Clean Water Works
CLEVELAND, OHIO: From the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District, an in-depth and fun conversation led by Donna Friedman and Mike Uva on any and all topics related to clean water, wastewater treatment, stormwater management, and the people, projects, and programs serving Lake Erie and our local waterways and communities.
Clean Water Works
Lobbying for Clean Water Progress
What actually leads a policy idea into becoming a clean-water milestone? We take you behind the scenes with Danielle Giannantonio, Senior Manager of State and Federal Legislative Affairs & Grants at the NEORSD, to map the practical path from bills to budgets to better infrastructure. Danielle shares how a Statehouse page job led to legislative aide work, a crash course in clean-water issues at Ohio EPA, and ultimately a role where relationships, timing, and clarity determine whether good ideas stick.
Our conversation dives into PFAS, those "forever chemicals" that water utilities passively receive. We also dig into affordability and make the case for a permanent LIHWAP program to stabilize households and utility operations alike. Danielle's work also tracks policy that touches our utility’s daily mission: employment issues, IT, drones, AI, and more. She walks us through the playbook for proactive advocacy and how trade associations can amplify local voices in D.C.
Acronyms used in this episode:
LIHWAP - Low Income Household Water Assistance Program, provides funds to assist low-income households with water and wastewater bills.
LIHEAP - Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program, provides federally funded assistance to reduce the costs associated with home energy bills, energy crises, weatherization, and minor energy-related home repairs.
PFAS - Per- and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances
WQIS - Water Quality & Industrial Surveillance
Hey! I need to buy that poncho for Kathy. My mom would lose it. I love a little poncho moment.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you and Kathy. I literally thought I'd be a podcast host. You did?
SPEAKER_00:You had uh aspirations. What would you talk about?
SPEAKER_01:Probably talk shit. I'm really good at that.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:It is Monday morning. Great to have you along again for this conversation.
SPEAKER_00:It's not Monday morning.
SPEAKER_01:Oh yeah. Tuesday morning. This is the pre-pre-Christmas show. And it's casual, right?
SPEAKER_02:Like I don't have to be like so polished. You just have to use a radio voice. They say voice actors. It's like the perfect, like, that's the job you want in Hollywood. It's like an easy way to make money. But is AI gonna take over that job? I think AI is taking over everyone's jobs. Oh, right. Except mine, because it's relationship building. And AI can't do that. Can it?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Like this is this is authentic. If these AI robots can do the type of one-liners that I got on a regular basis, God bless them.
SPEAKER_01:I am looking forward to hearing all of those. And we are actually just gonna do 30 straight minutes of your one-liners. It's like when you watch like a highlight reel of a show on YouTube and you're like, none of this makes sense, but I love every second.
SPEAKER_02:I guess like here's an example. Yesterday, my sister's like, I don't know, she's off her rocker and she's saying a bunch of crazy stuff. I was like, Kristen, I knew you were culty when you joined CrossFit. Oh, that's real though. I was like, listen, we knew you were susceptible to cults after that.
SPEAKER_01:We saw you flipping the tire and we were like, that's it. She's gone.
SPEAKER_02:One thing that's interesting actually politically is that like it's kind of a man's world. And it's funny because I'm a girl's girl at heart. Like I like I have guy friends, but like I'm really more of a girl's girl. But it's funny because like again, the industry is more like male dominated. I don't think it's like ever worked against my benefit, but I just like it was definitely an adjustment when I got to like oh you're talking about the political legislative, yeah. No, so things are changing because like more women are going to college, more women are doing XYZ. And then I, of course, then I joined Sewage, and that is it. All my friends thought it was very funny considering I'm very girly. I told them I was working in.
SPEAKER_00:We have a lot to unpack here.
SPEAKER_02:Are we on?
SPEAKER_00:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:We are not. I love when people do that. That's actually my favorite part of the podcast.
SPEAKER_00:You're good with this, us recording this today, right?
SPEAKER_02:Uh yes. Okay, I just didn't know you had started. You thought we were riffing.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, we're riffing. We're just getting warmed up. Danielle Gianantonio is the senior manager of state and federal legislative affairs and grants here at the regional sewer district. Yes. And Danielle is here with us to talk about legislation.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:Laws. What's coming down the road? Why do we pay attention to that stuff? But before we get into all that, how did you come to work at the sewer district?
