Hearing Transcript (Juneau, AK) (PDF)
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2 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 EPA PUBLIC MEETING 2 OCEAN DISCHARGE CRITERIA 3 September 8, 2000 4 7:00 p.m. 5 MR. TOROK: Good evening. It's 6 7:00 o'clock, according to my watch. So why 7 don't we start finding your way to some seats? 8 And if we need to set up more chairs, we can 9 do that in back. But there's still some empty 10 chairs, especially up front. 11 My name is Steve Torok, Environmental 12 Protection Agency, and I'm here in Juneau. 13 I'd like to welcome you all. I think the 14 agenda was at the front table. And if you 15 haven't signed in, we really would appreciate 16 everybody signing in. And also, if you have 17 not indicated whether you want to testify or 18 not, but if during the course of the 19 proceedings you decide that you do want to, 20 just give a hand signal or something and we'll 21 get you on the list and give you an 22 opportunity to testify. 23 All right. We've got everybody back. 24 Great. Okay. What we are going to start, 25 Mayor Dennis Egan is here. And we've asked 3 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 him to give some opening remarks. And then we 2 will go through some introductions, some short 3 presentations and then move fairly quickly into 4 testimony. Mr. Mayor. 5 MAYOR EGAN: Thanks, Steve. 6 Actually, it was casual Friday, but I went 7 home and put on a shirt and tie. Actually, I 8 did have a shirt on. Never mind. I'm a 9 short-timer so they can't do anything to me. 10 Anyway, I want to welcome you to the 11 second in a series of Regional Hearings that 12 are being held throughout the nation. And 13 we're pleased that you have called these 14 hearings and because you've called these 15 hearings at least you've selected Juneau for 16 one of the three sites to hold these Regional 17 Hearings at. 18 It was just over a year ago that 19 Juneau was singled out as one of the 20 destinations that related to the largest fine 21 in history against a member of the cruise 22 industry. And because of that, we invited the 23 president of that organization to come to 24 Juneau and meet with the public. And I think 25 because of that conversation this community had 4 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 with its president, the State of Alaska, 2 Department of Environmental Conservation under 3 the leadership of Michele Brown, the U. S. 4 Coast Guard, the Environmental Protection Agency 5 and Southeast Conference in cooperation with 6 our communities and the cruise ship industry is 7 to be commended for their participation. I 8 think we're making great strides here in 9 Southeast Alaska in developing voluntary 10 measures to assure compliance and adherence to 11 more stringent environmental measures to 12 protect the environment of Southeast Alaska. A 13 lot more is to be done, but at least in this 14 neck of the woods, Southeast Alaska, this 15 region is on the leading edge. 16 We're also pleased that the 17 Environmental Protection Agency is going to 18 utilize the data that's gained in the state 19 Initiative in its national assessment. So 20 they'll use the voluntary guidelines that we 21 have come up with and are still working on 22 fine tuning here in Southeast Alaska in their 23 national assessment. 24 Again, welcome back to Alaska. A lot 25 of you have been here before. And it's a 5 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 pleasure to have you here again. And it will 2 be partly cloudy tomorrow so stay over and buy 3 locally. Steve. 4 MR. TOROK: Thank you, Dennis. 5 At this time we'll go through some 6 introductions. And we'll just start at this 7 end of the table and if you'll just go through 8 and pass the mike. 9 MR. VOGT: Good evening. I'm 10 Craig Vogt. I'm from EPA in Washington, D. C. 11 headquarters. And you get to hear more from 12 me in a little bit. 13 MR. KREIZENBECK: I'm Ron 14 Kreizenbeck and I'm acting Deputy Regional 15 Administrator for EPA Region 10 in Seattle. 16 CAPTAIN BASEL: I'm Brian 17 Basel, Chief of the Office of Compliance with 18 Marine Safety, Environmental Protection at Coast 19 Guard headquarters in Washington. 