Committee hears testimony on bill to remove DEQ petition deadline for impaired waters

House Natural Resources held a hearing on House Bill 684 on petitions for listing impaired waters, with sponsor Rep. Steve Fitzpatrick saying the Department of Environmental Quality asked that the statutory deadline be removed to give staff more flexibility. "This is a bill I'm bringing at the request of the Department of Environmental Quality," Fitzpatrick said at the hearing.

The bill would strike a statutory deadline tied to DEQ's review of citizen-submitted information that can trigger consideration of whether a water body should be listed as impaired. Proponents from DEQ framed the change as an operational fix: Sonia Nowakowski, director of DEQ, said the agency did not present a specific replacement date because staffers need time to work out how the review fits with its biennial integrated report cycle. "60 days simply isn't long enough, Mister Chair, Representative Marler," Nowakowski said, adding that DEQ would like to negotiate a suitable timeline later in the process.

Opponents said removing the deadline would allow an indefinite delay of public petitions and create unequal treatment compared with regulated dischargers. Derf Johnson of the Montana Environmental Information Center told the committee the petition process is an important tool that allows communities to ask DEQ to consider listing a water body as impaired and that the bill "basically allows for an indefinite period of time in which DEQ could sit on the information that you submit." Sam Carlson of the Clark Fork Coalition argued Montanans deserve a timely response comparable to the timelines DEQ follows when industry seeks a permit: "When industry requests a permit to discharge into state waters, DEQ has a clear timeline to respond, and we believe that all Montanans deserve the same courtesy. Yet, this bill would allow DEQ to indefinitely delay any response."

Committee members pressed DEQ staff for details. Andy Ulvin, Water Quality Planning Bureau Chief, explained DEQ's integrated report is produced every two years and that petition timing can conflict with that schedule. Ulvin said some compromise between the current 60-day requirement and the full two-year cycle might be workable: "I think some number of days in between 60 and 2 years would give us a flexibility ... and also keeps us from that becoming stagnant and going 18 months or so between assessment periods." Several legislators suggested a temporary numeric extension (for example, 180 or 270 days) could be addressed in the Senate if necessary; Fitzpatrick said amendments may be difficult before transmittal and likely would need to be handled on the Senate side.

The hearing record contains both the request for administrative flexibility and vocal calls for preserving a clear response timeline to protect public access to the petition process. The committee closed the hearing on HB 684 without a vote.