By Madeline Bove | Food & Water Watch | Jan. 21, 2025

Last week, Governor Tina Kotek issued “a state of emergency due to risk of economic shut down,” that allows the Port of Morrow to violate its wastewater permit and dump pollution in ways that present massive risk to local drinking water and public health. The Port has long contributed to nitrate contamination in the area by overapplying its wastewater on nearby fields. And now, despite a pending emergency petition under the Safe Drinking Water Act to the U.S. EPA and rollbacks to the permit’s environmental protections made – at the Port’s behest – within the last three months, the Port will now be allowed to make the problem worse.