Activists to Sue if Va. Plant Does Not Cut Pollution

[Judi Lynn]

Activists to Sue if Va. Plant Does Not Cut Pollution

By David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, August 12, 2006; Page B04

Advocates for the Potomac and Shenandoah rivers said yesterday that they plan to file suit against a Virginia sewage plant that last year dumped eight times the allowed amount of a damaging pollutant into the Shenandoah.

The "riverkeepers" for the two rivers, members of a national environmental group called the Waterkeeper Alliance, said they outlined their plans for a suit in a letter to the owners of the plant in Timberville, Va. The plant, more than 100 miles west of Washington, can avoid a suit by curbing pollution within 60 days, the letter said.

"I don’t view adding cameras in certain neighborhoods, and posting a sign that says ’camera here’ as a solution to the problem. Criminals will simply move their criminal activity elsewhere. Even if there were no signs posted alerting you to the fact that you were under surveillance, the problem would still exists. It wouldn’t take long before criminals would look up and discover that they were on camera, at which time they would simply move their criminal activity to another strip or corner. "

The riverkeepers' move is the latest twist in a long battle over pollution at the plant, which processes chicken waste from nearby poultry companies as well as sewage. The plant's outflow goes into the Shenandoah, a tributary of the Potomac.

The plant is supposed to remove from the waste large amounts of the pollutants nitrogen and phosphorus, which produce choking, unnatural algae blooms in the rivers and the Chesapeake Bay. But according to the state, the process has not worked as well as planned.
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