20 CAPTAIN PAGE: I'm Captain Ed 21 Page, Chief of Marine Safety, Environmental 22 Protection Division for the 17th Coast Guard 23 District which is the Alaska Region. I'm 24 involved in the last several years, of course, 25 in the safety and environmental protection of 6 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 cruise ships, but put more emphasis on the 2 environmental side in light of environmental 3 concerns that -- public concerns that were 4 raised with environmental issues this last 5 year. 6 We've been working closely with the 7 Alaska State Department of Environmental 8 Conservation and the EPA in its Cruise Ship 9 Initiative this last year with respect to 10 oversight of cruise ships, conducting samplings 11 that were funded by the cruise industry to get 12 a better understanding of what the discharges 13 were composed of going off the ships. I've 14 been working on that whole process this summer 15 and meeting periodically with the 16 environmentalists, ADEC, cruise industry and the 17 Coast Guard. 18 MR. CONWAY: My name is Mike 19 Conway. I'm with the Alaska Department of 20 Environmental Conservation. And I'm the Director 21 of the Division of Spill of the Statewide 22 Public Service and I'm the coordinator for 23 Michele Brown to the Initiative. And although 24 Mayor Egan sort of took my opening remarks, 25 I'll have an opportunity to talk a little bit 7 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 more about that in a minute. 2 MS. COMBES: I'm Marcia Combes 3 with the EPA out of Anchorage. And I'm the 4 Director for Alaska Operations. 5 MR. CARLSON: I'm Dorn Carlson 6 from the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency 7 in Washington, D. C. I'm in the Oceans and 8 Coastal Protection Division. That's Craig 9 Vogt's division. 10 MS. HURLD: And I'm Kathy 11 Hurld. I'm also from EPA headquarters in 12 Washington, D. C. Also with the Oceans and 13 Coastal Protection Division. 14 MR. CHARLTON: I'm Tom 15 Charlton. I'm in the Office of Wastewater 16 Management at EPA headquarters. And I work in 17 the NPDES Program. 18 MR. TOROK: Thank you. Can 19 everybody hear okay? And if you do have 20 trouble hearing, just again give me a high 21 sign or a hand wave and we'll take care of 22 that. All right. At this time, Ron, did you 23 want to offer some other initial comments? 24 And then the Coast Guard and the state might 25 have some further brief comments. 8 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 MR. KREIZENBECK: Well, Mayor 2 Egan alluded to the work that's been going on 3 in Juneau with the cruise industry and the 4 regulatory agencies. And because of that work, 5 a lot of you have a lot of really good 6 information to offer to this process. That's 7 one of the reasons why this hearing is being 8 held here. So I look forward to not speaking 9 anymore and listening to you. 10 CAPTAIN PAGE: Coming from 11 headquarters, the Office of Compliance works 12 hand in hand with our officer investigations 13 and our standards directorate. And we are part 14 of the interagency partnership on gray water 15 and wastewater management with EPA and some of 16 the other federal agencies. And what we're 17 hoping to do is take some of the best 18 practices from around the country and set up a 19 national program. 20 MR. CONWAY: One of the things 21 that was talked about briefly by Mayor Egan 22 and Captain Page was the volunteer cooperative 23 effort with the Coast Guard, EPA, state, local 24 communities represented by Southeast Conference. 25 And I saw Loren Gerhard in here earlier. 9 EPA Public Meeting #12227 9/8/00 1 Loren, are you -- Loren is raising his hand. 2 He gladly stepped in to represent the 3 communities of Southeast Alaska since this was 4 an Initiative that they had talked about at 5 their last conference about a year ago. 6 And in addition to those parties, we 7 had a meeting last December to talk about what 8 is going on, let's try and get our arms 9 wrapped around the issues, try to figure out 10 what could be done, what needed to be done, if 11 anything, that sort of thing. And in the back 12 of the room over in that corner, the far 13 corner to my right, there are three documents 14 that if you haven't had an opportunity to get 15 in the past, they will be good references for 16 information available to the public about what 17 this so called Alaska Cruise Ship Initiative 18 has been doing.