Walker's 8-year war on the Wisconsin environment. Part 19. Foxconn.

This is the 19th installment of a 21-part series on Walker's war on the Wisconsin environment. The series will conclude before the Nov. 6 election..
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You could not overstate the environmental costs that accompany Foxconn's equally-unprecedented and intertwined claims on state taxpayers, one small village's borrowing authority, Wisconsin's road-building budget and private property owners being moved off their land to accommodate a single Taiwan-based firm and an incumbent Governor's personal and political agendas.

I have been tracking the Foxconn project since June, 2017; this archive - - "A Foxconn Fever Primer" - - has been continuously updated with more than 200 posts and readers can peruse the bold-faced links to follow just about any aspect of the story.

Why "Foxconn Fever," you ask?

Because that's what came over Walker and his allies - - even Attorney General Brad Schimel who jumped on board right after the official word got out, whether or not he'd ever have to be in court defending the taxpayers' interests should some part or parts of the deal turn out to other than what had been promised.

So given the breadth of the subject, let me do two things.

I will point you towards some of the key environmental issues, and then add a few more points for context.

1. Here are links to some of the main environmental issues, and the thread running through them is obvious: favors were given away to Foxconn by Walker and the Legislature, but the basic resources involved - - clean air and water - - belong to the people and are supposed to be protected for the people by their trustee: the state and the DNR.

Filling Wetlands, streams and lakes.


More extensive clean air exemptions.

Quick water diversion approval.

Quick air emissions approvals.

Routine environmental impact statement mocked, waived.

2. Now a few summary observations:

The company is posting futuristic videos of what it says will eventually be there - - and, as Walker had said in earlier political campaigns, put this up on your refrigerator and hold him to it - - and bringing in eager media to see all the dirt that's being moved around by battalions of big machines.

All to dull your recollection that the dirt had been for decades and until recently many working farms and homeowners yards in the painfully, ironically-named Village of Mount Pleasant.

And Team Walker keeps cheering the dislocation along, and hoping you don't ask whether this is all a little premature, given local litigation over private property seizures, the pending and unresolved challenge to the Lake Michigan diversion because of the risk it poses to the integrity and value of the Great Lakes Compact, the opposition in Illinois in several jurisdictions over surface and wastewater concerns and a separate challenge to the air emission permits, and so on.

And a final thought:

While Foxconn and its boosters like then-DNR Cathy Stepp and others have repeatedly said the project will abide by all relevant environmental standards - - clever wordsmithing, given the exemptions already granted - - take a look at Foxconn's failure to abide by a common sense requirement as simple as not moving all that dirt around before completing required runoff detention ponds, just in case it were to rain heavily on the site.

As it does, in Racine County. Foxconn headed for flood-prone Racine County (Oct. 15, 2017).

As was in the forecast this summer. Storms forecast for Racine County where Foxconn is bulldozing, filling. Sept. 1, 2018.

And yet, this.

What's your comfort level with the project's respect for the environment now?

And remember: Mother Nature gave us wetlands to soak up excess precipitation and filter it to keep the environment clean - - wetlands Foxconn is free to fill on its massive site at will so long as they do not connect to a federally-protected waterway.

The Legislature earlier this year tried to remove protections from all state-level wetlands so developers could fill and build in them - - a Foxconn-style, equal-rights' for all state wetland holders' privilege, if you will - - but an outcry from conservationists forced the Legislature to send Walker a simpler bill he signed that cut the acreage released statewide for development to 100,000 acres from 1,000,000.

Yea, who needs all those wetlands and the junk science that goes with it, eh?

Don't worry. The more filling that goes on by Foxconn, the more normalized will he the bulldozing and the filling and the more likely that they and their significant value will disappear.

Also, as predicted.

Wisconsin's Public Trust Doctrine requires the state to intervene to protect public rights in the commercial or recreational use of navigable waters. The DNR, as the state agent charged with this responsibility, can do so through permitting requirements for water projects, through court action to stop nuisances in navigable waters, and through statutes authorizing local zoning ordinances that limit development along navigable waterways. 

The court has ruled that DNR staff, when they review projects that could impact Wisconsin lakes and rivers, must consider the cumulative impacts of individual projects in their decisions. 

