This bill (Substitute House Bill 2343, 69th Legislature, 2026) adds new sections to chapter 77.12 RCW and chapter 90.48 RCW and requires that when a state department operates any publicly owned or operated facility where wildlife or other animals are held, confined, propagated, hatched, fed, or otherwise raised in numbers and circumstances that would qualify the facility as a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO), the department must obtain a water discharge permit consistent with the bill. Upon determining a publicly owned facility would qualify as a CAFO, the department must either begin applying and enforcing the CAFO general permit requirements or issue an individual CAFO permit to the facility. The new provisions set minimum permit requirements or equivalent department‑required measures, including a manure pollution prevention plan, production area runoff controls, land application limits, protocols for management of dead animals, a prohibition on discharges that cause or contribute to violations of water quality standards, and logistical compliance measures such as monitoring, recordkeeping, and reporting. A facility with more than 5,000 game birds at any time must be treated as a large CAFO and subject to the most protective water quality standards applicable to any CAFO category. The department’s powers, duties, enforcement provisions, and remedies under chapter 90.48 RCW are made applicable to these publicly owned facilities in the same manner as they apply to privately owned CAFOs. Legally, this is a procedural and regulatory change: it creates new statutory permitting requirements for publicly operated facilities that meet CAFO criteria and extends existing CAFO enforcement authority to those facilities. The act states Section 2 is effective immediately. The text provided does not explicitly identify which “department” is referenced, does not include existing CAFO threshold definitions from chapter 90.48 RCW for full comparison, and does not provide fee, penalty, or detailed timing provisions for updates to the CAFO general permit or the Department of Ecology’s actions. Legislative findings referenced groundwater monitoring and an investigation at the Bob Oke game farm, but those technical reports or data are not included in the provided text.

If enacted, publicly owned or operated facilities that hold or raise animals in numbers that would qualify as a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) will have to obtain a CAFO-style water discharge permit right away and follow required pollution controls, monitoring, recordkeeping, and reporting. Facilities with more than 5,000 game birds are treated as “large” CAFOs and must meet the most protective water quality standards, and the operating state department must either apply the CAFO general permit requirements to its facilities or issue individual permits and use existing enforcement authorities the same way they apply to private CAFOs. The people most affected are public operators of game farms and other animal-holding facilities (state agencies and local governments), who will likely face new planning and operational duties and added costs for manure and runoff controls, monitoring, recordkeeping, permit applications, and possible enforcement actions. The Department of Ecology and the unnamed operating department will have to update and enforce permitting, but the bill text here leaves unclear which specific department is meant, what permit fees or penalties will apply, and the detailed technical or timing rules for those permits.