Grady County received approval to build a 960-acre fishing lake that would inundate wetlands and streams, and it sought a stream-buffer variance from Georgia’s Environmental Protection Division. The EPD Director granted the variance despite objections from Georgia River Network and American Rivers, who argued that the application failed to address buffers for affected wetlands. An administrative law judge disagreed with the Director’s interpretation of OCGA § 12-7-6(b)(15)(A), but the superior courts reversed the ALJ. The Georgia Court of Appeals then held that the statute required a 25-foot buffer along all state waters, whether or not the banks had wrested vegetation. The Georgia Supreme Court reversed. Applying the statute’s text and ordinary meaning, the Court held that the phrase requiring measurement from wrested vegetation defined how the buffer was established and meant that the provision did not apply to waters beside banks without such vegetation. The Court declined to add protection the General Assembly had not expressly enacted and limited its review to that statutory-construction issue. Justice Melton dissented, viewing the provision as ambiguous and arguing that the EPD’s interpretation failed the Act’s protective purpose and deserved no deference. The judgment of the Court of Appeals was reversed.