The immediate impact of levee setbacks in Pierce County

By Lauren Gallup
The Orville Road Setback Revetment was completed in 2022, to set a levee back from the Puyallup River in Pierce County. (Credit: Lauren Gallup / NWPB)
In the foothills of Mt. Rainier runs the Carbon, the Puyallup and the White Rivers, meandering through towns and cities, along roadways and near homes, the paint strokes of the natural environment now surrounded by a human-built ecosystem. Once tightly restricted by levees, these rivers are beginning to again flow closer to how they would have, not adhering to the confines Read More

Wastewater Is The Infrastructure Crisis ‘People Don’t Want To Talk About’

By PBS Newshour
Environmental justice activist and 2020 MacArthur Fellow Catherine Coleman Flowers speaks at a "Fire Drill Fridays" event, part of a movement that seeks to draw attention to the global "climate emergency." Courtesy of Catherine Coleman Flowers
Some infrastructure concerns go far less discussed than others including, notably, the issue of wastewater and sanitation. According to the American Society of Civil Engineers, the country’s wastewater treatment plants are functioning at an average of “81 percent of their design capacities,” and 15 percent have “reached or exceeded” that capacity. Drinking water service Read More
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