Broad-Based Effort Makes Best Sense

People who settled above the Spokane Valley aquifer have come a long way since the 1970s, when a handful of activists began criticizing septic tanks for flushing waste into the gravel above our underground drinking water. Today, sewers are replacing septic tanks and chemical handling businesses face closer scrutiny.

This has taken 30 years and the job’s not done. Over these years, public concern about the aquifer has gone through cycles, from apathy to controversy.

Now, controversy is at a peak. That’s good - but only if it creates an enduring, two-state commitment to mitigate the many hazards created by our metropolitan area’s presence above the aquifer.

Current controversy centers on the locomotive refueling depot to be constructed near Rathdrum by the Burlington Northern and Santa Fe Railway. On Monday, Kootenai County commissioners approved the project, imposing 33 conditions that should make this depot one of the area’s least hazardous fuel facilities. The railroad designed the depot with multiple safety systems - made better in response to public concerns. Commissioners added further safeguards, such as a requirement the railroad pay the state of Idaho to hire a technician to monitor the depot.

The commissioners did the right thing - and so did the railroad, by submitting to local regulation when it didn’t have to do so. Now, Kootenai County has tools to insist the depot become a model facility. At the very least, this is a step forward. The depot will upgrade current locomotive refueling practices.

What about the other fuel and chemical handling facilities that sit above the aquifer? Many feature much larger quantities, more primitive safeguards and more dangerous substances, such as industrial solvents and gasoline additives. And what about neighborhoods that still use septic tanks?

Focusing on the depot exaggerates the risk it poses and misses the larger, overall problem, as well as the way to deal with it.

The risk comes from an entire metropolitan area, which will remain and grow. To grow well, the area needs a more mature expression of environmental concern. It’s a mistake to focus on pulverizing individual projects - long after they have improved. That style of activism is fanatical rather than helpful. Instead, business after business, subdivision after subdivision, regulation after regulation, year after year, our region must press continually for state-of-the-art aquifer protection. That’s what the railroad embraced. What’s next? The risk to our aquifer cannot be eliminated but it can be reduced significantly, as long as we keep moving forward.