenged to keep up with water quality inspections and permitting in the face of years of legislative budget cuts. Chemours, the company that discharged GenX, is operating on an expired permit.
H 56 leaves DEQ without needed resources to monitor discharges from the Chemours plant and DHHS without adequate staffing to address the toxicology issues. DHHS, for example, has only one toxicologist to address these and other issues statewide.
"Flow control" handed to private waste companies
At the request of private waste companies, the bill includes a new provision that would take authority from local governments for determining where to dispose of solid waste and give it to the companies themselves. The technical term for this is "flow control." Unlike local governments, private waste companies are not bound by law to provide environmentally safe waste disposal for citizens.The proposed shift in control could be a bonanza for these companies, as they compete for revenue from both in-state and out-of-state waste streams.
Other veto overrides that may come up: S 16, H 576
In August, Governor Cooper vetoed Senate Bill 16 "Business Regulatory Reform Act of 2017" due to environmental concerns. The governor’s veto statement said, “We should make it easier, not harder, for state and local governments to protect water quality, whether through stormwater safeguards or by giving public health departments the ability to revisit wastewater permits if needed. Rolling back ways to protect water quality is dangerous.”
The Legislature could also take up a veto override of House Bill 576 "Allow Aerosolization of Leachate." H 576 would force DEQ to allow a landfill wastewater-spraying technology. Currently DEQ has the discretion to review such technologies and determine whether they are safe or not; or perhaps allow such technology with certain permit conditions. The bill potentially puts workers and neighbors who live near landfills at risk from an unproven technology.
Governor Cooper vetoed H 576 on the basis that scientists, not the Legislature, should decide whether the technology can safely dispose of contaminated liquids from landfills.
Opportunity for action
Please also ask your representative to vote against S 16 and H 576 if the bills come up for veto override votes.
Administrative procedure trainwreck bill may also be considered
House Bill 162 "Amend Administrative Procedure Laws" would sharply undercut the ability of agencies and commissions to adopt common-sense, much needed rules. The bill would entirely prohibit an agency from adopting rules that would have an aggregate five-year financial impact of $100 million or more, and would require approval by a supermajority of the rulemaking commission for rules with an aggregate financial impact over five years of $10 million-$99 million. This could negatively impact environmental protections that often have wide-ranging health and safety benefits.
H 162 started out as a non-controversial House bill but was revised and passed by the Senate in its current form. The House has, so far, declined to take up the Senate version - and last week a House committee took a hard look at the bill. See this WRAL article for details about all the questions raised in committee about the bill.
Opportunity for action
Please ask your representative to oppose House Bill 162.
Thank you for your advocacy!