"A little fill here and there may seem to be nothing to become excited about. But one fill, though comparatively inconsequential, may lead to another, and another, and before long a great body may be eaten away until it may no longer exist.  Our navigable waters are a precious natural heritage, once gone, they disappear forever," wrote the Wisconsin State Supreme Court justices in their opinion resolving Hixon v. PSC.(2) 

Sources: (1) Quick, John. 1994. The Public Trust Doctrine in Wisconsin. Wisconsin Environmental Law Journal, Vol. 1, No. 1.  (2) "Champions of the Public Trust, A History of Water Use in Wisconsin" study guide. 1995. Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources Bureau of Water Regulation and Zoning. Champions of the Public Trust 

The 17th and 18th installments were published October 27th

Walker's 8-year attack on Wisconsin's environment. Part 18. The 33 times science was dissed, dismissed.

This is the 18th installment of a 21-part series on Walker's war on the Wisconsin environment. The series will conclude before the Nov. 6 election.

When Walker announced the DNR on his watch would be run with "a chamber of commerce mentality," he meant with less science, too.

And as documented below in an exhausting but not exhaustive list - - more suggestions are welcome in the comments section - - that attitude has moved across the Legislature and state government more broadly, as Walker, his DNR or his allies:

*  Scrubbed climate science, information and relevant links off the DNR's key climate webpage, first disclosed by this blog in late 2016.

* Presaged by wholesale earlier deletions from DNR webpages of multiple links to climate change and global warming studies and outside materials.

*  Merged and downgraded the DNR's Science Bureau to better serve business. Then agency Secretary Cathy Stepp's own words in her memo.

Science Services – The Department’s highest priority business decisions must be informed by sound and up-to-date science. While we are proud of the efforts that the science branch of the organization has produced to date, the Leadership Team believes our Science Services program must be better positioned in the agency to ensure alignment of effort and funding to priorities. 

To accomplish this, effective immediately, the Bureau of Science Services will become a part of the Office of Business Support and Sustainability and report directly to the Office’s Director. 

* And those cuts, along with other downgrades, have led to shortages and gaps in scientific information, insiders say:

A former DNR staffer said: 

The most alarming issue to me is the great waste of decades of sound science, compiled overtime in on-going studies and data collection. WI had more information about our natural landscape than most states. Abolishing science services put an end to decades long studies vital to maintaining and recovering rare and endangered plants and animals as well as understanding natural communities as information on resilience for climate change. 

And a current employee on personal time echoed many of the lobbyists and former staffers' observations:

Under Walker and Stepp, science is not a priority. Scientific knowledge is ever-changing but in Wisconsin our staff are being left behind. We no longer have a statistician to help interpret data, a library to provide journals or books, or researchers that monitor fish counts, wildlife health, air quality, water quality and etc….employee scientific knowledge and data specific to WI is stagnant...we cannot do the best job possible for our state. 

The DNR is currently run by people who understand public relations spin but not the complexity of the natural resources they are responsible for...Communications staff, generally not trained specifically in resource communication, answer questions with talking points...usually developed by upper management - political appointees - and legal staff. The information provided is biased and superficial.

*  Made those cuts to the DNR science staff in part at the behest of the Legislature's lead mining ally who didn't like what DNR science DNR scientists might have been studying.

*  Promoted with the active support of DNR Secretary Cathy Stepp, and also with secret campaign financing, 35 years of mountain top/open-pit mining in the pristine Penokee Hills and Bad River watershed, despite evidence of asbestos-like fibers in waste rock, harm to wild rice estuaries, multiple private wells and community water systems, and regional air quality.

*  Dragged its feet despite known, measured and confirmed drinking water contamination in wide swaths of rural NE Wisconsin and the Central Sands area to the west

* Signed separate legislation into law ending a clean water enabling 30-year ban on toxifying sulfide mining in the state.

* Lowered the standards for what scientifically constitutes a waterway of special interest that should be protected from construction or intrusion.

* Failed to abide by its own follow-up rules after pollution inspections 94% of the time.

* Repeatedly ignored scientific approaches to the control of deer chronic wasting disease, now an epidemic effecting the herd in most Wisconsin counties. 

*  With no scientific underpinning, the Legislature passed and Walker signed bills to sell 10,000 acres of state land 'managed' by the DNR, and to remove state protections from 100,000 acres of flood-mitigating, surface-water cleansing wetlands.

