Lawmakers Seek to Curb Contaminants in Drinking Water
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WASHINGTON — House and Senate negotiators agreed Thursday to legislation to force greater federal regulation of contaminants in drinking water, establish a ground water protection program and ban lead pipes in drinking water systems.
The compromise proposal, which is expected to win approval in both chambers, also would boost spending over the next five years to carry out the mandates of a reauthorized Safe Drinking Water Act.
The measure calls for outlays averaging $164.5 million a year through 1991, about $100 million a year above current levels, for a program that has come under sharp and repeated attack in Congress.
A major provision of the measure is a requirement that within three years the Environmental Protection Agency set maximum permissible levels for a list of 83 of the hundreds of chemicals contaminating the nation’s drinking water.
The legislation would require the EPA to regulate another 25 contaminants every year once it completes the first 83.
The measure also would require states to periodically monitor public drinking water systems.
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