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Presented at
Pennsylvania Watershed Conference: Restoration and Protection
October 13-14, 2000
State College, Pennsylvania
Good Evening!
It is a sincere pleasure for me to speak to you tonight. I view this conference as a celebration a celebration of the environmental success being achieved across Pennsylvania and a celebration for each and every citizen who is playing a part in the protection and restoration of Pennsylvania waters.
As the "CEO of Pennsylvania waters," I often have the honor of speaking to groups both inside and outside the Commonwealth. Invariably I am asked what is the secret of our success. Well, my response centers on three major points:
Quite clearly we have a winning formula here in Pennsylvania and we all need to continue with our shoulder to the wheel to build upon our successes.
A revolution is underway in Pennsylvania ... an environmental revolution. It is not being fought with muskets or cannons but instead with commitment, dedication and the sweat of many Pennsylvanians.
It is not a revolution being fought by bureaucrats or hired gun lobbyists or lawyers. Instead it is a revolution being fought by average citizens and watershed groups across the state, many of whom we will celebrate at this conference.
It is not a revolution where the tactical decisions are made by Commander Jim Seif, Field General Dave Hess, or Lieutenant Larry Tropea. Instead it is a revolution in which local citizens and watershed groups make the decisions, set the priorities and develop the plans to preserve their watersheds and enhance their quality of life.
It is not a revolution being fought with new DEP regulations or "one size fits all" solutions from Harrisburg. Instead it is a revolution being fought with local knowledge and local intellectual capacity.
Quite clearly, it is a great time to be a Pennsylvanian and an even better time to be a Pennsylvanian working on environmental issues.
Great things are happening across Pennsylvania, and I would like to take a few minutes to chronicle some of our key successes:
If you are like me, you have probably pondered questions like: Where do we go from here? How will environmental protection evolve? What future role will citizens play in protecting the environment?
Well, I would like to provide you with my perspectives and thoughts about the next generation of environmental protection. Some of these trends are emerging today while others may be less apparent and perhaps a few are Larry Tropea dreams.
The next generation will witness an increasing shift in power from the government bureaucrats to the citizens. We will increasingly see local citizens take ownership of their watersheds, and they will be the planners, the stewards, and the conscience for their fellow citizens and neighbors. Government will evolve to play more of a facilitation role in which they educate, train and nurture local watershed groups and step in to take enforcement action where appropriate.
We will also see the evolution of a citizen environmental ethic across the Commonwealth. We will see citizens learn the true value of having a clean stream flow through their town and see them learn the real value of clean air. As this new environmental ethic takes hold, we will see both younger and older Pennsylvanians take ownership of their watershed and make its protection a priority in their daily lives.
While we will always have a few who "just do not get it," I predict we will see increasing numbers of bullhorns at garage sales as citizens discard them for shovels to lead real environmental progress.
We will hopefully see more emphasis on environmental partnerships than placing "labels" on people and dreaming up the next sound bite for the press. I hope for a climate where individuals from all sectors come together, as partners, because of a love of the watershed - regardless of whether they come from business, government, environmental groups or are citizens.
I was fortunate to be a soldier on the front lines during the legislative development of the Clean Water Act, the Clean Air Act, RCRA and the other environmental statutes. I can recall testifying on both the Clean Air and the Clean Water Acts before Congressional House and Senate Committees. It was an exciting and heady experience to have a say on these landmark environmental laws.
There can be no doubt that these statutes were essential and that they energized significant pollution reductions. We need environmental laws and regulations to serve as "guard rails" to guide the way for the responsible and to protect the public from the irresponsible.
But as remarkable as these laws were time has illustrated that many of these laws are now outdated, cumbersome and inefficient. For example, Superfund, the poster child for inefficiency, has resulted in large expenditures that have done little to address the real clean-up needs of our nation.
We have reaped the low hanging fruits through our media specific legislation. But today, many of our environmental problems are caused by me, or you, or the person sitting next to you. Today it is the cumulative impact of our activities, like driving an automobile or fertilizing our lawns, that create some of our greatest environmental challenges.
Today's challenges call for new approaches not contemplated when the media specific legislation was enacted. Today's world calls for comprehensive, ecologically sound decisions that may require media specific compromises or trade-offs. This more ecological approach will allow us to better solve our challenges and is a critical need for the future.
I can assure you that state environmental programs lead in innovation. Just look at Pennsylvania's leadership with Brownfields, eFACTS and Growing Greener.
There are creative individuals in other levels of government, and we see an occasional glimmer of hope. But it is the states that have assumed the leadership role in developing new initiatives that get real results. In the next generation, we will hopefully see an acceleration of power to the states and, in turn, a further acceleration in new and better ideas that achieve real environmental results.
