The Penobscot Nation is cheering a new final ruling on state water quality standards from the federal government as a major step forward in protecting the tribe’s fishing rights on the the river that bears its name.
Though locked in a federal lawsuit over water quality in Penobscot River, the state of Maine and the tribe do agree on one thing: that under the Maine Indian Claims Settlement Act of 1980, the Penobscots have sustenance fishing rights. But the state has argued that it cannot guarantee the quality of the fish in those ancestral waters.
Ken Moraff, director of water quality at the Environmental Protection Agency, questions the state’s logic. And he says the new ruling addresses the matter.
“The EPA ruling makes it clear that where there are sustenance fishing rights, then the standards for those waters have to protect the health of the people who exercise those fishing rights,” he says. “It doesn’t make sense to have a sustenance fishing right, if the fish aren’t healthy enough to eat.”
The new EPA final rule addresses water quality standards for Indian lands in Maine, two new standards for all waters in Maine including waters in Indian lands and one new standard for waters in Maine outside of Indian lands. Moraff says the agency considered the best available science, including local and regional information as well as applicable EPA policies and legal requirements, in its effort to protect human health and aquatic life.
On Indian Island near Old Town, Penobscot Nation Chief Kirk Francis describes the rule as critical to the health of the members of his tribe and all of the people of Maine.
“What this does is really protect the river for future generations to practice this subsistence lifestyle and to be able to eat fish at a rate that’s conducive to being a sustainable practice for tribal members,” he says. “So we couldn’t be more excited about this standard. EPA’s diligence over the past few years in pushing back and looking at the science — we still feel that this is a real conservative approach, but it’s a beginning.”
Francis says that in determining water quality standards for the river, the state has used a fish consumption rate for native populations of just over 32 grams per day. EPA has rejected that standard, and instead has set water quality standards to protect the health of tribal members based a much higher consumption rate of 286 grams per day.
John Banks, the natural resources director for the Penobscot Nation, says that rather than dispute the water quality standards in tribal waters, the state should be aggressively focusing its efforts on restoring healthy fish populations in the region.
“Last spring we had tremendous shad and striped bass fishery right here in the Old Town area, and it would be great if those folks that are enjoying that activity could go take those fish home and have them for supper without the fear of getting sick,” he says.
Tribal leaders say they’re not sure what effect the final EPA rule might have on pending litigation between the state and the feds over tribal water quality.
Representatives from the state Department of Environmental Protection and the Maine attorney general’s office were not made available for comment.