CHARLESTON — Amid continuing fallout from the weekend anti-Islamic display controversy, the House of Delegates managed to work its way through its Monday calendar, passing some bills and squashing another attempt to restore some pollution control measures to a water quality rules bill.
— SB 72 establishes a Sexual Assault Victims’ Bill of Rights. Delegate Vernon Criss, R-Wood, posed a successful amendment to have the bill named Hazel’s Law, to honor a woman who endured many years of abuse and survived to become an advocate for others.
The rights include a forensic exam, a representative present for medical matters and legal proceedings, and a rape kit tested and preserved and notice of planned kit disposal in order to request preservation for another 10 years.
It passed 99-0 and returns to the Senate for amendment concurrence.
— SB 393 protects the right to farm and protects agricultural operations from nuisance litigation if the facility has been in operation for more than one year. It passed 97-1 and returns to the Senate for amendment concurrence.
—SB 441 ends the residency requirement for college campus police officers and authorizes institutions of higher learning to appoint all qualified individuals to serve as officers. This originated out of WVU, which was unable to hire a qualified officer who lived just across the state line in Mount Morris, Pa.
It passed 97-0 and goes to the governor.
Water rule
Delegate Evan Hansen, D-Monongalia, made one last attempt to amend some Department of Environmental Protection recommended water pollution discharge standards back into SB 163, a rules bundle containing eight separate DEP rules bills that was on second reading Monday.
The bill — in particular the rules in its sub-bill, SB 167 – has been the subject of contention between environmental and business interests.
The contentious rule deals with DEP human health standards for wastewater permits and pollutants — some of them carcinogenic — in wastewater discharge. In July, following its triennial review, DEP proposed a rule adopting new EPA recommendations for 60 of the pollutants.
Some of the standards were stricter than the previous, some more lenient.
In November, the interim Rule Making Review Committee, at the behest of industry, asked DEP to withdraw its recommendation and retain the standards EPA set in the mid-1980s.
In late January, the Senate Energy, Industry and Mining Committee restored the 60 parameters to the rule. The Judiciary took the 60 parameters back out. Industrial interests wanted more time to study the standards and develop more state- and site-specific measures for some of the 60.
As the bill now stands, all stakeholders have until Oct. 1, 2019, to submit comments and recommendations to the DEP; DEP has until April 1, 2020, to re-submit its proposed standards for the 60 contaminants to be enacted in 2021.
Hansen tried and failed to get the standards amended back when House Judiciary considered it, and fought a losing battle again Monday.
Hansen said the latest science is the best science, and adopting the standards now won’t affect companies such as Dow, which will be receiving a five-year permit, with a potential for extension to as long as 10 years.
Delegate Barbara Evans Fleischauer, D-Monongalia, kicked off a round of discussion by recalling the 2014 Freedom Industries spill that contaminated the water supply for most of the Kanawha River Valley.
Opponents were able to turn that against her, however, by pointing out that this rule won’t prevent catastrophic spills.
Fleischauer attempted a rebound by saying this rule will help keep carcinogens out of the water.
The amendment failed 34-64 and the bill is on third reading on Tuesday.
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