SPEAKER_02:So I went to college at University of Dayton. I was actually getting a business degree. And maybe a year in, I kind of was like, you know, I I mean, I read the news a lot. I was kind of interested in politics. And, you know, I talked to my dad and I was like, you know, I kind of have some interest in politics. And, you know, I kind of, I think somewhat said, maybe I'll switch my major. And he's like, listen, I think you should get some experience in the field before you make such a jump like that, and like just confirm your interest. And he knew, you know, lobbyists. And so he's like, I think you should meet this woman lobbyist I know and just get some career advice, guidance of how you can kind of get experience in this industry. And so I did, and she gave me like the best first advice. She's like, You cannot really even be a lobbyist until you work at the state house. Based on your personality, you're very outgoing, you communicate well. It seems like you're able to build relationships. Like this could be a great career for you, but you just have to learn the legislative process at the state. So that summer she helped me secure a job at the Ohio State House as a page. Do you guys know what a page is? Uh, only from 30 Rock.
SPEAKER_00:Are you a runner kind of?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, you're kind of a runner. You actually they're very distinguishable because you have like a navy blazer and like a red and blue striped tie. I have a bow tie. It's basically an internship, but it's a very easy way to like learn the legislative process. So you help the state house prep for session, you learn how to take constituent calls, you gather data, you run documents between the chambers. Do you work for like a specific person or are you shareable? You actually kind of have like a page class. So it's a basically a bunch of other like internships. And it was a lot of students at Ohio State. That was kind of like their job during college. And you do get paid. And it was so fun. We debated. We you were kind of in a room like this where this is where you're kind of like headquartered out of. You know, you get a call from a member office, they're like, hey, we need you to pass this legislation to the next chamber. So then you take the call and you go and you run it. So it was just really good. And to be honest, I fell in love. Like I knew, I was like, oh yeah, this is awesome. And I learned, you know, it's a it's a nice way to just like lightly learn the legislative process. I ended up getting an internship at the Treasurer of State's office because I do have a business degree. I did continue my business degree. So I was actually in their accounting department. So I was doing a lot of you know financial inputs type work. And then actually they moved me to their public affairs office. And then I would say, not even a month after the House of Representatives called me and they're like, we do have a job for you to be legislative aide, you know, after at the end of the summer, as I as predicted, people started leaving their jobs. So that I worked for a member. He did a lot of aerospace and aviation policy. He represented the Wright Patterson Air Force Base. So that's where his interest was. So it was just right outside Dayton. And then two and a half years into that, the administration called me and said, Do you have any interest in becoming a liaison for a state agency? I said, absolutely. That, you know, when when the governor's office calls, you go. And that you want to. And I ended up at the Ohio EPA. This was about six months after the Toledo harmful allergy bloom kind of crisis.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So I got thrown in pretty quickly to all of like the policies that were happening at that time. There was also um lead found in drinking water in Seabring, Ohio.
SPEAKER_00:So you got a crash course and a lot of water.
SPEAKER_02:Crash course into water. And again, there's more obviously at the high page. There's solid waste, infectious waste, hazardous waste, there's air, but water was the main topic. So I kind of, you know, I ended up loving the water scene. And I was really lucky because I was doing a lot of lobbying. So I mean, I would say over, you know, I would say maybe the three years I was almost three years that I was there, I think I advocated the state house for no less than 25 policies, which is a lot. And those are all different. Had two huge bills pass. Again, you don't always see that. That's not always common. So, and again, I didn't do it all alone, but it really kind of solidified and helped me transition to this job that I got here. So at the end of the administration, I got a call from the sewer district saying we'd love to have someone that it wants to do state and federal, but be headquartered from Cleveland. And I am a Cleveland girl, so that's kind of how I ended up here.
SPEAKER_00:Is being a lobbyist kind of like being a lawyer? And that you're advocating for a position on an issue or you're trying to pitch something?
SPEAKER_01:It's like a lawyer like plus salesperson.
SPEAKER_02:It's like a lawyer light. Lawyer light L-I-T-E. So, yes, and so a lot of lobbyists are lawyers. So that's very common because you do have to be able to like read and understand legislation. Now, admittedly, I I rely a lot on our attorneys to tell me like the exact impacts. Um but yes, and also being a lobbyist is similar to a lawyer because you have a client. So for me here, it's the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District. There's a lot of lobbyist firms out there, and they have all different clients education, healthcare, and you represent that individual client's interest as you would a lawyer. And you can, it's the same thing. You give them advice, they don't have to take it, and guidance and strategies. Um, so it's similar in that way.
