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The Clean Water Act and the Lake Champlain Basin
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01 March 2027

Essays outlining the emergence, evolution, and application of the Clean Water Act and its impact on the waters of New York's Lake Champlain Basin.
Multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary in focus, The Clean Water Act and the Lake Champlain Basin features the work of scholars who think deeply about the connections between the 1972 U.S. Clean Water Act and the waters of the Lake Champlain Basin. Each contribution considers contemporary policy-relevant issues; in so doing, this collection examines and emphasizes the background, scope, and impacts of policy decisions. As such, the focus of this book is purposely broad, considering local, state, federal and binational perspectives. Full of fresh arguments and insights about a complex and relatively understudied relationship and expanding on previous academic treatments of the Clean Water Act, this volume also complements applied studies centered on Lake Champlain Basin water-management issues and activities.
"This book provides the broad-ranging, up-to-date account of the Clean Water Act, water management, and environmental policy in the Champlain Valley that we've long needed. Diverse in perspective, yet cohering around these themes, the essays provide a clear-eyed account of the successes of the past fifty years, the limitations of the CWA, and of possible paths forward." — James Rice, Tufts University, Department of History and Program in Environmental Studies
Christopher Kirkey is Professor and Director, Center for the Study of Canada and Institute on Quebec Studies, State University of New York at Plattsburgh. Timothy Mihuc is Distinguished Service Professor and Director, Lake Champlain Research Institute, State University of New York at Plattsburgh.
Acknowledgments
Foreword
Patrick Leahy
Introduction. The Clean Water Act and the Lake Champlain Basin
Christopher Kirkey and Timothy Mihuc
Part One: The Clean Water Act and Lake Champlain: Historical, International, Political, Regulatory and Judicial Influences
1. Lake Champlain Hydropolitics and U.S.-Canada Environmental Diplomacy
Daniel Macfarlane
2. Wingtips on the Beach: The Awkward Political Origins of the Clean Water Act
Christopher Kirkey and Kevin J. McMahon
3. Clean Water Act Reflections: Moving from Fishable/Swimable to Sustainable Water Resources
Jeff Lape, Curt Gervich, and Kathryn Breen
4. Is a Geographically Broad Clean Water Act necessary to protect water quality? The Lake Champlain Basin as a case study
Damien M. Schiff and Charles T. Yates
Part Two: Applied Case Studies: State and Local Initiatives in Vermont and New York
5. Restoring the Physical Integrity of Vermont Rivers through Corridor Protection: Working with Nature to Reconnect the Riverscape and Meet a Principal Goal of the Clean Water Act
Michael Kline
6. Using the Theory of Planned Behavior to Assess Private Road Crossing Management in the Lake Champlain Basin: A Case Study in Vermont and New York Watersheds
Luke Briccetti and Kimberly Coleman
Part Three: Beyond the 50 Year Mark: Considering the Current and Future Role of the Clean Water Act on the Waters of the Lake Champlain Basin
7. Watershed Management and Lake Champlain: Reflections and Paths Forward
Jeff Lape, Curt Gervich, and Kathryn Breen
Epilogue: The Changing Political Calculus of Environmental Action in Washington
Christopher Kirkey and Kevin J. McMahon
List of Contributors
Index