A Blueprint for Cleaning Up
Pollution from Forest Roads
Dear
Guardian, 
Thanks to years of advocacy in our Rewilding Campaign we have
an important milestone to announce.
A landmark legal settlement with the Environmental Protection
Agency last week requires the agency to finally develop a plan to regulate
pollution from forest roads that clogs streams and rivers killing fish and pollutes
our drinking water supplies.
The spider web of dirt roads that spread across our
landscapes are a cancer to clean water, dumping tons of sediment into waterways
with every rainstorm. Across the U.S., 67% of watersheds on Forest Service
lands ranked as poor or fair condition due to roads.
We’ve been pressing them in the forests, in the nation’s
capitol, and in the courts to control runoff from forest roads for over a
decade.
Because of the settlement, EPA has agreed to new deadlines to
shore up rules on storm water pollution from forest roads and urban areas.
WildEarth Guardians’ advocacy for these rules helped to bring this problem to
the court’s attention.
In the settlement, EPA agreed to lay out options to best fix
the forest road storm water problem by May 2016.
More than 43 years—and still counting—after Congress passed
the Clean Water Act the promise of clean water is still unfulfilled in streams
and rivers across our nation. The EPA’s plan to deal with pollution from forest
roads—and our and your participation in it—can make a real difference to
fulfill the promise of clean water.
WildEarth
Guardians and our Rewilding Team will be there every step of the way demanding
the strongest rules for preventing polluted runoff from roads.
Stand
with us for clean water and wild forests!
Bryan Bird
Wild Places Program Director
WildEarth Guardians
bbird@wildearthguardians.org
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