In an effort to clean up polluted runoff from chicken manure, Maryland officials have decided to seek new regulations that would hold big poultry companies accountable for the waste their animals produce.

Secretary of the Environment Jane Nishida said Maryland would be among the first states in the nation to make the poultry companies take responsibility for the chicken manure, which until now has been a problem left to the growers who raise the birds.

The state is "strongly considering" holding the big companies, known as "integrators," responsible for proper disposal of the chickens' waste, Nishida said last night. Current plans call for adding a manure disposal requirement to the permits that the big companies' processing plants already hold.

Nishida said Gov. Parris N. Glendening supports the strategy, which represents a significant shift in state policy. Glendening did not include any provisions holding the big companies accountable in anti-pollution legislation that he proposed and the General Assembly passed last year.

Tom Grasso, Maryland executive director of the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, called the Maryland Department of the Environment plan "a critical step in solving one of the biggest unsolved industrial waste problems we have.

"Practically speaking, it isn't possible to enforce manure controls on every farmer in the state," Grasso said. "The companies own the birds. They have control over the whole process. They're really the appropriate parties to hold responsible."

Grasso said the bay foundation supports MDE's proposal to hold poultry companies responsible for the waste but wants to see the agency's specific language, which Nishida said has not been finalized.

"Agricultural runoff has been identified as a contributor to water-quality problems," Nishida said. "Farmers are doing their part. We've asked wastewater treatment plants to do their part. And we believe the integrators also need to do their part to address water quality in our rivers."

MDE's move "would be a giant step forward," said state Sen. Christopher Van Hollen, a Montgomery County Democrat who last year tried and failed to pass legislation that would accomplish what the agency now proposes.

"The farmers are at the bottom of the food chain," Van Hollen said. "They're the people who can least afford to get rid of the stuff if it involves an expense. This would ensure that the big companies are responsible for disposing of that waste, and, in doing so, it greatly strengthens the environmental protection of the Chesapeake Bay."

The Water Quality Improvement Act, which was triggered by 1997's toxic outbreaks of Pfiesteria piscicida in some Lower Eastern Shore waterways, required farmers to come up with plans for safely disposing of chicken waste by the year 2005. Many farmers, environmentalists and others complained that it unfairly burdened the growers -- most of whom earn modest incomes from raising chickens -- with potentially staggering costs for disposing of unwanted wastes.

The big poultry companies protested that the extra cost would hurt their bottom line; some poultry executives said they would consider moving out of Maryland if they were forced to pay for manure disposal.

Last week, however, the federal government unveiled regulations that give states the option of holding the big companies liable under the Clean Water Act for tainted runoff produced by the animals they slaughter and sell.

Maryland's plans call for adding a section to poultry processing plants' pollution control permits. Dane Bauer, deputy director of MDE's water division, said the plants would have to show that chickens slaughtered there were grown on farms where manure was disposed of safely, without causing any polluted runoff.

"Basically the [plants] would have to maintain records to show what happened to all that manure and show that it was handled properly," Bauer said. "If they don't, that would be a permit violation, subject to penalties like any other permit violation."

The state has seven big poultry processing plants -- including one, a Perdue plant near Berlin, whose permit expired last year, Bauer said.

Perdue spokesman Richard Auletta said last night that he has not seen MDE's proposal and could not say how the company would respond.

MDE wants all the companies to have to meet the new requirements at about the same time, so that none of them has to face an unfair financial burden, Bauer said.

The agency intends the first of the new permits to be completed in "weeks or months, not years," he said.

Pub Date: 3/19/99