Great Falls - just outside of DCFlowing through the nation's capital, the Potomac River is no longer safe for swimming in too many of its reaches and is polluted by nutrients, bacteria, heavy metals, and hormone-disrupting chemicals. Fish kills in the Shenandoah have killed up to 80% of the adult smallmouth bass and redbreast sunfish population in one year and intersex fish are now found regularly.

The Potomac Riverkeeper is dedicated to protecting and restoring water quality in the Potomac River and its tributaries through community action and enforcement. One main way we work is to focus on enforcing the Clean Water Act and making sure that all of the 235 dischargers into the Potomac and its tributaries are in compliance with the law. In a new report, we identified 41 polluters who chronically violate their permits. The facilities include municipal sewage treatment plants and industrial facilities. Working with law school environmental law clinics, we have targeted the most egregious violators for enforcement via the citizen suit provision of the Clean Water Act, and we put the others on notice that we are monitoring their performance. Already we have had success - two wastewater treatment plants in West Virginia with hundreds of violations are now under state orders to upgrade their facilities and must pay penalties after we submitted a notice of intent to sue.

Environmental laws like the Clean Water Act are only as good as they are enforced - and we want all polluters to follow the law. Using a comprehensive and systematic approach, we are taking a hard look at all the polluters in our watershed. The Potomac deserves as much.