SPEAKER_01:And what are your main capacities here?
SPEAKER_02:I use the word liaison between the district and state and federal officials. I'm a liaison between any RSD staff and our lobbyists. A lot of it's relationship management, a lot of it's strategies, monitoring legislation, tracking legislation, making a strategy. Because again, there's all different types of policies. There's legislation, there's regulations, there's executive orders, there's mandates. We mostly focus on regulations here and legislation. And again, the best way to describe the major difference between legislation and regulation is that legislation or statute is the outline. Regulations is the substance. A good really kind of easy example is that like the state says, we're gonna create an XYZ program. And they don't necessarily prescribe in law what that program is all gonna be, because that would be a very long statute. They really kind of give an outline of what it should be, and then they leave it to the state, specifically agencies, to fill in the rest and kind of carry the intent of that law and implement it and oversee it.
SPEAKER_00:So you're keeping an eye on everything that's coming down the road as far as legislation, new policy, and you're putting a star next to the ones that have to do with water and it's not even just water.
SPEAKER_02:You know, I actually have to track in our lobbies as well a wide range of policies, anything that it impacts public employees, our retirements, you know, healthcare. So it really sometimes is interesting. Like again, even even me, again, I was used to just tracking environmental stuff at the at the EPA. But then, of course, when I came here, it was like even IT, AI laws, drone legislation. There's a few that have been consistent over the past few years. You know, affordability, anything around affordability is something that we very commonly advocate on and we track. And then PFOS, again, we're often tracking PFOS on the regulatory side and on the legislative side because you know that is going to impact the district and our operations. You know, if you have to if we have to put in new treatment technologies that are costly, we you know, we may advocate for funding to help utilities implement that treatment so that it doesn't fall back on our ratepayers. Right.
SPEAKER_00:So PFOS, for people who aren't familiar with that, those are the so-called forever chemicals.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, and there's two majors there's PFOA and PFOS. And so again, I would say the last few years, those have been the main focuses because those are the most like commonly used. USCPA designated PFOA and PFOS as hazardous. Uh there's a lot of impacts for us. So we don't produce or profit off of PFOS. We just simply passively receive it. It just goes through our plants. And again, at this time, there's no regulations and there's no even large-scale treatment technologies that can even get it out of our system. But unfortunately, the way if you designate something that that means if something becomes a super fun site or a circle site, people could bring us into a lawsuit, like a 3M, a DuPont. They could pull us in and say that, you know, we've received that PFAS, and then we could potentially be on the hook financially to help clean something like that up. So there's kind of no protection for municipal utilities in that. So something that we've been working on over the past few years is trying to get water and wastewater agencies exempt from that law. Again, since we didn't produce it or profit of it, we've just received it. We don't think it's fair to have our ratepayers pay for something we never even produced or profited off of.
SPEAKER_00:Right. From our perspective, the problem should be handled farther upstream.
SPEAKER_02:Correct.
SPEAKER_00:The producers of the or the manufacturers.
SPEAKER_02:Right. And people that are using it. And again, a lot of people are facing it out and trying to find alternatives to PFAS, but again, it's not um required at this time.
SPEAKER_01:So when something comes up, what's the process internally for that? So if there's legislation that comes up or like changes to a rule or something, how does that flow through the sewer district?
SPEAKER_02:Sometimes, and I think this is kind of what's tricky with legislation regulations, what's not always defense. I think a lot of times people think when you're doing advocacy, it's like you just reacting to something. But sometimes it's also offense. It's something that maybe we've thought about here where we're like, this would be very helpful if this was changed in a rule or a statute, water quality standards, or you know, something that could be helpful to us or to other utilities or other stakeholders. So I wanted to note that because I think sometimes like you always feel like it's just reaction, reacting, but sometimes it's actually being proactive. I find something, or our lobbyists find something, or again, or we initiate something that we want to do. And we work first work with our attorneys. If there's already proposed language, how would we change it and modify it to be something that's you know better suited for us? Then we talk to our lobbyists about a strategy. Who should we contact at the state house? What is the best timing? Is it the state budget? Is it a standalone bill? Who would be a good supporter of us? Are other municipal utilities would want this too? Or is this just a Northeast Ohio regional sewer district initiative? So we kind of identify all of those things and play out all those scenarios. And then we work with leadership on whether it's something that they would feel comfortable with us moving forward. Again, we do have advocates or lobbyists on the ground in Columbus. So if it's state related, they tend to do the majority of the meeting with legislators, or even again, if it's something with a state agency or the governor's office. At the federal level, we work more with our trade associations because there's so many people in the DCA world, it's a little bit harder to get noticed just as an individual entity. So it's better to work through your trade associations that you know represent thousands of members and kind of make sure it's a good idea and something that they would feel comfortable with, and then see if it's something that's of high priority to everyone. When we're dealing with regulations, we work a lot with the lab and WQIS about concentrations and water quality and regulatory compliance. And I do tend to do the majority of the executive lobbying because most of it is with Ohio EPA um or US EPA. And I do have pretty strong relationships there. Right.
