Why It's Easier These Days To Fill WI Wetlands
Wisconsin Governors and legislators carrying water for builders and other special interests have used their power and state law to make it easier to fill wetlands.
And if you think wetlands preservation is a priority of the "chamber-of-commerce mentality" crew given the reins at the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, why aren't they trumpeting it on a wetlands facts page not updated since August, 2012.
Some relevant state wetlands political history would include these low lights:
* When he was Governor, Republican Tommy Thompson, fed up with assertive litigation filed by watchdog lawyers doing their jobs in the Attorney General's Public Intervenor unit, abolished it in the 1995 state budget.
The message to citizens concerned about Wisconsin's air, water and other public resources sent on behalf of Thompson's business backers: Hire your own lawyer - - and if you cannot compete with the deeper pockets on the other side who also can write off the cost as a business expense - - tough.
Here is a post about that as well as a Marquette Law Review article by environmental lawyer Jodi Habush Sinykin.
* Flash forward to the very first days of the current administration, when the Governor we now know as "Wrong-Way" Walker had a bill introduced to suspend a DNR wetlands' filling permit review in progress so that one of his donors could immediately fill a wetland for a development near Lambeau Field.
The bill passed, but the development's intended tenant - - Bass Pro Shops - - pulled out because wetland filling was incompatible with a fishing equipment retailer's business and image.
But the signal had been sent and legislators working on Walker's behalf - - along with business special interests - - adopted a bill easing permitting procedures along the lines sought by builders. Which they bragged about helping to write with Matt Moroney, a former builders' official, whom Walker had appointed Deputy Secretary of the Department of Natural Resources.
* And to drive home the point, Walker signed the bill in front of a cheering crowd of real estate agents.
The result is that pressure is growing on state ground and surface waters from proposed or developing big dairy expansion, golf courses, frac sand and iron-ore mining, and other projects at the same time oversight has been weakened on a playing field intentionally-tilted away from the public interest.
* The US loses a lot of wetlands annually. In Wisconsin, many of the causes are not Mother Nature's fault.
And if you think wetlands preservation is a priority of the "chamber-of-commerce mentality" crew given the reins at the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, why aren't they trumpeting it on a wetlands facts page not updated since August, 2012.
Some relevant state wetlands political history would include these low lights:
* When he was Governor, Republican Tommy Thompson, fed up with assertive litigation filed by watchdog lawyers doing their jobs in the Attorney General's Public Intervenor unit, abolished it in the 1995 state budget.
The message to citizens concerned about Wisconsin's air, water and other public resources sent on behalf of Thompson's business backers: Hire your own lawyer - - and if you cannot compete with the deeper pockets on the other side who also can write off the cost as a business expense - - tough.
Here is a post about that as well as a Marquette Law Review article by environmental lawyer Jodi Habush Sinykin.
* Flash forward to the very first days of the current administration, when the Governor we now know as "Wrong-Way" Walker had a bill introduced to suspend a DNR wetlands' filling permit review in progress so that one of his donors could immediately fill a wetland for a development near Lambeau Field.
The bill passed, but the development's intended tenant - - Bass Pro Shops - - pulled out because wetland filling was incompatible with a fishing equipment retailer's business and image.
But the signal had been sent and legislators working on Walker's behalf - - along with business special interests - - adopted a bill easing permitting procedures along the lines sought by builders. Which they bragged about helping to write with Matt Moroney, a former builders' official, whom Walker had appointed Deputy Secretary of the Department of Natural Resources.
* And to drive home the point, Walker signed the bill in front of a cheering crowd of real estate agents.
The result is that pressure is growing on state ground and surface waters from proposed or developing big dairy expansion, golf courses, frac sand and iron-ore mining, and other projects at the same time oversight has been weakened on a playing field intentionally-tilted away from the public interest.
* The US loses a lot of wetlands annually. In Wisconsin, many of the causes are not Mother Nature's fault.
2 comments:
While I agree that walker has really loosened wetland regulations from the state perspective, you must remember that the Army Corps of Engineers has the ultimate say-so on fills over 10000 square feet. The real proof will come when the G-Tac mine starts up.
And also to be fair, the Cabelas/Bass Pro site permit was started under the Doyle administration. A lot of good folks at Green Bay DNR got bit on the #@& by both Doyle and Walker administrators. And politicians that had in the past has supported wetland protection, most notably Sen Rob Cowles, backtracked and fell in line with Walker.
Yes, the Green Bay wetland permit review began under Doyle, but, really, so what? Walker got the Legislature to end-run the process before it was completed.
Cowles, like Kedzie, both moved rightward on environmental preservation towards de-regulation after Walker took office. Kedzie just left to become the trucking association's Exec. Dir. 'Nuf said,
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