Volume 20, Issue 2, 1995 June/July 1995

What Are Remedial Action Plans?

by Sally Cole-Misch

"Remedial Action Plans," "Areas of Concern," "Stages 1, 2 and 3," "beneficial use impairments." Sometimes so much jargon is used to describe water quality programs that we wonder if anyone really knows what we're talking about. A number of articles in this issue of Focus discuss Remedial Action Plans. So what are they?

Not Long ago, "No swimming" or "No fishing" signs were common in several places around the Great Lakes, because of high levels of pollution entering rivers and other waterways that flow into the lakes. Many areas are becoming cleaner, thanks in large part to local community efforts to get rid of this pollution. These efforts are the result of a creative program between the United States and Canada called the Remedial Action Plan process.

Canada and the United States recognized that pollution was threatening the health of the Great Lakes, and every species living around them, by signing the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement in 1972. When these two good neighbors revised that Agreement in 1978 and again in 1987, they pledged to stop pollution from entering specific locations around the lakes.

These polluted locations are called Areas of Concern because pollution levels are harming fish and wildlife in these areas, and stopping local citizens from enjoying the water for drinking and recreation. More than 40 sites have been identified, most near large urban areas where pollution from industries, sewage treatment plants, landfills and other sources enters nearby rivers, harbors and channels. Some pollution stays in these waterways for years, and combines with other pollutants to create unsafe conditions for people or other creatures who come in contact with the water.

In the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement, the two countries committed to developing Remedial Action Plans (RAPs) for each Area of Concern. RAPs must identify what types of pollution have or are entering the waterways, how that pollution will be cleaned up, and who will make sure the area becomes clean. Once the pollution is gone and the river, harbor or channel is again safe for people, fish and wildlife to enjoy, the site is monitored to ensure that pollution does not affect the area again.

Many people must become involved in a RAP to help to ensure its success. In most Areas of Concern, the people responsible for controlling environmental pollution in federal, state or provincial, and local governmental agencies are joining with local citizens, scientists, business owners and workers, educators, children and others to develop and carry out the plan together. This is essential to the RAP process, because governments simply do not have enough people or money to tackle the job alone.

To assist Canada and the United States in restoring and protecting these valuable Great Lakes, the Commission receives and reviews RAPs in three stages:

• once the sources and causes of the pollution have been identified;
• after cleanup and preventive actions the community wishes to undertake have been determined; and
• at the end of the cleanup, to confirm that the Area of Concern has indeed been restored and is again safe for people, fish and wildlife to use and enjoy.

Sommaire

En vertu de l'Accord relatif à la qualité de l'eau dans les Grands Lacs, les deux pays se sont engagés à élaborer des Plans d'action correctrice (PAC) pour chaque secteur préoccupant. Les PAC doivent définir les types de pollution qui ont contaminé ou qui contaminent les voies d'eau, le choix des mesures correctrices et l'organisme responsable de vérifier l'efficacité des mesures de rétablissement.

Revised: March 20, 1997
Maintained by Kevin McGunagle, mcgunaglek@ijc.wincom.net