SPEAKER_00:You've built those relationships. Yeah. Affordability seems to be an important topic or subfield of what you're working on, right?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. We've been focusing this on them for many years. I would say one thing that has really stood out to us is that the federal lie heap program, it helps low-income families pay for, you know, electric utility bills. And we realized there's no lie heap for water.
SPEAKER_03:Right.
SPEAKER_02:If you struggle paying your utility bills, such as electric or gas or whatever it may be, you're probably also struggling with your water bill. And so we've been doing a lot of advocacy about a permanent, what we call LIWAP program, which is the low-income household water assistance program, which is essentially set up similar to LIHEAP, but for water. There's a lot of discussion whether it'd be it should be between HHS, like administered by the federal HHS, which is Health and Human Services, or USAPA. Now, one thing that was interesting is that during the COVID pandemic, they did a temporary LIWAP program. And it was over a billion dollars, and it was doled out to the states, and it was an amazing program. It helped a lot of our low-income ratepayers, customers with helping their water bills. And so we've now been doing even more advocacy. Affordability issues remain the same. And, you know, this is something that should be permanent.
SPEAKER_01:What are the barriers? Like, what are the barriers to starting a program like that?
SPEAKER_02:Finding the money. You know, getting appropriations at the state and federal level is hard. There's only so much money that can go around. And if something's not existing, sometimes I think people aren't as motivated to create a new one and you know, maybe take money from somewhere else and put it there. I think some of it is messaging. You know, I think sometimes things hit different people different ways. One thing that I've been somewhat discussing, it's it helps our customers, but it also helps us because it helps them pay off their bills if they're you know they're struggling. But it also helps us because you know, we provide a service and we do need money to come in to do that. And so it helps us continue our operations at the best level that we can. I think sometimes it gets lost as just helping a specific group of people, but it's actually helping all of our customers because that's it's helping us provide the best level of service that we can.
SPEAKER_01:You are across the aisle, as they say, right? Like it doesn't matter. We are advocating to Republicans, Democrats, independents. We are advocating to anyone who is potentially representing us.
SPEAKER_02:Anyone that'll listen. I mean, you need everyone on board to get something passed. It's good to have a sponsor and a champion in Cleveland, but it goes far beyond that. And you have to be willing to go across the aisle and work with everyone to get something passed.
SPEAKER_01:Sometimes you do go to DC.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. So every April, I think it's the first or second week, there's something called Water Week. And it's basically when all of the water trade associations host a fly-in for all water and wastewater utilities. And, you know, you hear all these updates from USEPA or, you know, other administration officials, which is very helpful. And then they leave the second day for you to go meet with your representatives. So myself and our chief executive officer, Kyle, we set meetings with the Cleveland area representatives and senators. I try to meet with Senate EPW, that's environment and public works staffers, or on the House side, it's transportation and infrastructure. So we meet, so we basically do a whole day, it is a very long day, of six to eight meetings. We're walking back and forth between the House and the Senate. And there's many, there's quite a few Senate office buildings. There's different House buildings.
SPEAKER_00:So it's uh running around all day, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Uh yes. I pride myself on being able to wear heels well, but I even bring an extra pair of shoes in my purse to to walk the Capitol. It's yeah, it's a long day, but it's great. Because they get FaceTime with us, they understand us more. Like Zooms are great. Letters are great. But when you talk to someone, you can answer their questions on the spot. And that is really probably the best form of advocacy.
SPEAKER_00:So you're breaking down these issues for them, giving them kind of the elevator pitch.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. I would say, or like, you know, we've got so many calls from constituents wanting you to vote this way.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_02:And, you know, this is some of their input. People are saying that they need property taxes lowered or property taxes raised for other reasons. So it just depends. You know, it's your job as an aide to relay that feedback back that you get from the constituents you represent and work with your boss about what is the best way to potentially vote or move forward or, you know, what would you like us to say back to constituents? I loved constituent work. I love talking to people on the phone. I love to chat in general, as you may be able to tell.