* Granted through actions of the DNR and its oversight board preliminary approvals to a Walker donor the right to build a golf course in a nature preserve that DNR staff have said will damage dunes, wetlands, timber stands and wildlife habitat, and which will also require transfer to the project of state parkland acreage.

* Eliminated an existing early warning notification system which alerted the public to the known buildup of unhealthy air conditions.

* Discouraged recycling, a known contributor to cleaner land and water.

* Supported eased shoreline construction and dredging restrictions designed to protect water quality.

* Intentionally rolled back rules designed to lessen phosphorous discharges and thus contamination of Wisconsin waterways, leading directly to an increase in waterways reported to the US EPA as 'impaired.'

The Little Plover River runs dry with so many large ag operations drawing groundwater nearby. During Walker's tenure, impaired waterways in Wisconsin have doubled, according to DNR data routinely supplied to the US EPA.

* Eased or shelved inspections of an expanding number of large animal feeding operations (CAFOs), tolerated manure runoff that led to 'brown water events' and continually put water science on the back burner.

* Intend to move DNR CAFO inspectors and perhaps water quality experts away from the DNR to the more industry-friendly Department of Ag, Trade and Consumer Protection, which also coordinates and funds ag, dairy and other commercial development domestically and worldwide.

* Approved new fees and charges for solar power installations.

* Proposed ending funding for a UW biofuels program and more than a dozen other environmental and scientific activities throughout the UW system. Only legislative intervention prevented implementation, but the US system suffered tens of millions of dollars in broad budget cuts anyway.

*  Suspended an ongoing DNR review of a wetland-filling permit so a campaign donor could more quickly fill the wetland for a development.

* Obstructed wind power development to serve his real estate friends.

* Approved the expansion of a tar sands pipeline running the north-south length of the state with only cursory and minimal permitting reviews, despite the pipeline operator's calamitous in-state and regional environmental record.

* Legislatively urged Trump's EPA to move an air pollution monitor because it was recording too much pollution.

*  Granted the Foxconn project unique exemptions from standard, science-based environmental impact analyses, and gave the company the right to fill wetlands, build on lake beds and re-route streams, despite years of science and law to the contrary. More about Foxconn later in this series.

* Convinced Trump's EPA to apply weaker air quality standards over heavily populated portions of SE Wisconsin.

* Used the DNR to quickly approve huge dirty air emissions for the Foxconn project.

*  Used the DNR to quickly approve a controversial diversion of water from Lake Michigan for the Foxconn project without known what proprietary chemical compounds or residues would be in the wastewater that the project would return to the lake.

* Granted a permit for a sand mining operation to carry out a massive wetland filling which former DNR experts said should not be permitted.

* Though hybrid and electric vehicles reduce dirty air emissions, Walker's DOT proposed and he signed into law annual fee increases on those vehicles.

*  Ensured that Wisconsin's short-lived wolf hunting program which ignored science-based restrictions would continue with few limitations by removing wolf hunting opponents from the state's wolf advisory committee.

Update: Oct., 28th addendum. Walker and the state joined two separate lawsuits to block Obama administration's science-and-public health clean air initiatives, here and here.Even Trump's EPA, dedicated to nullifying the Obama era clean air plans, acknowledged they would save thousands of lives annually.

Part 17 of this series was published October 27th.

Walker's 8-year war on Wisconsin's environment. Part 17. Eyeing public losses, private gains.

This is the 17th installment of a 21-part series about Walker's assault on the Wisconsin environment. The series will conclude next week before the Nov. 6th election. 

This posting provides expert analysis I gathered about a year ago, and will help explain the remaining posts over the next few days.

As one state insider told me: "There is a message I would like to send to Wisconsin: Make no mistake, Wisconsin is being sold off piece by piece to rich individuals who own the party currently in the governors office."

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In June, 2016 - - and in subsequent updates -- I posted a look inside the Wisconsin DNR based on interviews with then-current and retired staffers, and others whose work kept them connected to the agency and its responsibilities.

That posting became the heart of the 11th installment of this series on October 23rd.

In late 2017, I decided to go back to some of the original sources and some additional experts to again get a feel for what was happening inside state decision-making and within the DNR, and the responses were so extensive that I ran them over two days, and then combined them into one long posting because it was easier for people to share the material is a single item.

So I want to add those items to this current series, as they provide context for, and insight into what Walker and his legislative have wrought, and the steep challenges facing a new Governor, fresh legislators and others if given the change to begin to restore both the DNR and state's damaged environment.

