Bay Area/ San Francisco/ Politics & Govt
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Published on September 26, 2024
San Francisco Fights to Curb Potential $9,000 Utility Bill Spike At Supreme Court Over Water Act DisputeSource: Google Street View

San Francisco is making a last-ditch effort to prevent a surge in utility bills. With City Attorney David Chiu presenting the final brief to the Supreme Court, the city's legal battle aims to get the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set clear requirements for water discharge permits by the Clean Water Act, which, as Chiu asserts, would avert looming utility hikes that could exceed $9,000 yearly per ratepayer within the next decade and a half; this steep rise is fueled by a potential $10 billion in capital expenditures necessitated by stringent permit terms opposed by the city, according to the San Francisco City Attorney's Office.

The City's case, City and County of San Francisco v. Environmental Protection Agency, is centered around "three abstract sentences in a 150-page permit," which City Attorney Chiu and Dennis Herrera, General Manager of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC), argue introduce uncertainty into the City's permits and could trigger infrastructural investments that marginally impact water quality but significantly burden ratepayers, as they told the San Francisco City Attorney's Office, Herrera underscored the untenable position San Francisco finds itself in, having to deal with unclear pollution thresholds set by the EPA that can lead to post-violation enforcement which is, by its nature, a reactive rather than proactive means to manage environmental impacts.

The Clean Water Act, enacted in 1972, was a shift from the previous model of environmental regulation, which focused on post-pollution punishment toward proactive pollution prevention through detailed NPDES permits issued by the EPA; these permits are meant to give clear and actionable standards for municipalities, but in San Francisco's view EPA's inclusion of generic prohibitions within the permits returns the system to a dysfunctionally reactive state, as reported by the San Francisco City Attorney's Office, the heart of the contention is over two generic prohibitions included in the city's Bayside and Oceanside permits which they believe tie compliance to water body conditions outwith the city's control.

In the face of a divided Ninth Circuit panel's ruling, which the city found unfavorable, the City and County of San Francisco chose to take their grievance to the highest court to absolve their utilities and their constituents from the financial straits and legal morass these prohibitions threaten, the precise legal question to be resolved is whether the Clean Water Act permits EPA or authorized states to include broad prohibitions in NPDES permits that hold permitholders accountable for quality standard exceedances without specifying exact limits for discharge conformity, as Deputy City Attorney Tara Steeley, who is set to represent the city, as per the San Francisco City Attorney's Office.