I have read a couple articles recently about The Puget Soundkeeper Alliance and their recent litigation suit.  One of the articles that lays it out very well is by Warren Cornwall. The Puget Soundkeeper Alliance is a group in the Puget Sound that uses the citizen lawsuit provision in the Clean Water Act to sue polluters of the Puget Sound.  Well, they are at it again.  They are taking issue with the a permit that was issued by the Department of Ecology to the Department of Transportation regulating how they are going to manage storm water run off from our state highways.

Untreated storm water is the number one pollutant in the Puget Sound.  The group feels as thought he permit does not do enough to fix older highways that continue to pollute storm water into the Puget Sound and other surrounding bodies of water.  They also feel as though the permit does not go far enough in regulating future road projects.  

What they would like to see is the Department of Ecology forcing the Department of Transportation to add systems on the existing highways to prevent the storm water from going directly into surrounding water.  It will be interesting to see affect the suit will have.

To read the original article on this story go to:

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2008809012_storm04m.html

To read the permit go to: 

http://www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/wq/stormwater/municipal/wsdot/finalPermitdocs2009/WSDOTfinalPERMITsig.pdf

To look at the Puget Soundkeeper Website go to:

http://www.pugetsoundkeeper.org/