An immediate task: free policy from donors - - which was the focus of Part 1 of this series because it was what consumed Walker on Day One of his first term.

This is the link to the combined accounts of what the various insiders and experts had to say November 20-21, 2017.

I will pull out a few excerpted highlights, below, but recommend taking in the comments in full:

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* From the inside - - "Desperation at all levels of the DNR." 

The past year has really shown me how the GOP is afraid of and caters to their wealthy donors - some of whom aren't even that generous. It was obvious before but this year has been brutal. DNR administrators support any development project regardless of environmental impacts. They are not interested in the environment or public health. If they can't maneuver around the law by bending it, the legislature simply changes the law. 

Rich Republican donors feel free to call up the DNR Secretary and Governor and demand that their projects go through. This puts pressure on legislators and DNR upper management. It has created an atmosphere of desperation at all levels of the DNR.

I have witnessed administrators simply ignoring valid environmental and legal concerns from experienced, competent employees and I have seen administrators ignoring the process for determining environmental hazards when granting permits. It is true that DNR doesn't follow their own processes and skirts the law when possible.

The Secretary's office seems to have a lot of power. And when that power is wielded by an incurious, pro-business person, bad things happen. So far, even in his short tenure, Dan Meyer has proven himself to be the same as Cathy Stepp. 

The only real check on unbridled donor power is the citizen groups and nonprofits who sue. Most of these groups are focused on local problems so it is difficult for the average person to know what damage is being done to other parts of the state.

And let's face it, the Supreme Court of Wisconsin is mostly unsympathetic to the average citizen. The DOJ under Brad Schimel is complicit in twisting the law.

There is a message I would like to send to Wisconsin: Make no mistake, Wisconsin is being sold off piece by piece to rich individuals who own the party currently in the governors office.

And that party is more than willing to promote (for money) the destruction of the environment in order to stay in power. These rich donors (at least the ones I have met) aren't exceptional. They are ridiculously selfish people less worthy and no more intelligent than you. They are stealing your water, polluting your air and compromising your health and wealth. We deserve better. 

Get rid of the politicians who are beholden to and serve these losers. Replace them with people who take your well-being into consideration. You matter. - - DNR staffer.

*  The DNR is behaving like a developer's "private contractor." 

We challenge the DNR’s working as Kohler’s private contractor. FBRF has records showing Scott Walker’s office working with the Kohler Company to influence the annexation of State Park, Town of Wilson and Kohler lands to the City of Sheboygan so Kohler would not have to follow Wilson’s requirement of environmental impact evaluation. 

The DNR has become an arm of businesses and has not taken steps to protect our park land or our natural resources. We continue to gather supporters who will stand up to this Governor, legislators and DNR management to take back control of our resources. - - Friends of the Black River Forest. 

[Editor's note: the project referred to here - - a high-end, privately-owned golf course proposed by a powerful Walker donor to be built on a nature preserve and into a popular state park along Lake Michigan - - is the subject of Part 10 of this series.] 

* The Legislature is attacking environmental protections in Wisconsin "at a stunning rate."

The majority in the Legislature is attacking environmental protections at a stunning rate.

Just last year, not content to pass sweeping legislation to try and limit the DNR's regulatory authority, the Legislature requested an attorney general's opinion to reinforce its edict that DNR could not impose conditions when permitting high capacity wells. Clean Wisconsin challenged nine well permits that were issued after the AG's opinion, for proposed wells that DNR's own scientists found would have significant impacts on nearby water bodies.

The DNR's attorney argued at the hearing that Wisconsin Supreme Court justices who unanimously held (in the Lake Beulah case) that the Public Trust Doctrine requires DNR to consider environmental impacts of high capacity wells "got it wrong."

The Dane County judge asked (rather incredulously) whether she was then supposed to ignore the Supreme Court? DNR's attorney said yes, and went on to state that DNR has no authority to regulate the waters of the state, only "access" to those waters. (He didn't say how DNR would manage "access" to rivers and lakes that had dried up due to over pumping of groundwater.)

Clean Wisconsin won in circuit court, but that won't be the end of it. - - Advocate 1.

* Like water, Wisconsin wildlife - - another public trust - - in "ongoing decline."

