Understanding that our health, economic prosperity, recreation, and wildlife depend on clean, abundant sources of water, in 1972 the U.S. Congress passed the Clean Water Act with overwhelming support. The Act declares that “It is the national goal that the discharge of pollutants into navigable waters be eliminated by 1985.” People understood that we cannot go on using our water supplies as our sewers. The Clean Water Act led to many victories in cleaning up our rivers, lakes, and oceans.

But the goal was not met, and the work is far from done. Despite over 40 years of cleaning up our waters, there are still over 1,000 water bodies in California alone that do not meet healthy water quality standards.

EcoRights fights to stop water pollution by using grassroots outreach & education, performing empirical water sampling and analysis, and promoting citizen enforcement of the Clean Water Act.