Work Plan & Progress Report - Rhode Island Department of ...

December. Sue indicated DEM would need to take a two tiered approach to this issue and EPA agreed
that would be fine.
With respect to P&C List item 71, Sue indicated that Chris Deacutis and Ames Colt, through the
Coordination Team, will be focusing on developing a strategy for determining nutrient criteria for
Narragansett Bay. There is a lot of information available and additional analysis of the data is
necessary before the issue could be resolved. Margherita indicated there has been and may continue to
be some EPA resources to assist in the criteria development process.
Elizabeth raised the issue of the status of EPA’s review of DEM’s Water Quality Standards revisions.
She indicated that DEM is waiting EPA action on a number of items and would appreciate EPA’s
response to DEM 2001 letter concerning this issue. Ellen indicated that she would forward a copy of
her review of the water quality regulation revisions that EPA has not taken action on.
P&C List Item 70 was mentioned and DEM requested EPA to identify any outstanding water quality
standard issues by a date certain. December 31, 2010 was suggested.
For nutrient criteria development, there was some discussion concerning the need to expand
monitoring to fish and periphyton. EPA expressed some concern that macroinvertebrates had different
responses to nutrients and we should perhaps look at other response organisms as we develop nutrient
criteria. DEM indicated its approach was not focused on macroinvertebrates but was expected to
incorporate other biological data; e.g. chlorophyll, etc.
P&C List Item 70 was mentioned and DEM requested EPA to identify any outstanding water quality
stand issues by a date certain. December 31, 2011 was suggested.
This topic was closed out by Ellen mentioning that EPA is holding a meeting on regulation revisions
that may have an impact on state’s anti-degradation policy. There is a session only for states and she
will provide DEM with the details of the meeting at a latter date.
Watershed Measures (P & C List Items 73-76)
Margherita began the discussion indicating it was important to identify instances where there have
been success stories in implementing strategies that resulted in water quality improvements. Liz
countered with an instance of a pond that was downstream of a WWTF that should have been delisted.
The delisting did not happen because EPA requested additional sampling of ponds further downstream
to prove the connection of water quality improvements. They were trying to determine if the pollution
signal was from the WWTF or stormwater run-off. Liz indicated there needs to be more dialogue
between EPA and DEM on the issue of the representative nature of sampling points.
There was a suggestion to modify and update measure W by adding the Runnins, Barrington River to
the list.
NPS Program Issues
Ernie reported that DEM received $4M in request for NPS project funding for the FY09/10 RFP that
has available about $650K. He indicated there will be good projects that DEM will not be able to be
fund due to the lack of funding. He mentioned that two-thirds of the proposals were for TMDL related
projects. DEM suggested possibly adding the FY2011 funds to the FY 09/10 funds for additional
projects that were submitted pursuant to the recent RFP. EPA agreed depending on the final
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