By Qing ZhangGreat Lakes Echo
Environmental and industry groups are usually thought to fight like cats and dogs.
But things are different in the Michigan’s Environmental Advisory Rules Committee, a group of a dozen environmentalists, manufacturers, attorneys and Michigan Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) officials.
They are assigned to identify duplicative, obsolete or burdensome environmental rules as part of Gov. Rick Snyder’s project to streamline government.
As of January, the committee came up with 77 recommendations that require changes to the process, policy, rules and statutes administrated by the environmental agency. Forty-five have been implemented.
The agency has reduced a quarter of its 2,800 rules. That includes rescinding 312 of them and transferring 420 storage tank rules to the Bureau of Fire Services, according to Dave Fiedler, the DEQ regulatory affairs officer.
Many rules were removed and replaced by similar federal regulations, Fiedler said, but that doesn’t mean the state will loosen regulations and align everything with federal requirements.
“The state can have more restrictive regulations than federal ones as long as there is a good reason,” he said. “In the case of our water programs, Michigan could have some more strict regulations as it has a lot of water resources.”
A surprising amount of consensus was reached by the disparate groups. James Clift, policy director of the Michigan Environmental Council, said, “We are constantly working on different issues together, and two-thirds of the time we agreed on the recommendation.”
When environmental and industry groups agree, that usually provides important information to legislators that the issue shouldn’t have any problems, Clift said.
Andy Such, director of environmental and regulatory policy for the manufacturers group, also said the consensus “more readily” gets things done.
“For the majority of the recommendations, everybody supported it,” Fiedler said. That’s probably because many of the 77 recommendations don’t involve any rule changes. Instead, the group updated outdated rules or policies and removed duplicative state and federal regulations.
For example, the committee suggested removing rules for grant and loan programs that no longer have funding, as well as eliminating state mercury emissions limits that are similar to a federal rule.
Some rules, said Fiedler, were burdensome and didn’t benefit the environment, like the state’s annual wastewater report. A lot of industries already reported their wastewater discharges in other reports. It was a burden for them to do so again.
The process was not without controversy.
“Cooperation doesn’t mean capitulation,” Such said. “We still have differences. No doubt about that.”
Clift said that the environmental council and the manufacturers’ group disagreed on two major issues: whether to eliminate Michigan’s air toxics rule and whether to pass legislation to use “industrial byproducts,” which include foundry sand, coal ash and paper mill residue in construction.
While it can be environmentally friendly to make full use of industrial waste and reduce the cost of disposal in landfills, Clift said “such regulations are going too far and aren’t being protective to public health.”
They allow the use of materials that could leach toxic chemicals at a level 20 times that allowed in drinking water, he said, and those standards are two to four times weaker than in Wisconsin.
Fiedler said the committee made government requirements more transparent and accessible to businesses.
One recommendation standardizes state policies and procedures in one location on the Internet.
“In the past, we have policies and procedures that were not that easy to identify,’’ said Fiedler. Now on one webpage people can find all DEQ rules.
“It helps put better outreach to the regulated community,” he said.
The public also has opportunities for input before rules become final. Fiedler said, “We try to get everybody involved. It’s important to get all stakeholders together and communicate with them on what changes we are making.”
So far, 2,055 environmental and non-environmental rules have been rescinded, according to an Office of Regulatory Reinvention report.
Fiedler said the agency is getting positive feedback from the regulated community and will continually review, update and improve rules.
“It is not going to stop once the 77 recommendations are completed. It’s an ongoing process. It will not end,” he said.