Environment (Waste Management)

This bill allows Kansas counties to adopt local resolutions regulating activities like camping, waste disposal, and vehicle use on navigable rivers, specifically to protect public health, safety, and welfare. It also expands the criminal trespass law to include navigable rivers, making unauthorized activities on them subject to trespass penalties. The policy directly affects county governments (which gain new regulatory authority) and river users (who must comply with local rules). The changes amend Kansas law to explicitly grant counties this power, without altering state-level river management.

HB 2064 removes an existing exception in Kansas law (K.S.A. 65-3407c) that allowed oil and gas drilling operations to dispose of their solid waste through land-spreading without a solid waste permit. This change directly affects oil and gas companies in Kansas that currently use land-spreading for waste disposal. The bill requires these operations to obtain a permit from the Department of Health and Environment for such waste disposal, aligning it with standard solid waste regulations. The law amendment repeals the specific exception (previously listed as section 65-3407c(8)) for drilling waste land-spreading.