KOOTENAI COUNTY, Idaho — Kootenai County moved one step closer this week to authorizing Panhandle Health District to enforce rules about how businesses located over the Rathdrum Prairie Aquifer handle chemicals.
Though PHD has administered the aquifer protection rules since 1997, the Idaho Legislature determined that health districts are not state agencies and thus don’t have rulemaking or enforcement authority on their own.
“The state legislature stripped away PHD’s (Idaho Administrative Procedure Act) rule,” Community Development Director David Callahan said.
As a result, counties and municipalities have since adopted ordinances that allow health districts to carry out certain functions. The cities of Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls have already adopted new ordinances for critical materials management, as well as memorandums of understanding with PHD for inspections and enforcement.
Kootenai County planning and zoning commissioners voted unanimously Thursday to recommend that the county adopt an ordinance authorizing PHD as the enforcement agency for the critical materials program, which manages how materials with the potential to contaminate groundwater below the aquifer are handled.
Jenny Gray, the aquifer protection coordinator for Panhandle Health District, emphasized the importance of protecting the aquifer from contamination. Hundreds of thousands of people rely on the aquifer as their source of drinking water.
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