LEWISTON – A new environmental group took aim Saturday at recent legislation that lowered clean water standards for the Androscoggin River.

Androscoggin River Alliance, a group with a membership that hails from as far from the Twin Cities as Brunswick and Rumford, seeks to restore the river to a natural, healthy condition by encouraging sound and safe uses by business, agriculture and recreational users. The alliance maintains the major polluters of the Androscoggin are members of the pulp industry with mills along the river.

The group presented its agenda at a news conference at the Bates Mill during the annual conference of Maine Rivers, an advocacy group calling for complete restoration of the Androscoggin and other Maine rivers.

Alliance leader Dr. Gregory D’Augustine called for a turnaround of recent legislation that made the Androscoggin the least protected of all Maine rivers. The legislation reversed state law that, until this year, had treated all rivers equally.

State Rep. Elaine Makas, D-Lewiston, and a member of the Founding Committee of Androscoggin River Alliance, said lobbying efforts by industry were responsible for the legislation passed during the last session that allowed the Androscoggin to be held to lower clean water standards.

“I intend to introduce legislation during the upcoming session that corrects this error,” she said.

Several alliance members acknowledged the river is cleaner than it was decades ago, but more needs to be done, they said, before it returns to a pristine, natural condition.

The Maine Rivers conference came three days before the first of two meetings sponsored by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection to discuss the continued pollution of Gulf Island Pond. The DEP has scheduled meetings on Tuesday, Dec. 7, at the Rumford Public Library, and Wednesday, Dec. 8, at Lewiston City Hall in the council meeting chambers. Both meetings start at 5 p.m., with the DEP soliciting public comment at them from 6 to 8 p.m.