The Clean Water Protection Act, soon to be reintroduced in Congress, would restore the intent of the original Clean Water Act by prohibiting coal companies from burying our streams with mining waste. With this new Congress, we have a great opportunity to build more support for this legislation and raise the profile of mountaintop removal.

To contribute to the efforts of regional and national environmental groups in DC, the Appalachian Center for the Economy and the Environment, West Virginia Highlands Conservancy and OVEC have hired Louise Dunlap to help educate members of Congress and others in Washington, DC, about this bill and to develop a sound strategy to build on past efforts on Capitol Hill on this issue. 

Louise, along with just a handful of other advocates, worked tirelessly and successfully against the Byrd rider in 1999 (this rider would have made it easier to permit new mountaintop removal mines - it was defeated). Louise has a long term and genuine commitment to working to protect communities ravaged by coal mining.  We are lucky to have someone with Louise’s commitment and expertise on Capitol Hill to help us ensure that the effort in the new Congress gets off to a good start.

Louise was the first woman to become chief executive of a major U.S. national environmental organization. From 1976 until 1986, she was President of the Environmental Policy Institute and Environmental Policy Center, groups she co-founded in 1972, and which, under her leadership, grew into the largest public-interest environmental lobbying organization in Washington. Louise has been working to end the abuses of coal mining for more than thirty years.  She created and led the seven-year-long national citizens’ effort to enact federal legislation, the Surface Mine Control and Reclamation Act of 1977.  Louise continues to be an important strategist and advocate for community groups working for reclamation of abandoned mines and enforcement of surface mining laws.

We are pleased to have someone with Louise’s experience to help us work together with national and local groups to build toward passage of the Clean Water Protection Act.