From today's Denver Post: "Pueblo County District Attorney Bill Thiebaut on Wednesday sued the city of Colorado Springs and its utility over a series of sewage spills into Fountain Creek. The federal lawsuit accuses Colorado Springs Utilities of violating the Clean Water Act by discharging more than 73 million gallons of sewage into the creek since 1998. Steve Berry, a spokesman for Colorado Springs Utilities, said he was disappointed Thiebaut resorted to suing the utility. 'With the lawsuit, there's not much I can say now other than we don't think this is the way to solve mutual watershed challenges,' Berry said. Pueblo officials have long complained about pollution flowing down Fountain Creek into the east side of their town, but this spring's major spills galvanized county and city officials. In late July, bacteria levels recorded in Fountain Creek in Pueblo were 240 times greater than state water-quality standards allow. Utility officials have argued that their system isn't the only source of bacteria plaguing the Fountain Creek Watershed. The U.S. Geological Survey has found high levels of bacteria upstream from Colorado Springs. Last week, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment fined the utility $110,000 for 21 sewer overflows that occurred between Jan. 1, 2004, and Oct. 4."
Here's an opinion piece from the Denver Post about Consortium for Research and Education on Emerging Contaminants (CREEC) [October 13, 2005, "Stealth threat in water"]. Susan Thornton writes, "They're out there. Ten years ago we couldn't detect them, but now, advances in technology allow scientists to identify and measure them. The problem is that no one knows exactly where each of them comes from, how they are transported, or what impact they may have on human health or the environment. No, they're not something from outer space. They are called 'emerging contaminants,' or ECs, and they are in Colorado's lakes and streams - and possibly in our drinking water. Some occur naturally, but others come from man-made chemicals like detergents, fire retardants, pesticides, fertilizer and even anti-bacterial soaps...Members include representatives of private industry, the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. Geological Survey, Denver Water and wastewater treatment plants. Researchers from the University of Colorado, Colorado State University, the University of Wyoming and the Colorado School of Mines are all involved."
Category: Colorado Water
4:59:27 AM 
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