Like our Wisconsin water resources, our state’s wildlife—deer, birds, and predators alike—are held in trust for current and future generations of Wisconsin citizens. But, regrettably, the last few years has shown an ongoing decline in regulatory oversight over our wildlife, placing this invaluable resource in jeopardy and creating public safety and health risks to the public at large.
While the elimination of Wisconsin DNR’s Science Services Bureau speaks volumes in and of itself, the state’s de-prioritization of science bodes particularly poorly for wildlife management and complies with a harmful trend toward increased deregulation as highlighted below. - - Advocate 2.

* On the outside, "it's painful to watch..."

It’s painful to watch Scott Walker in campaign mode, especially if you are old enough to remember that Wisconsin once led the nation in progressive environmental protection, following the lead of Increase Lapham, John Muir, Aldo Leopold, Gaylord Nelson, Lorrie Otto and dozens of others who loved our diverse, beautifully mysterious gift of nature.

In speaking and writing, they proved they were real humans of titanic character, clear of thought, who expressed their passions for this place, wearing their hearts on their sleeves, leaving an imprint of their values permanently in place for their fellow citizens to emulate.

By contrast, the campaigning Walker is his own invention of a person he is not. The rehearsed smile, the little nod

more like a plastic bobble-head doll than a natural orator, the carefully composed empty sentences that ring with phrases like “keeping your hard-earned money” even when he is scheming to pass another tax cut for his billionaire backers.

Or to ban any public discussion of global warming. Or to further shrink the scientific staff of the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources. Or to invite gold and copper sulfide mining, which always renders large tracts of land and waterway unusably toxic. Or to try to undermine the gloriously useful Wisconsin Idea. Or to destroy primitive wetlands, prime habitat for wildlife and rare plants. 

When the campaigner Walker speaks, your eyes look through the pathetic plastic invention standing before you on the stage to that group of shadowy figures behind him pulling the strings, the few billionaires from Wisconsin and the Koch brothers, the winking oligarchs who back this drama, his true masters for whom he has staged this sad, little one-act Punch and Judy show. - - Paul G. Hayes, former Science Reporter, The Milwaukee Journal.

The 16th installment in this series ran on October 26, 2018.

DNR says site sediment runoff is major polluter; we have a fresh example...

I noticed in today's installment of my blog series on Walker's eight-year assault on the environment this note of waterway pollution that causation I had pulled off a DNR web posting in 2015:

A DNR web page last updated in 2015 says the causes of these impairments are known, and the implications are serious:

Impaired waters in Wisconsin are affected by a variety of pollutants. The top three are: mercury, total phosphorus and sediment... 

While natural erosion produces nearly 30 percent of the total sediment in the United States, erosion from human use of land accounts for the remaining 70 percent. In agricultural watersheds, the most significant source of sediment is tilled fields.... 

Improperly managed construction sites also contribute significant amounts of sediment to local waterways; up to 25 times that of agricultural lands (Chesters, 1979) and 2,000 times that of forested lands (EPA 833–F–00–008, R 12/2005 [PDF exit DNR])...

What caught my was that line:

Improperly managed construction sites also contribute significant amounts of sediment to local waterways; up to 25 times that of agricultural lands (Chesters, 1979) and 2,000 times that of forested lands (EPA 833–F–00–008, R 12/2005 [PDF exit DNR])...

Hmmm....Where have I just read about and seen an image of that very phenomenon? 

Oh, now I remember: from the improperly managed Foxconn construction site, downstream into the Pike River.

So while I'm not happy about it, and Foxconn has a court date where its full fine will be discussed, we have a recent image of how sediment can get into a waterway. I will add this to my full Foxconn archive, here.

Walker's 8-year war on Wisconsin's environment. Part 16. Polluted waterways skyrocket.

This is Part 16 of a 21-installment series about Walker's attack on the environment. The series will conclude before the election in Nov. 6th. Each part has at the end a link to the previous day's installment.

You may remember that as he laid the groundwork for one of the most clumsy and short-lived presidential runs in recent American history - - and I would argue a misstep that continues to cascade and erase what smidgen of credibility he still had as a 'Wisconsin-first-and-forever politician - - Scott Walker encountered a seven-year-old brought to a political convention who wanted to know what Walker would do as President about climate change.

Video, here, as the child hears Walker say that he learned as a Boy Scout to  leave your campsite cleaner than it was when when you found.

