Spokane County commissioners appear to have beaten an approaching deadline by signing a loan agreement with the Washington state Department of Ecology Friday. But the deadlines that loom will grow increasingly critical until the state and various local entities achieve reasonable accord over water quality in the Spokane River and Long Lake. The key word is “reasonable.”

The $8.5 million loan will let the county revise its plans for building a new sewage treatment plant to accommodate growth while addressing the river’s ability to sustain fish.

Ultimately, the county wants a low-interest loan from the state with which to build the $100 million plant. First, though, it has to demonstrate to DOE that the new facility will help improve water quality.

DOE has declared the river “impaired” based on dissolved oxygen levels that are lower than needed to support the cold water fish runs the department says are suitable there.

So as the county works on its wastewater-disposal plan, other studies are under way, too. DOE is working on one that will prescribe the level of dissolved oxygen that must be maintained. Meanwhile, a coalition of entities that discharge treated water into the river are conducting an additional study that focuses on identifying what uses are actually attainable.

The stakeholders who will feel the direct impact of these investigations include Spokane County; the cities of Spokane, Spokane Valley, Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls; the Liberty Lake and Hayden sewer and water districts; and two private entities – Kaiser Aluminum and the Inland Empire Paper Co. (The latter is owned by the company that owns The Spokesman-Review.)

The dischargers know they will have to improve their performance, and they intend to, either through better technology or through innovative strategies. Hayden, for example, uses treated water to irrigate land rather than put it back in the river; Post Falls is moving in the same direction.

But DOE needs to be more flexible, too. The agency is focusing its regulatory attention on the dischargers who collectively account for half or less of the problem. The department needs to pay more attention to the so-called non-point sources that account for the other half.

The department also owes the community – whose sewage treatment costs could more than double, for starters – a close look at the attainability study the dischargers are putting together. DOE would find that its assumptions about what the Spokane River and Long Lake can sustain (even if all discharges were ended) are arguably unrealistic.

It’s possible to protect both the environmental and economic interests of the community if reasonable people put their minds to it. Regulation for its own sake is pointless.