Even More EPA Bozocrats? It's Possible

About 25 years ago, the City of Brookfield had a lengthy fight with the State of Wisconsin when the City wanted to elevate a section of Calhoun Road just north of the tracks and south of Burleigh.

The State's DamnNearRussia insisted that Calhoun Road was a "navigable waterway" subject to DNR's rules. And one of those rules was that nobody could TOUCH a 'navigable waterway,' because that might disturb the three-grocked-winklewort, or its grandchildren, or something.

Of course, Calhoun Road was a "navigable waterway" only for a week or so every spring when the snowmelt combined with a rainstorm flooded the damn road.

It took about 5 years to get the permit to raise the road surface 6 inches.

The story is germane to this:

...Rep. James Oberstar, Minnesota Democrat and chairman of the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, [will] try to match a Senate committee that already advanced a bill to radically expand the scope of federal water regulations. Last week, Mr. Oberstar's staff repeated his determination to do likewise by year's end, with a bill misnamed the Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA).

The Senate version of the legislation looks deceptively like a minor change. As confirmed in several recent U.S. Supreme Court cases, federal regulatory authority currently extends only to waters that are navigable or perhaps directly connected to navigable waters. The Senate bill would remove the word "navigable." The significance of the dropped word is that any backyard fish pond or birdbath, any swimming pool or even a piece of low ground that is prone to forming puddles after rains, could be subject to the dictates of bureaucrats at the EPA and the Army Corps of Engineers.

The bozocrats at EPA and CoE (not to mention those in Damn Near Russia) take their three-grocked winkleworts very seriously.

Let's hope you don't have one (or scat therefrom) in your backyard in spring.

Alternative: Shoot, Shovel, Shut Up.