Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele, Jr. (I, D, WF, WE – Sag Harbor) today announced that he supports New York State’s lawsuit against the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) over its decision to designate a permanent open water disposal site in eastern Long Island Sound for tens of millions of cubic yards of dredged sediments. The EPA's site designation violates the Ocean Dumping Act and the Coastal Zone Management Act.

Assemblyman Thiele said, “The State of New York has invested millions of dollars to clean up our estuaries, including the Long Island Sound and the Peconic Bay. Both water bodies are part of the National Estuary Program. The decision by EPA to permit the dumping of dredge spoil in the Sound is contrary to these conservation efforts. I applaud the decision of the Governor and the State Attorney-General to protect our waterways by bringing this litigation. If the federal government won’t protect clean water, the State must take up the fight. ”

In 2005, the states of New York and Connecticut called for, and the EPA subsequently established by regulation, the necessary goal of reducing or eliminating the disposal of dredged material in the estuarine waters of Long Island Sound. However, the EPA violated the intent of that regulation in 2016 by increasing the number of permanent open water dump sites in Long Island Sound by designating a third one in eastern Long Island Sound.

In August 2016, Governor Cuomo announced New York's intention to fight the EPA's designation of the eastern Long Island Sound disposal site because of its adverse effects to the waterway. Subsequently, the New York Department of State identified the EPA’s proposed site designation as being inconsistent with the Long Island Sound Coastal Management Program policies. In December 2016, the State filed a Notice of Intent to Sue immediately after the EPA finalized its designation.

The lawsuit, which is in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York, charges that, in designating the dump site, the EPA failed to identify the navigational conflicts that will be caused by the dump site location, or to examine the environmental impacts of dumping dredged materials under differing testing regimes. The suit states that the EPA also failed to designate historically used or ocean disposal sites and to properly quantify the existing capacity at already designated sites. Further, the EPA has been unresponsive to New York's stated concerns about the reliability of sediment testing and has made insufficient assurances that the dredged material will not have a negative impact on the environment, as it has in the past.

New York also maintains that increasing the volume of open-water disposal of dredged materials, and the number and availability of open water disposal sites, is inconsistent with public investment and policies that are already in place aimed at restoring the Long Island Sound. This lawsuit underscores New York's continuing commitment to pursue upland alternatives for beneficial reuse of the material to preserve and protect the integrity of Long Island Sound for future generations.