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Information Sheet IS-2 Reissued Waste Discharge Requirements General Order R5-2013-0122 Existing Milk Cow Dairies Quality Control Board, Central Valley Region (Central Valley Water Board or Board) adopted Resolution No. 82-036, which waived the ROWD requirement for most dairies in the Central Valley Region. This waiver remained in place until statutory changes to Water Code section 13269 resulted in the automatic expiration of all existing waivers on 1 January 2003. Knowing that the existing waiver was due to expire, the Central Valley Water Board adopted Resolution R5-2002-0205 on 6 December 2002. This resolution stated that all dairies would be expected to obtain regulatory coverage under either: • Individual or general waste discharge requirements prescribed by the Board pursuant to Water Code section 13263; • A conditional waiver that the Board would adopt pursuant to Water Code section 13269; or • Individual or general National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permits, which would be issued by the Board pursuant to Federal law. The Board rescinded Resolution R5-2002-0205 on 13 March 2003 because it had failed to issue general waste discharge requirements or a general NPDES permit, and thus dairy operators could not apply for regulatory coverage under either one of those permitting schemes before the deadlines in the resolution expired. The Central Valley Water Board spent the next couple of years developing a regulatory strategy for addressing dairy wastes. On 8 August 2005, in furtherance of this strategy, the Board issued certified letters to the owners and operators of all known operating dairy facilities. These letters requested that the owners and operators submit a ROWD for each dairy (i.e., multiple RWODs if they owned or operated more than one dairy) to the Central Valley Water Board by 17 October 2005 (this correspondence is referred to as the "ROWD Request Letter"). On 3 May 2007, the Central Valley Water Board issued General Order R5-2013-0122 (the "2007 General Order"). The 2007 General Order regulated "existing milk cow dairies," defined as those dairies that were operating as of 17 October 2005 and that had filed a ROWD in response to the ROWD Request Letter. Following the issuance of the 2007 General Order, the Asociacion de Gente Unida por el Agua (a coalition of community residents and non-profit organizations) and the Environmental Law Foundation (collectively referred to as the "Petitioners") petitioned the 2007 General Order to the State Water Resources Control Board (State Water Board). The State Water Board dismissed the petition, concluding that it failed to raise substantial issues. The Petitioners then filed a petition for writ of mandate in the Sacramento County Superior Court (the "Superior Court"), arguing that the Central Valley Water Board failed to comply with the requirements of State Water Board Resolution 68-16, the Statement of Policy with Respect to Maintaining High Quality of Waters in California (State Anti-Degradation Policy) when it issued the 2007 General Order. The Superior Court denied the petition, and the Petitioners subsequently filed an appeal in the Third District Court of Appeal (the "Appellate Court"). The Appellate Court reversed the Superior Court's decision, and found that the Board's 2007 General Order did not comply with the requirements of the State Anti-Degradation Policy. (Asociacion de Gente Unida por el Agua