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Ask Your Senator to Protect Colorado's Wetlands and Waters - Vote NO on SB 127, YES on HB 1379

Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a decision resulting in the biggest rollback of the Clean Water Act since its inception in 1972. The Court’s decision essentially eliminated protections for certain wetlands and other critically important waters, including streams that don’t flow consistently year-round. Without state-level protections, many of Colorado’s critical wetlands and streams could be polluted, filled in, paved over, and destroyed without abiding by the Clean Water Act pollution control and mitigation requirements that have protected them for the past 50 years. Degradation of these wetlands and waterways can jeopardize fisheries, drinking water supplies, and other ecosystem benefits such as flood mitigation, wildfire resilience, and wildlife habitat.

While advanced as a measure to fill that protection gap for Colorado waters, SB 24-127 would fall far short of Clean Water Act standards in several key ways:

It's scope leaves out many of Colorado's wetlands and potentially seasonal streams, despite those waters having a vital role in maintaining downstream water quality;
It abandons the Clean Water Act's proven approach of first avoiding impacts to waters, then minimizing those that cannot be avoided, and mitigating any that remain to ensure that watershed values and functions are maintained;
It sets federal water quality criteria as a ceiling rather than a floor, opening the door only for weaker Colorado protections; and
Even among waters that might remain covered, it creates multiple new exemptions that go far beyond the longstanding federal exemptions that regulated industries have operated under for years.

Colorado has lost about 50% of its wetlands to development since statehood, so protecting what remains is a necessity. While SB 24-127 would establish a weak and limited state program, fortunately there is a better option: HB 24-1379 provides a solution that builds on the Clean Water Act's successful approach and ensures appropriate protection for Colorado's waters and wetlands.

HB 24-1379 will:

Restore protection for critical Colorado wetlands and waters undermined by last year’s Supreme Court decision, including wetlands and seasonal streams that shape the health of downstream waters;
Require impacts to be avoided, and only if they cannot be avoided, to be minimized and mitigated, with clear and consistent guidance for compensatory mitigation to ensure that watershed values and functions are maintained;
Establish a fair and transparent permitting process, including general permits that can streamline approval for classes of activities (such as restoration) that have no or minimal adverse impacts;
Preserve longstanding Clean Water exemptions for standard agricultural practices and irrigation ditch maintenance; and
Secure clear mechanisms for strong enforcement to protect Colorado wetlands and streams.

HB 24-1379 will ensure that the Colorado waters that lost their protection to the Supreme Court's Clean Water rollback are given the protection they need under Colorado law, so that our fisheries, watersheds and communities continue to enjoy the benefits of clean water.

Please take a moment today to contact your State Senator and ask them to oppose SB 24-127 and to support HB 24-1379. You can use the provided email template to send your comments, including editing to incorporate your own personal experiences with Colorado wetlands, headwaters, and feeder streams.

Please take a moment today to urge your Senator to protect Colorado's wetlands and headwater and feeder streams.

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Colorado Senate

Subject: Protect Colorado's Waters - Vote No on SB127

Message:

Colorado’s waters and wetlands need your help. I urge you to oppose Senate Bill 24-127 and support House Bill 24-1379. Colorado's wetlands play a vital role in preserving downstream water quality, promoting climate resiliency, supporting habitat for fish and wildlife, and helping mitigate natural disasters like floods and wildfire. Following a US Supreme Court decision that rolled back federal protection for many of Colorado's wetlands and waters, it is essential that the General Assembly step in to provide state-level protection for these critical waters. Unfortunately, rather than restoring such protections, SB24-127 offers a much weaker structure that leaves out too many of Colorado's waters and wetlands and fails to provide the standard of protection Colorado waters enjoyed under the Clean Water Act prior to its rollback by the Supreme Court. SB 24-127 would put at risk Colorado values that depend on clean water including our watersheds, our recreation economy, and drinking water supplies for our communities. At the very core of the Clean Water Act and its success in improving water quality across the country has been its fundamental approach: projects must first avoid impacts to waters, then minimize those impacts that can't be avoided, and finally mitigate any remaining impacts to compensate for the wetland functions that would be lost. SB 24-127 ignores this foundation for water quality protection and instead sets a standard that is exactly backwards: Colorado's protections must not be any more stringent than federal criteria. Further, SB 24-127's narrow scope of waters covered under the bill would exclude many important wetlands and potentially streams that do not flow year-round. Even among those waters that would be covered, the bill is rife with exemptions, going far beyond the longstanding exemptions that exist under the federal program. SB 24-127 will allow more wetlands and waters to be dug up, filled or polluted - many without even any permit or review. Fortunately, there is an alternative that would provide needed protections for Colorado's waters in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's Clean Water rollback. HB24-1379 embraces the proven approach of avoid-minimize-mitigate from the Clean Water Act, while carrying forward the previous federal exclusions and exemptions that have worked for regulated industries for decades. It emphasizes the use of general permits that set appropriate sideboards while minimizing administrative burdens on lower-impact activities, but also ensures careful review of more impactful projects with individual permits. It is a balanced approach that gives needed protection to Colorado waters and all of us who depend upon them. I urge you to protect Colorado's waters and wetlands, by voting "no" on SB-127 and "yes" on HB 24-1379.

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Ask Your Senator to Protect Colorado's Wetlands and Waters - Vote NO on SB 127, YES on HB 1379

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Thank you for lending your voice to protect Colorado's wetlands and waterways.

Can you take a moment to contact your Representative as well, and urge them to support HB 1379? Take action here!