On May 11th, the Clean Water Network Board of Directors released a public position statement on the oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. The spill, which has already poured millions of gallons of crude oil into the Gulf, continues to grow at an alarming rate.

 The Network's statement outlines the following crucial issues:

 May 3- CWN Alert #1 on Gulf Oil Spill Disaster: News update, message from Mobile Baykeeper

Late last month the US Environmental Protection Agency announced a policy that instructs states to adopt smart-growth principles in allocating the $3.3 billion in water infrastructure funding that the federal government doles out each year. Under the policy, states should make projects that upgrade the drinking water and wastewater infrastructure in cities a priority over projects intended to serve new developments on the suburban fringe.

On April 20 BP's Deepwater Horizon deep sea oil rig exploded, burned for some time and eventually sank. The rig left it its wake a ruptured well pipe that is spewing out 210,000 gallons (5,000 barrels) of sweet crude oil per day into the Gulf of Mexico. BP officials are on the record saying that it could take as long as 90 days to stop the leak, meaning that almost 18.9 million gallons could ultimately get into the water.