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Cleaning up

'56 Alum's perseverance leads to cleaner Potomac River

By Eric Gorton ('86)

Gordon Leisch ('56) ('65M)

Gordon Leisch ('56) ('65M)

Nature lover and sleuth

Growing up along the Potomac River in Northern Virginia, Gordon Leisch ('56, '65M) became hooked on fishing at an early age.

By his teen years, he developed a keen awareness of the plants and animals that depended on the river for their survival. It was also as a teenager, during a fishing outing in 1948, that Leisch noticed something completely out of the ordinary on the river -- a sudden discoloration of the water and lots of debris. Something else happened too, the fish stopped biting just as quick as the water changed color.

Leisch did a bit of investigating and discovered a murky torrent coming from a small feeder stream, a stream nicknamed "Stinky Creek" due to its foul odor, including a strong chlorine smell. He knew where the pollution was coming from but didn't find the cause of it for more than 20 years.

A career biologist

After graduating from JMU in 1956, Leisch took a job teaching high school biology. A few years later, he changed careers and became a biologist for the federal government, a job that took him to Nebraska for a time. In 1974, he returned to the Washington, D.C., area to work as a biologist with the Office of Environmental Project Review in the Department of the Interior.

The discovery

It was then that Leisch discovered what had been -- and still was -- causing all the pollution to his favorite fishing spots: a water treatment plant operated by the Army Corps of Engineers. The plant took water from the Potomac to provide drinking water to Washington, D.C., and parts of Northern Virginia. To make the water potable, the plant treated it with various chemicals, including chlorine, and filtered it. When the plant cleaned its filters, the discharge went back to the Potomac, along with all the filtered sediment and residual chemicals.

"I was concerned that we were not getting the truth"

It just happened to be Leisch's job to review environmental impact statements submitted by other government agencies, and when he came across one for the corps, which was proposing changes to its discharge method at the water treatment plant, it seemed a bit fishy.

"The more I reviewed the EIS, the more I was concerned that we were not getting the truth," Leisch says. "For one thing, the list of fish was all wrong for that area and for another, every time the river would flood, this old spillway would fill up with debris. Who would want that eternal maintenance problem? So I went to my boss and said, 'There's something wrong; I don't know what it is.' He said, 'Let it be. The water will have precedence over fish any day.'"

Gordon Leisch (left), Jack Leffel ('56) and Steve Smith ('78) celebrate at 2006 Spring Reunion Weekend

Gordon Leisch ('56), left, Jack Leffel ('56) and Steve Smith ('78) celebrate at 2006 Spring Reunion Weekend

The battle to make things right

That remark in no way deterred Leisch, who did all he could for another 25 years to make things right.

"The Corps of Engineers, EPA, National Park Service, one way or another, knew that they were in violation of the law; and they seemed to make excuses, tell the public one thing but do another," Leisch says. "For a long time, I tried to get people involved through different environmental organizations. Even the outdoor writer for the paper. Nobody would touch it. Absolutely nobody would touch it."

Taking on the Army Corps of Engineers

Until 1999, when Leisch found out about three people running an organization called the National Wilderness Institute. "They said they'd take the corps on and I said, 'Man, that's what I want to hear. I'll help you in any way I can.' But at the time, I also told them 'the Corps of Engineers has the best lawyers in the world, and you're going to go bankrupt trying to fight them.' The long and short story is, they did go bankrupt, but they brought two suits."

"You don't get overnight change"

The two suits, based on violations of the Endangered Species Act and the Clean Water Act, ultimately led to hearings by a Congressional subcommittee and orders for the corps to draft a legal environmental permit and abide by it. Although the corps has until 2009 to fully implement the changes, some positive steps have already been taken, Leisch says. For one, no discharges from the plant are allowed during the spawning season, which runs from March 1 to June 30. The corps also must reduce its annual discharge from the plant by 20 percent.

"You don't get overnight change, but say in the next four or five years, there will be absolutely everything that should have been done beforehand," Leisch says.

Editor's note:

Leisch is one of the Madison people who have found the way to Be the Change. See his profile at http://www.jmu.edu/bethechange/leisch.shtml