This decentralization of environmental responsibilities will bring environment policy and decisions closer to the real people and ensure that decisions are made by those who actually live in the area and truly understand the problem and the trade-offs. The time has passed for inefficient "one size fits all" national dictates we simply cannot afford, nor should we tolerate, them in the future.
The world is shrinking and global forces and challenges cannot be ignored. No matter where we live in the world, whether it is in Pennsylvania or China, we are part of an intertwined global community. Environmental problems transcend political boundaries, and we must have a level global environmental playing field to avoid inequities or the creation of pollution havens. I feel strongly that countries cannot be allowed to compete for economic wealth at the expense of the environment.
We will clearly witness the continued growth of market based environmental policy. It will no longer be ignored as "egghead" theory. It is apparent to me that we will see increasing links between economic and environmental policy in the future. However, we must have broad-based buy-in on these approaches, or we will unfairly tilt the economic playing field for our businesses.
We will, in the shorter term, see the establishment of watershed effluent trading and in Pennsylvania I can assure you that it will be coupled with proper public participation, sound science and achieve an environmental benefit. I believe it is in our best interests to help ensure that our pollution reductions are achieved at the overall lowest cost to society.
Technology must have an important seat at the table in the next generation. The problems of the future cannot be effectively resolved with the tired technologies of yesterday. We must find creative ways to nurture new technology by removing the current implementation barriers. Many of today's environmental regulations, while well intentioned, are overly prescriptive and create barriers to new technology. Also, our regulatory enforcement system has stifled innovative solutions, which might be better for the environment, because of potential enforcement concerns. We need to make more funding available to address the technology challenges of the next generation, and we must find ways to hurtle the barriers to innovative technology.
We have many exciting tools available to us that can greatly aid our decision-making. We have GIS, sophisticated computer models and many other leading edge tools. But without a sound database on the environment, we will not be able to reap the value these tools and, worse yet, may be mislead by placing too much confidence in them.
In my future vision, citizens will be able to click on a watershed map to find all the information available including habitat, endangered species, wetlands, cultural history, water quality, demographics, drinking water sources, etc.
But these tools require good data. We must, therefore, accelerate our investment in comprehensive, long-term data for our streams, our air and our groundwater.
The next generation will provide local governments with a golden opportunity to adopt and implement sound land use plans and ordinances ... to combat urban sprawl, strip development and the loss of farmland. This type of planning cannot be properly done in Harrisburg or be relegated to some smart MBA who once visited Pennsylvania. Instead local governments will increasingly need to work with local citizens and development interests to aggressively take the lead in planning for the future and watershed groups need to actively participate in this process.
Responsible, progressive businesses can make a tremendous difference for the environment, and we need more companies to take a leadership role on environmental issues. All businesses should implement ISO 14001, the environmental management standard and demand that their suppliers adhere to the same high standard.
They should conduct product life cycle analyses and make their products more sustainable.
They should practice pollution prevention and publicly commit to exceed government standards. They should adopt an environmental policy to operate all their worldwide facilities to the highest worldwide environmental standard. And, they should require their suppliers to meet these same standards.
They should report their environmental activities to the public and their Board of Directors and form external Environmental Advisory Councils.
Many of us who have served in business realize that leadership on the environment is simply good business and will be increasingly expected by customers, neighbors and employees.
During this conference, as we celebrate our watershed achievements and look to the future with optimism and excitement let us agree to redouble our commitment to partnerships and achieving improved environmental results through the watershed approach. Let's bring all interests to our watershed table. Let's develop watershed plans that will chart a strategic direction and be our guiding light for the future. Let's join hands as partners to ensure a safe and healthy environment for our children and their children to follow.
Let's sing the praises of our beautiful Pennsylvania environment loud and clear. Let's make our friends, neighbors and other interests know the value we place on clean water, clean air and clean groundwater. Let's remind people that a clean environment and high quality streams are not a liability but rather, an asset to be cherished and protected.
Let's "just say no" to the interests who argue we cannot afford to protect the environment and who want to return to the confrontations, and stalemate, of the 1970s. Let's not let them knock us off our revolutionary track. We know that, time and time again, it has been shown that protecting the environment does NOT mean sacrificing economic progress.
As partners, let's make the Pennsylvania environmental revolution the envy of other states and be "the way we do things here in Pennsylvania."
You, here today, are our leaders, our visionaries and the tireless soldiers who are making a positive difference for the environment. On behalf of Governor Ridge, Secretary Seif, and our entire DEP team, I thank you and encourage you to keep up the good work.