Environmental Law Foundation v. State Water Resources Control Board

California Court of Appeal, Third Appellate District · Property

PropertyWater quality regulationNonpoint source pollutionAntidegradationPorter-Cologne Water Quality Control ActNonpoint Source PolicyAntidegradation Policygeneral waste discharge requirements

Facts

The State Water Board adopted Order WQ 2018-0002 governing discharges from irrigated lands in the Eastern San Joaquin River Watershed through general waste discharge requirements applicable to coalition members. The Order required members to implement management practices, prepare farm evaluations and nitrogen management documents, and report information to the Coalition, which would aggregate and anonymize certain data before submitting it to the Central Valley Water Board. The Coalition also had monitoring and management-plan duties when water quality exceedances occurred. Appellants argued the Order violated the Nonpoint Source Policy and Antidegradation Policy in several respects, including anonymized data reporting, allegedly insufficient management-practice descriptions and feedback mechanisms, and inadequate antidegradation findings.

Issue

Whether the Order violated the Nonpoint Source Policy by using anonymized reporting, by allegedly failing to describe specific management practices, or by lacking sufficient feedback mechanisms, and whether it violated the Antidegradation Policy by lacking adequate required findings or by improperly departing from AGUA.

Rule

For the Nonpoint Source Policy, the binding requirements are the underlined key elements, while the accompanying commentary is advisory and nonbinding. Key element four does not prohibit anonymized management-practice or reporting data if the program otherwise includes sufficient feedback mechanisms, and key element two requires a description of expected management practices and related selection and verification processes, not necessarily exhaustive field-specific prescriptions. For antidegradation, the Board must make findings that any degradation is consistent with maximum benefit to the people of the state, will not unreasonably affect beneficial uses, and will not violate water quality standards; for diffuse irrigated agricultural discharges regulated by a general order, the Board may use a general assessment of reasonably available existing water quality data where an accurate numeric baseline is impossible.

🔒

See the holding & full analysis

Create a free KwikCourt account to unlock the rest of this brief — and practice the case.

The court's holding and reasoning
Doctrine tests, pitfalls & exam hypotheticals
10 practice questions + 4 AI-graded essays on this case

Free sample · practice this case

Test yourself

One of 10 multiple-choice questions for this case. Pick an answer to see why.

A regional water board in Fresno adopts a nonpoint source control program for vineyard runoff. The program satisfies the underlined text of key element four, but several growers and a neighborhood association sue because non-underlined commentary after key element four says monitoring information should be available to the public, and the program keeps farm-specific data confidential.

How should a court most likely rule on the challenge?

Explanation. The majority held that the operative requirements of the Nonpoint Source Policy are the underlined key elements, while the following non-underlined paragraphs are commentary and nonbinding. A challenge based only on commentary therefore fails if the program complies with the binding underlined text. The court specifically rejected an argument that commentary about public availability made anonymization unlawful.