The role of the DEP in water management by Deputy Secretary Cathleen Curran Myers

Over lunch, DEP Deputy Secretary, Office of Water Management Cathleen Curran Myers spoke of the hope that the DEP has to be involved with regional water management efforts in southwestern Pennsylvania. Meyers talked about the nature of Pennsylvania’s government infrastructures, and explained that although they are not supportive of adaptive governance, she saw opportunities for cooperation to achieve the desired end result of better water quality in the state and region. Myers contended that more monitoring will only tell us what we already know, which is that, 'when it rains, we have pathogens everywhere and we can’t meet the water quality standards.' Instead of more monitoring, she advocated for better monitoring combined with modeling for adaptive governance efforts. Meyers drew laughs when she sympathized with municipalities over the complicated processes that they have to follow in order to be in compliance with DEP and Health Department regulations. She presented the idea of having one water resources management plan with a template to follow in order to save each municipality from an unreasonable amount of planning, and requested help from officials to work towards the comprehensive plan.

Time 12 min 32 sec