Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Special Interests Grab State Water Pollution Policy

I put this item up on Friday about a plan by the GOP Legislature to make it easier for phosphorous-fed algae scum to choke Wisconsin waterways supposedly held in trust for everyone by the Wisconsin State Constitution:

Am hearing that Walker and legislators are floating out some kind of Orwellian-titled 'Healthy Waters' bill backed by the WMC, Paper Council and others to give polluters another 20+ years to get phosphorous out of Wisconsin waters, strip much of the program's management from DNR scientists and hand it to Wisconsin Department of Administration partisan apparatchiks. 
I've been saying for a while that the ultimate goal of these private-sector captives is the destruction of the Wisconsin Constitution's Public Trust doctrine, and this is clearly a step in that direction.
And right on schedule came the bill - - sponsored in the State Senate by former GOP environmental moderate Robert Cowles - - along with the Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce laying out the case to overturn or muddy current state law that enjoys US EPA approval.

The impact of the proposal on water, nearby land and businesses is summarized here by the River Alliance of Wisconsin:

Further information in this Journal Sentinel story.


2 comments:

Anonymous said...

It's simply amazing that they continue to trot out these time-worm ideas of ALEC and WMC that if you get rid of regulations protecting either people or their living space that unfettered capitalism will not use the loss of regulation for profit and personal gain. "GREED" is the "mantra" of corporate CEO's and profit at all cost is what they get rewarded for....not their care and compassion for people or the environment. As long as special interests pay politicians to control and manage their actions nothing will change and we will continue to march backwards in Wisconsin.

Anonymous said...

And as long as the people in Wisconsin are ignorant, the longer corporations will get away with such things.