Dozens of small towns in Colorado have banded together to protest new wastewater treatment permits that are designed to protect state rivers and streams, saying they contain new rules that are too costly to implement and they haven’t had time to make the necessary changes to comply.
The controversy comes as climate change and drought reduce stream flows and cause water temperatures to rise, and as population growth increases the amount of wastewater being discharged to Colorado’s rivers.
In response to the towns’ concerns, the water quality control division of the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment has taken the unusual step of holding off on taking enforcement action against at least some of the towns that say they can’t comply with the new regulations. It issued notice of its decision March 24.
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“Some smaller communities have faced real technical and financial challenges meeting these new requirements,” CDPHE spokesman John Michael said in an email. “In response, we issued a temporary enforcement discretion memo to give systems time to work through compliance barriers without immediate penalties.”
Now Colorado lawmakers who represent the Eastern Plains have drafted a bill designed to help small communities cope with the new regulatory requirements by extending the time they have to build or upgrade new plants and raise the money to pay for them.
The issue came to a head last month. Akron Town Manager Gillian Laycock, whose town is trying to comply with its new permit, invited dozens of communities facing the same issues to attend a special meeting. Representatives from 64 towns attended along with lawmakers, Laycock said.
But problems have been brewing for years. The water quality control division has a large backlog in wastewater discharge permits, meaning small towns have been allowed to operate their plants under old rules as they waited for their new permits to arrive. Laycock said Akron had been waiting for its new permit for at least eight years.
“We knew something was coming,” she said, “but this has been a shock.”
In recent years, lawmakers have given the division more money to hire additional people so that the backlog can be reduced and more towns can come into compliance with the new standards.
But Sen. Barbara Kirkmeyer, a Republican from Brighton, and Sen. Byron Pelton, a Republican from Sterling, said they are frustrated that the more than $2 million spent to address the problem isn’t helping.
“I told the CDPHE if they continue down this road, the folks out in the rural areas are about ready to tell them to pound sand,” Pelton said. “That’s how stressful it’s been for these small municipalities. The regulations just keep coming at them.”
Under the federal Clean Water Act, entities that discharge fluids into streams, including wastewater treatment plants and factories, must get approval from state water quality regulators to ensure what they’re putting into the waterways does not harm them.
Towns and water districts can receive either a general permit, which has standard terms and conditions, or individual permits, which take much longer to process, are typically more expensive and are often used by large systems in cities such as Denver.
The general permits were finalized in 2022 to help small towns comply with the stricter regulations quickly and at less cost, said Michael, the CDPHE spokesperson. But many haven’t been issued because of the backlog.
Akron finally received its new permit last October, Laycock said. But the town was unprepared for the strict new limits on what and how much can be discharged, the tight timelines to comply and the costs.
Once the new permit was issued, Laycock said, its old permit expired almost immediately, leaving the town out of compliance with the new regulations, exposing them to potential legal issues and fines.
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The regulatory shock is understandable, but could have been avoided, according to Meg Parish, an attorney for the , a nonprofit focused on enforcing air and water pollution regulations. She previously worked for the state’s water quality control division and helped develop the new general permit that is causing current concerns.
“Some of these towns have really old permits,” Parish said. They’ve been allowed to continue discharging under a special administrative permit. In the interim, strict new standards have taken effect.
But she said the new rules shouldn’t have come as a surprise to anyone.
She said the new general permit was finalized after months of public work sessions and outreach meetings.
“We invited every small discharger in the state to participate. All the terms are on the state’s website….it literally says ‘if your (wastewater discharge) flow is this much, this is what your limit is going to be. There is no mystery.”
But Adam Sommers, an environmental engineer who has several clients trying to obtain new permits, said the process is cumbersome and expensive.
“Each permitting activity has a 180-day review period and if changes are needed, the clock starts over,” he said in an email.
“This frequently adds years to the schedule,” Sommers said. “The estimates engineers create are time sensitive. If years have passed between when they prepare the budget and when the project is constructed, they face affordability issues.”
Sens. Kirkmeyer and Pelton are working on a bill that will be introduced shortly forcing the CDPHE to give the towns more time to comply and help them address the financial challenges of the new regulations. It will also set strict deadlines on the permitting process, according to the latest draft of the bill. Kirkmeyer said the CDPHE has been helping with the new legislation.
Kirkmeyer said she was taking the unusual step of running the bill through the Joint Budget Committee because it approves the budget for the water quality control division and she wanted to send a strong message to the regulators.
“I want them to know we are serious about this,” she said.
Looking ahead, as water quality continues to deteriorate, treatment standards will continue to tighten, Parish said.
“One of the key realities is that wastewater treatment plants need to upgrade their plants and do better, and pollute less,” Parish said.
Laycock, the Akron town manager, said she understands the urgency of the problem but she said the state’s approach needs work.
“We are agricultural people and we love our land, but how do we as a town afford to meet these requirements? I understand what they are trying to do. But this is not the way to do it.”