Rutledge Says Back River Plant Is ‘An Epic Failure,’ Presses Brown on Enforcement

Republican AG nominee ties Baltimore’s chronic odor complaints to January’s Potomac Interceptor spill, and faults Annapolis for a response that came only after the governor first denied Maryland had a role

By Michael Phillips | MDBayNews

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BEL AIR, MD — Republican attorney general nominee Jim Rutledge called Baltimore’s Back River Wastewater Treatment Plant “an epic failure” in a campaign release issued Wednesday, using two of the state’s most visible sewage problems to argue that Attorney General Anthony Brown has been long on rhetoric and short on enforcement.

Rutledge, a Harford County attorney and former Bel Air town commissioner, is challenging Brown in the November election. His release pairs two separate stories that have dogged Maryland’s water infrastructure this year: the decades-old odor problem at Back River in eastern Baltimore County, and the historic sewage spill that fouled the Potomac River after a pipe collapse in January.

Rutledge accused Democratic officials of lecturing Marylanders about the environment while doing little to fix it. “Talk is cheap,” he said in the release. “Enforcement is the job.”

“Talk is cheap. Enforcement is the job.”

Back River: A settlement that didn’t end the smell

The Back River plant, the largest wastewater facility in Maryland, has drawn state scrutiny for years. Brown’s office and the Maryland Department of the Environment settled a lawsuit with Baltimore City in November 2023 over discharge violations at Back River and the nearby Patapsco plant, winning a $4.75 million civil penalty and a timeline of required upgrades.

The state already won a $4.75 million settlement and an enforceable repair schedule. The odor complaints did not disappear with it.

Three years later, residents of Dundalk and Essex are still filing odor complaints. Del. Bob Long, R-Baltimore County, held a town hall on the issue September 10 and has prefiled the Maryland Wastewater Odor Accountability Act, which would require continuous odor monitoring, independent testing and public reporting from the plant. “We’ve been dealing with this for probably fifty years or better,” Long told WBAL-TV.

Baltimore City’s Department of Public Works, which runs the plant, has told WBAL it is still trying to pin down the source of the smell and expects results from ongoing engineering assessments by early January.

The Potomac spill: a separate case, and one the state has already filed

The release’s second target is the collapse of the 72-inch Potomac Interceptor near Clara Barton Parkway in Montgomery County on January 19, which sent an estimated 240 million to 300 million gallons of raw sewage into the Potomac River, among the largest such spills in U.S. history.

That pipe belongs to DC Water, not a Maryland agency, though the break itself occurred on Maryland soil. DC Water’s own inspections between 2011 and 2015 had already found corrosion along most of the Potomac Interceptor, and a Washington Post investigation published in April found the utility had sought permission to reinforce the failed section as early as 2018 but was held up for years amid National Park Service environmental reviews. DC Water’s own review later pointed to a construction-era design flaw, oversized boulders placed too close to the pipe when it was built in the 1960s, as a likely factor in how badly the collapse spread.

Rutledge’s release argues the collapse reflected years of deferred maintenance rather than an unpredictable accident, a characterization the corrosion history and the Post’s reporting support.

Maryland’s own response was slow to materialize. As raw sewage was still reaching the Potomac in February, Gov. Wes Moore told the public, “Maryland has nothing to do with this,” treating the spill as strictly a District of Columbia problem. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency later called that position incorrect, pointing out that Maryland holds the federal authority to enforce the Clean Water Act within its own borders and had full power to act. It wasn’t until April, roughly three months after the collapse and after the EPA and the Justice Department had already filed their own federal complaint against DC Water, that Brown’s office and MDE brought Maryland’s lawsuit seeking civil penalties, cleanup costs and a court order to prevent future discharges.

The same campaign argument lands differently at Back River and on the Potomac: one involves years of continuing complaints; the other already has an active state enforcement case.

What Rutledge says he’d do differently

Rutledge, who has practiced law for nearly four decades, said an AG under his watch would:

• Treat chronic violators like Back River as ongoing enforcement matters rather than closed cases
• Push for independent monitoring and public reporting on odor and discharge complaints
• Prioritize aging sewer infrastructure statewide over what he called politically fashionable lawsuits in federal court
• Work with local prosecutors, MDE and riverkeeper groups on enforcement

What to Watch

Long’s Wastewater Odor Accountability Act will need sponsors and a hearing when the General Assembly convenes in January. Maryland’s lawsuit against DC Water and the federal EPA complaint are both still pending in court, and any settlement terms in either case are likely to become a talking point in the final weeks of the attorney general race. Baltimore City DPW’s odor-source assessment at Back River is expected in early January, around the same time lawmakers return to Annapolis.

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Sources: This report draws on a September 16, 2026 press release from the Rutledge for Attorney General campaign; Maryland Department of the Environment and Office of the Attorney General press releases on the November 2023 Back River/Patapsco settlement and the April 2026 lawsuit against DC Water; WBAL-TV and PressNewsAgency reporting on Del. Bob Long’s prefiled legislation and town hall; DC Water’s Potomac Interceptor incident reports and rehabilitation plan; U.S. EPA and Department of Justice press releases on the federal Clean Water Act complaint against DC Water; and Washington Post, Maryland Matters, WJLA and Chesapeake Bay Journal reporting on the cause and cleanup of the January 2026 Potomac Interceptor collapse.

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