The Missouri Department of Natural Resources is looking for public input on its list of impaired bodies of water.
Twelve Boone County waterways are on the current list because they don’t meet the water quality standards of the Federal Clean Water Act. Some of the bodies of water on the list are listed with high levels of E. coli, but in most cases, the cause of pollution is listed as unknown.
Gena Terlizzi is a spokesperson for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. She says the list gives residents, along with state and federal agencies, a way to keep track of waterways that need to be cleaned up.
“The purpose of the list is really to identify the water bodies that are impaired, and then we kind of take the steps to see what happens next," Terlizzi said. "How do we get this water body from the impaired list to remove it off that list?”
The Department of Natural Resources is hosting public meetings on the current list, which is a draft and is still being finalized. Two meetings are scheduled on Dec. 11 and Jan. 22 in Jefferson City. Terlizzi says they want input on refining the process of how bodies of water get on the list, as well as any details on the bodies of water that are on the list now.
The list comes out every two years, and a new one will be established in 2016. Terlizzi says there is no blanket solution to solving the problems in these bodies of water, but steps are taken to try and clean them up.
“Without singling one out, if there’s one that consistently has high levels of a certain contaminate and there is a known facility that is polluting that area, obviously we would work with that particular facility to address the kinds of waste that are going into the water,” Terlizzi said.
Terlizzi says Missouri residents can go onto their department’s website at dnr.mo.gov to find out more about the process.
