What progress in improving water quality?

Excerpt

JUST over twenty years since the enactment of the Clean Water Act, many of us are anticipating a careful examination by Congress of what has been accomplished, what remains to be done, and what must be done to fully realize the important goals adopted two decades ago. It's an important opportunity for all of us here. I'm especially eager for these deliberations because two areas of my responsibility, wetlands protection and control of nonpoint source pollution, are certain to be among the issues garnering much of the attention. But I must begin this “assessment” phase of the conference by noting that the assessment and monitoring programs we administer with the states have not been designed to identify water quality status and trends, rather, they are structured to help us identify and understand water quality problems

The need for better monitoring

Conclusions about the condition of the nation's waters are complicated by the fact that data on water quality and the health of ecosystems are incomplete. Much of our …