EPA message to the little people: If you like your river, you can’t keep your river.

The EPA has pardoned itself from paying claims totaling more than $1.2 billion for economic damages from a mine waste spill the agency accidentally triggered in Colorado the summer of 2015.

The EPA said the claims could be refiled in federal court, or Congress could authorize payments.

But attorneys for the EPA and the Justice Department concluded the EPA is barred from paying the claims because of sovereign immunity, which prohibits most lawsuits against the government.

“The agency worked hard to find a way in which it could pay individuals for damages due to the incident, but unfortunately, our hands are tied,” EPA spokeswoman Nancy Grantham said.

The EPA is hiding behind the Federal Tort Claims Act, indicating that it prevents the agency from paying claims the result from “discretionary” government actions. Congress passed the law to allow government agencies to act “without the fear of paying damages in the event something went wrong while taking the action,” according to its press release.

However, many people are not buying into that reasoning.

http://www.sltrib.com/news/4817864-155/epa-says-it-cant-pay-economic?fullpage=1