High Court to decide how logging roads regulated

(AP) The U.S. Supreme Court will decide whether to switch gears on more than 30 years of regulating the muddy water running off logging roads into rivers.

At issue: Should the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency keep considering that muddy water the same as water running off a farm field, or start looking at it like a pipe coming out of a factory?

The case being heard Monday in Washington, D.C., originated from a small environmental group in Portland, the Northwest Environmental Defense Center. It sued the Oregon Department of Forestry over roads on the Tillamook State Forest that drain into salmon streams.