CHAPTER 486

AN ACT to amend and reenact § 62-48 of the Code of Virginia, relating
to the unlawful pollution of water used for the supply of cities
and towns.

fS 221]

Approved March 30, 1956

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

ai That § 62-48 of the Code of Virginia be amended and reenacted as
ollows: .

§ 62-43. It shall be unlawful, except as hereinafter provided, for any
person to defile or render impure, turbid or offensive the water used
for the supply of any city or town of this State, or the sources or streams
used for furnishing such supply, or to endanger the purity thereof by
the following means, or any of them, to-wit: By washing or bathing
therein, or by casting into any spring, well, pond, lake, or reservoir from
which such supply is drawn, or into any stream so used or the tributary
thereof above the point where such supply is taken out of such stream
or is impounded for the purposes of such supply, or into any canal, aque-
duct, or other channel or receptacle for water connected with any works
for furnishing a public water supply any offal, dead fish, or carcass of
any animal, or any human or animal filth or other foul or waste animal
matter, or any waste vegetable or mineral substance, or the refuse of
any mine, manufactory or manufacturing process, or by discharging or
permitting to flow into any such source, spring, well, reservoir, pond,
stream, or the tributary thereof, canal, aqueduct, or other receptacle for
water the contents of any sewer, privy, stable, or barnyard, or the impure
drainage of any mine, any crude or refined petroleum, chemicals, or any
foul, noxious, or offensive drainage whatsoever, or by constructing or
maintaining any privy-vault or cesspool, or by storing manure or other
soluble fertilizer of an offensive character, or by disposing of the carcass
of any animal, or any foul, noxious, or putrescible substance, whether solid
or fluid, and whether the same be buried or not, within two hundred feet
of any water course, canal, pond, or lake aforesaid, which is liable to
contamination by the washing thereof or percolation therefrom; but noth-
ing in this section contained shall be construed to authorize the pollution
CHS. 486, 487, 488] ACTS OF ASSEMBLY 703

of any of the waters in this State in any manner now contrary to law *,
provided that this section shall not apply to any discharge into any State
waters of sewage, industrial waste or other waste under a certificate issued
by the State Water Control Board. Any person knowingly or wilfully
violating this section shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and shall
be punished for each offense by a fine not exceeding one hundred dollars,
or by imprisonment not exceeding thirty days, or by both, at the discretion
of the court. Nothing herein contained shall be so construed as to prevent
the washing of ore or minerals in any of the streams or waters of this
Commonwealth other than such as may be used for the water supply of
any city or town.