For the boy, an early lesson in politicians' spin. If he had ever believed that public officials were smart, serious, special people, Walker disabused him of that quaint fable at an age when most kids still believe in Santa Claus.

And for Walker, it was a moment of inane condescension that unwittingly helped unmask and nail down his contempt for honest dialogue and the environment, because if there's one thing Walker has done with the Wisconsin landscape as Governor, it's leaving it far more degraded that it was when he took office.

Which is basically what this entire blog series these past 14 installments have been all about, along with earlier items and summaries, like this:

In Walker's dirtied up WI, an end to coincidence

But let's look at just one area - - the state's precious, life-giving waterways - - to see how far from removed Walker is from his Boy Scout training. 

What does the official data show, culled from reports the DNR posted on its website and filed with the federal government?

There are now twice the number of polluted lakes, rivers and streams in Wisconsin, and the principals culprit is algae-promoting phosphorous being released with greater ease after Walker led the effort to roll back phosphorous-dumping restrictions.

Waterway pollution skyrockets in Wisconsin during Walker, GOP reign

As you read the excerpts below I've copied out from the post above, ask yourself: does this sound like a state managed to keep things cleaner than it had been, or a state managed with a deliberate 'chamber of commerce mentality,' with consequences for the public good be damned?
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*  Here is a link to the official DNR impaired waterways 2012 list, which covers the last year of the Jim Doyle administration and the first year of Walker's, and text from the DNR's  summary: 

Every two years, Section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act requires states to publish a list of all waters that are not meeting water quality standards. The existing Impaired Waters List includes more than 700 rivers, streams and lakes. In the 2012 list, updates include 147 new waters to the list. Twenty-eight waters were delisted, including three streams that have been successfully restored: German Valley Branch in Dane County and Eagle and Joos Valley Creeks in Buffalo County.

*  Here is the DNR link to the 2014 list. Again, the trends were not good:

In the 2014 list update, DNR added 192 new waters. A majority of the listing additions were waters that exceed total phosphorus criteria. A significant number of new listings were also based on poor biological condition. Read more about specific restorations and/or search and learn about Wisconsin’s impaired waters with the Impaired Waters Search Tool. [How to use the Search Tool]

Using the search tool, I count 23 deletions.

*  More lopsided data on the DNR list for 2016 in favor of pollution: 

In the proposed 2016 list update, DNR proposes to add 225 new waters. A majority of the listing additions were waters that exceed total phosphorus criteria. A significant number of new listings were also based on poor biological condition. Ten waterbodies are proposed to be delisted.

*  Same story in the 2018 list: 

In the proposed 2018 list update, DNR proposes to add 240 new water segments. A majority of the listing additions were waters that exceed total phosphorus criteria. Thirty-five water bodies are proposed to be delisted. 

So allowing for some portion of the total to have taken place in one year of the Doyle era, and also allowing for some late changes, the cumulative numbers in these reports which encompass most of Walker's tenure show the addition of 804 newly listed polluted waterways to the "more than 700" cited in 2012.

The additions, 804, outpaced deletions, 96, by a ratio of more than eight-to-one, and leaves Walker with about double what he inherited.

Furthermore:

A DNR web page last updated in 2015 says the causes of these impairments are known, and the implications are serious:

Impaired waters in Wisconsin are affected by a variety of pollutants. The top three are: mercury, total phosphorus and sediment... 

Note that mercury contamination is clustered heavily in 146 Northern Wisconsin waterways that are under consumption restrictions.

While natural erosion produces nearly 30 percent of the total sediment in the United States, erosion from human use of land accounts for the remaining 70 percent. In agricultural watersheds, the most significant source of sediment is tilled fields....Improperly managed construction sites also contribute significant amounts of sediment to local waterways; up to 25 times that of agricultural lands (Chesters, 1979) and 2,000 times that of forested lands (EPA 833–F–00–008, R 12/2005 [PDF exit DNR])... 

Phosphorus has long been recognized as the controlling factor in plant and algae growth in Wisconsin lakes and streams. Small increases in phosphorus can fuel substantial increases in aquatic plant and algae growth, which in turn can reduce recreational use, property values and public health.

