Hudson Riverkeeper Fund v. Putnam Hospital Center

The Clean Water Act (CWA) allowed a citizen to sue any entity that violated effluent discharge standards. Section 505(b) of the CWA required the citizen filing such a suit to send notice of the alleged violations to relevant state and federal agencies. The regulations of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) specified that the notice should include information sufficient to allow identification of the violated standard, the person responsible, the dates of the violations, and other details. In September 1994, Hudson Riverkeeper Fund, Inc. (Hudson) (plaintiff) sent a notice describing violations of discharge standards by Putnam Hospital Center, Inc. (Putnam) (defendant). The notice identified the discharge standards Putnam had allegedly violated but did not list the dates on which the violations allegedly occurred. The notice said that the violations were continuing. Hudson filed a citizen suit against Putnam. Putnam filed a motion to dismiss for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction on the grounds that the notice did not satisfy the requirements of § 505(b) as set out in the EPA regulations. Hudson argued that the specific dates need not be specified in the notice, so long as the notice included enough information for the recipient to identify the dates. Hudson asserted that Putnam could identify the dates of the violations by reviewing its own monthly discharge monitoring reports. However, eight months after the notice, Hudson had also stated in a letter that some of the allegations in the notice were based on testing carried out by New York State environmental authorities.