Washington—Senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris (both D-Calif.) today called on the Government Accountability Office to work with the Environmental Protection Agency’s inspector general to determine whether the White House pressured the agency to abuse its law enforcement authority to single out the city of San Francisco.

Last September, EPA Administrator Wheeler sent a letter to Governor Newsom alleging state water quality violations that contradict the agency’s own findings. The letter was sent after President Trump inaccurately claimed that solid waste and needles from San Francisco’s homeless were flowing into the ocean from storm sewers and the city would soon be given a notice of violation. In October, the agency issued a formal notice of violation to San Francisco.

“EPA’s internal guidance states that its ‘goal is to emphasize the value of deterrence and to establish a minimal national consistency by taking actions across the country so that no one state is singled out,’” the senators wrote. “We ask GAO to investigate whether EPA has, in fact, applied this ‘national consistency’ in its water quality enforcement actions.”

Full text of the letter follows:

July 6, 2020

The Honorable Gene Dodaro
Comptroller General, Government Accountability Office
444 G St NW
Washington, DC 20548

Dear Mr. Dodaro:

The EPA Inspector General (IG) recently informed us in the attached June 1, 2020, letter that the Inspector General is coordinating with the Government Accountability Office (GAO) in its review of EPA’s enforcement actions against California.

We urge GAO to work with the Inspector General on one important part of this potential investigation: whether EPA has failed to apply a consistent approach to enforcement against San Francisco as compared to other water utilities with combined sewer systems. The attached letter from the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission clearly spells out how EPA has singled out San Francisco for water quality enforcement in contrast to other municipalities. In fact, EPA’s September 2019 finding of San Francisco’s alleged water quality violations was inconsistent with both:

• EPA Region IX’s history of permit approvals for San Francisco’s wastewater collection and treatment system and EPA Region IX’s conclusion that San Francisco’s system protects beneficial uses in the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay; and
  
  
• EPA’s lack of comparable enforcement action against other municipalities with highly similar treatment systems for water quality discharges.
  
  

EPA’s internal guidance states that its “goal is to emphasize the value of deterrence and to establish a minimal national consistency by taking actions across the country so that no one state is singled out.” (See Interim Guidance to Strengthen Performance in NPDES Program (June 22, 2010)) We ask GAO to investigate whether EPA has, in fact, applied this “national consistency” in its water quality enforcement actions.

We request that GAO examine whether EPA’s enforcement actions against San Francisco are comparable to the agency’s enforcement actions against other municipalities which also have combined sewage systems. Thank you for considering our request.

Sincerely,

Dianne Feinstein
United States Senator

Kamala D. Harris
United States Senator

Attachment:

May 15, 2020 Letter from San Francisco to Senators Feinstein and Harris
June 1, 2020 Letter from EPA Inspector General to Feinstein and Harris