After much testimony and debate, the Senate Resources Committee has voted to approve a DEQ rule setting new water quality standards. Based on new surveys, it raises the expected level of fish consumption for Idahoans to 66.5 grams per day, which is equivalent to a 4.7-ounce meal every other day. The state’s previous fish-consumption standard of 17.5 grams was rejected by the EPA; that equated to about a 4.3-ounce meal of fish once per week.

Controversy surrounded the fish-consumption issue in part because tribal populations in Idaho had much higher fish consumption rates than the rest of the population. “It protects the general population at a low risk,” Barry Burnell, state DEQ official, told the committee. “It’s not going to be the same for everybody, because we all don’t eat the same amount of fish, we all don’t drink the same amount of water, we all weigh different amounts. Risk is individual-specific. … Our approach was to select that incremental increase in cancer risk at 1 in 100,000.” A stricter rule would have set the increased allowable risk at 1 in 1 million.

Senate Minority Leader Michelle Stennett, D-Ketchum, voted against the rule. “Water is a big issue in this state, but so is Idahoans’ health,” she said. While commending the Idaho Department of Environmental Quality for its extensive research and 18 negotiated rule-making sessions held with all sides on the issue, she said the final formula that was adopted still likely will land the state in court. “I’m just afraid that we’re going to end up in a legal battle,” she said.

A House committee still must consider the rule. Sen. Steve Vick, R-Dalton Gardens, the vice-chair of the Senate Resources Committee who presided over the rule hearing, noted that the panel only got through one DEQ rule today, and it only got through one at its last meeting on Monday. “We are out of time for today,” he said. “If we get through one DEQ rule a meeting we’ll be here for about two weeks.”