(September 4, 2019) – David Ross, head of EPA’s Office of Water, recently issued a policy memorandum rescinding any draft or interim guidance documents from the water office that were issued more than two years ago and never finalized in an effort to “increase transparency and regulatory certainty for stakeholders.”

The policy states that any documents recently issued must be finalized within two years of the draft date or they will be automatically rescinded, and also applies the same two-year deadline for all future draft documents issued by the Office of Water. The memo notes that the Office of Water has identified approximately 70 draft documents that have never been issued as final or formally withdrawn.

NACWA is requesting a list of these documents, but at least one document that NACWA has raised concerns with – the Draft Field-Based Methods for Developing Aquatic Life Criteria for Specific Conductivity, released in December of 2016 – could be among them.  NACWA will provide more details as they become available.