Help Needed For Aquifer Protection Program

Sat., April 10, 1999

By Alison Boggs alisonb@spokesman.com (509) 459-5314

The Panhandle Health District is hoping Spokane County will help pay for its aquifer protection program.

The Idaho Legislature in February granted the health district $98,000 yearly, but that’s less than what the district needs to run the program.

So Ken Lustig, director of environmental health for the district, has drafted a proposal, asking Spokane County for $39,000 to help pay for parts of the program that benefit both communities. The Rathdrum Prairie Aquifer is the sole-source of drinking water for many people on both sides of the state line.

“I’m hoping to make up what we didn’t get from the Idaho Legislature by working with Spokane,” Lustig said.

Spokane County can help Idaho out for two years, but after that, both communities will face the same problem, said Stan Miller, who manages the aquifer protection program in Spokane.

For years, the aquifer protection program was federally funded, thanks to an annual $1 million appropriation secured by former House Speaker Tom Foley of Washington. But when he left office in 1994, the money ran out.

The federal money was divided between Idaho and Spokane. Idaho’s share already has run out and Spokane County’s will be gone within the next two years, Miller said.

“I could be a little help to Idaho for two years, but that’s false security,” Miller said. “I want to put together a longer term solution.”

Miller said Spokane would be most likely to fund the parts of Idaho’s program that benefit both communities, such as water quality monitoring and inventories of aquifer contaminants.

Both Miller and Lustig would like to see their programs work together more cooperatively.

“I would like to be able to tether our programs together,” Lustig said.

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