Thursday, June 16, 2016

Tell Great Lakes diversion reviewers of Wisconsin water stewardship fail

Last-minute comments in opposition - - electronic form, here - - to the precedent-setting but scientifically-unjustified diversion of Great Lakes water to Waukesha, WI should stress that Wisconsin's Governor, his 'chamber-of-commerce" Department of Natural Resources, the State Legislature and Supreme Court are now controlled and coordinated by corporately-directed and ideologically-committed officials or appointees.

They have weakened state water law and regulatory oversight and cannot be trusted to provide the necessary and principled public water oversight which is at the core of the eight-state US/Canadian 2008 Great Lakes Compact that governs such diversions.

Read about the lack of public water concern - - as policy in Wisconsin - - here.
WI heading for more groundwater privatization, pollution and scarcity
File:Confined-animal-feeding-operation.jpg
Read about the Wisconsin Attorney General joining with Gov. Walker, big-water user special interests and the DNR to green-light the giveaway of state groundwater and give up regulatory authority, here:
As predicted, WI AG endorses public waters' giveaway
And read about the internal pressures at the DNR which have led and fed the intentional disregard of public water rights and oversight in Wisconsin - - as described by people with first-hand experience at the DNR - - here.
Inside the WI DNR: poor morale, fear, despair over lost mission
I'd also recommend this summary from an Ohio website about the diversion review process and Wisconsin's capitulation on groundwater management:
In a letter made public Thursday, the coalition of conservation groups cited an opinion by Wisconsin's state attorney general released last month that cast doubt on the state's authority to manage, regulate, and enforce conditions the Compact Council may require when approving a diversion. 
Although the Compact authorizes legal actions to compel compliance, the conservation groups are calling on Wisconsin to state, for the record, that it has this authority, and is willing and prepared to use this authority, when the Compact Council meets to vote on June 21.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Oh, the DNR horror, the horror, and the obfuscating wordiness...let DNR know
(y)our views of their use of the state's wild areas for barbaric "dog training" -- their so-called wildlife stewardship and their record of pollution oversight (overlooking water pollution, the use of farmed deer as prey for dog packs, the spreading of CWD by deer "farm" escapees or the public health threat to people and desecration of WI Waters, wildlife, Nature and soil by unregulated "ag" methods of manure pollution. Write to DNR before 11 am
tomorrow (Friday 6/17)
if you want to comment to the board when it convenes at Richland Center 6/22: http://dnr.wi.gov/about/nrb/calendar.html

Anonymous said...

You can write the board, but remember they are pawns of Walker. They publicly say "Cathy Stepp is doing a good job." Of course she is, at destroying every environmental quality process in the state. The board is lock step with Walker, colusion. So dont think it will make a difference no matter what they say publically.

The environment and . wildlife in Wi are due for even more hits, you will see shortly...these people have no interest in anything environmental, except to exploit it.

Anonymous said...

We all know by now that this is exactly the time to hold those thugs' feet to the wildfire of public anger aroused by their ultra-rightwing criminal activity. Do speak up!
I bet someone advised the Natural Resources Board member to say he was shocked, SHOCKED to "discover" that DNR was not issuing citations but simply over-looking criminal CAFO activity.

The report itself was bull concocted by Eberle/Stepp.

WI state government's inability to carry out its mandate to protect the people, Water and wildlife from obvious, documented environmental health threats for years now will not continue if we support citizens' and Midwest Environmental Advocates' Petition to the EPA for Corrective Action.

We have those Walker cronies on the run! See pages 4 and 5 of the BadRiverWatershed.org newsletter and get up to Northland College and be there (at Sigurd Olson Environmental Institute in Ashland) today, June 22, 2016, at 7:00 pm; info at midwestadvocates.org/pca

Anonymous said...

Oops...June 22, 2016 is the Wednesday; not today.