Wednesday Top of the Scroll: S.F. tells Supreme Court it’s not responsible for ocean water quality
In a case that could limit the authority of federal and state agencies to regulate water pollution, San Francisco is arguing to the Supreme Court that it is responsible only for the pollutants its sewage-treatment plants discharge into the ocean, and not for the quality of the waters themselves. The court agreed in May to hear San Francisco’s appeal of a ruling that said the city was failing to protect swimmers and bathers from discharges of sewage into the Pacific Ocean. The ruling, due by June 2025, will determine whether local governments can be penalized for pollution near their shores, or whether — as they contend — the law requires them only to limit contaminants to levels set in advance, like specific discharges per million parts of water. In its Supreme Court filing, San Francisco compared itself to a chef telling cooks what ingredients to include in a pot of soup, rather than vaguely instructing them not to make the soup “too salty.”
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