SPEAKER_01:So I know a lot of times, especially this year, I had folks asking me, you know, will our services be able to continue with cuts that were happening at the federal level? And our programs are funded by ratepayers, by our customers for the most part. However, we do have occasionally some grants that we that we get or that we apply for. I'm thinking specifically about projects, Danielle, that we've worked on together on the stormwater side where we have received funding for some of those projects. Do you want to talk a little bit about any of those applications and how that works?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. You know, I think everything kind of changed when earmarks came back in 2021. Right. Can you explain what an earmark is? Yes. So it is direct money for a project that you apply for through your congressional members. And we were quite successful in the first, you know, we got, I think, two earmarks, maybe two, three years in a row. Today we've gotten over, I think, 10 million in earmarks for different projects. I think that's five to six different projects. Any money we can get to fund projects opens up the opportunity for us to do more projects. Right. You know, Stormwater is a cash-funded program. You only have so much money that you can give each year to communities and, you know, and the regional stormwater system. So more money coming in just allows us to do more. Even outside of just pure projects, we've gotten trainings paid for, hazardous materials training. We do tree canopy grants. So we kind of have a broad range. It's not even just projects.
SPEAKER_00:So this is a an important outward-facing role for the sewer district. Does it help in your line of work to have an extroverted personality?
SPEAKER_02:Definitely. I mean, you have to be approachable. It's a lot of trust building. You know, it's funny because I watched the movie think, have you guys seen Thank You for Smoking? It's a movie about lobbying. Oh. It's, you know, tobacco, firearms, alcohol.
SPEAKER_00:It's kind of a satire.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, it's kind of a satire because you think like the word lobbying, I think, has a stigma to it. It's kind of like greasy, but it's not. It's just really communicating. It's communications and relationships. And again, people lobby for all good things. I mean, people lobby for, you know, cancer curing drugs, clean water. So yeah, it's definitely important to build trust. And I do think it's helpful when you have an extroverted personality. And you have to be on the clock a lot. I mean, a lot of things don't happen nine to five. Legislation, sometimes they go into session till midnight, 2 a.m. And you have to be ready to get a call from a legislator saying, Can you explain your amendment to me one more time so I can explain it to my colleagues? And you have to be ready to be on at all times and be on call.
SPEAKER_00:I think the other interesting thing is that we don't live in a silo, right? The sewer district doesn't operate in a silo. And so we are have our feelers out into the political landscape to try and advocate for our ratepayers.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. Affordability, clean water standards, and you know, when we comment on human permits, we're doing it for them.
SPEAKER_01:Aaron Powell That is a good point, Mike. It's sort of like we are in the ocean of policy and and government and politics. And so you can either be tossed around or you can try to like pull some direction and and find your way through that.
SPEAKER_02:Advocacy and lobbying, a lot of it is just tracking. There's sometimes well, let me say I would be remiss to say that a lot of it isn't just tracking and monitoring. Sometimes you don't have to do anything at all. It works itself out. Other people will weigh in before you weigh in, and maybe they kill a bill. So sometimes you it's genuinely just tracking and just watching and just making sure, you know, keeping in touch. But you just never want to be caught flat footed. You don't want something to hit the process, be at the end of the process and realize how much it might hurt you and your ratepayers. Right.
SPEAKER_00:It's too late to do anything.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah. So it's important.
SPEAKER_01:It's just really being informed at what's happening. And advising the people who make those decisions here.
SPEAKER_00:You like being in the water space though?
SPEAKER_02:Yes. Cleveland is a central basin, but I also have ties to the Western Basin. Um, my family has a home there, and I've always been a big fan of just being on the water. Again, a lot of my advocacy was related to Lake Erie at the EPA and here. So it holds a special place in my heart. Um, and I don't know if I ever would even move into a different space because I like the work so much.
SPEAKER_01:Danielle, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today.
SPEAKER_02:No, thank you for having me. I'm so honored. This is the first podcast I've ever been on.
SPEAKER_01:This has been Clean Water Works, a podcast.
SPEAKER_00:About clean water.
SPEAKER_01:I'm your host, Don Friedman.
SPEAKER_00:I'm Mike Uva. Thanks for listening.