• Many lakes and streams are listed as impaired due to phosphorus pollution or sediment, decreasing their recreational value and economic impact.
• Dozens of waters statewide experience harmful algal blooms fueled by the nutrient and last year, 35 people in Wisconsin reported human health concerns and the death of at least two dogs due to blue–green algae.
• Department of Health Services Blue–Green Algae [exit DNR]
• Smelly cladophora fueled by phosphorus washes ashore Lake Michigan beaches. 
• Recent statewide stream assessment data suggests that thousands of streams may have excess phosphorus levels. In addition to decreasing the dissolved oxygen that fish and other aquatic creatures need to survive, such excess phosphorus causes major changes in lake and stream food webs, which ultimately result in fewer fish and fish predators.

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And the kicker? 

The DNR made one revision to its impaired waters lists earlier in 2018 because it found two more.

And don't forget that Walker has been leading the charge to fill wetlands and remove shoreline building restrictions, thus exposing more waterways to runoff contamination, since his first day in office.

Part 15 of this series ran Thursday, October 25th, 2018.

Walker's 8-year war on Wisconsin's environment. Part 15. CWD remedies chronically wasted

This is the 15th installment in a 21-part series about the damage that Walker has done to Wisconsin's environment. The series will run until the weekend before the election on Nov. 6th.
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Wisconsin's traditional nine-day gun deer season begins November 17th - - but under a growing cloud; chronic deer wasting disease now affects 55 of our 72 counties, proving that voluntary practices the DNR is promoting to stem the epidemic are ineffective.

Noted in this early 2018 posting, and in subsequent reporting.

Also noted, in 2017: even less testing for the disease since Walker came into office.

Unfortunately, CWD testing in Wisconsin has plummeted in recent years because of budget cuts and the end of in-person deer registration in 2015. 

From 2002 through 2006 the Department of Natural Resources averaged 25,858 CWD tests annually. Soon after, lawmakers like former Rep. Scott Gunderson, R-Waterford, slashed CWD funding, causing CWD tests to average 9,053 from 2007 through 2010, a nearly three-fold decline. 

Since 2010, the DNR has averaged a record low 5,545 CWD tests annually, even while documenting record CWD cases, including 447 in 2016.

No wonder there is suspicion that someday CWD could jump to humans; one venerable deer processor decided not to take the chance.

This is how you promote that the state is open for business, let alone recreation and tourism?

You would think that Walker would not or could not mishandle the deer hunt in a state where rural voters are such an important part of his base - - and for whom he's curried favor by tweeting about his long hours in a deer stand - - but that is what he's managed to do. 

Because a 'chamber of commerce mentality' managed DNR in an administration so obsessively focused on business - - including supporting commercial deer farms which are definitely part of the CWD problem - - dealing with wildlife disease just isn't going to be a priority, as I pointed out in November, 2016. 

Today we learned that the DNR will not meet a reporting deadline about its plan to control Chronic Wasting Disease that is decimating deer herds and jeopardizing the culturally-significant-and-economically-crucial deer season.

The DNR had been tasked by the Natural Resources Board to provide an update by the end of the year on the state's efforts to combat CWD, a fatal disease found in deer, elk and other cervids. 

The DNR did not provide the first five-year review, prompting the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation and the NRB to request a report this year..

A hunter friend of mine wonders why the DNR hasn't been more focused on this important task given all the deer license revenue flowing into the agency.

Is it because the agency is more beholden to the privately-run deer farms that have rising influence in Walker and Stepp's world?

Deer farms are big business as they offer hunting of captive deer for up to $10,000 each; state and federal funds can be paid out to operators whose herds must be euthanized because they are carrying CWD, the Journal Sentinel explained.

Here's another question posed by a member of the La Crosse Tribune's editorial board:  

Richard Kyte: The end of deer hunting in Wisconsin? 

Unless we stop the expansion of CWD by drastically reducing the deer herd, hunters will soon have to choose between eating possibly infected venison or giving up hunting. 

Two more reasons why Walker did not make aggressively combating CWD a priority:

*  Like Trump, he never will admit that there are any problems in what he supervises.

*  And he will never concede that any problem might have to be addressed scientifically.

Because going down that road might mean all sorts of concerns about Wisconsin realities, preparedness and vulnerabilities - - from budgets to infrastructure to forest health to numerous farm, water and family health concerns - - just might need solutions rooted in science, especially in the climate change science he openly resists.

More about that later.

For the record, Walker this spring backed some modest 'emergency' changes to regulations aimed at preventing CWD from moving from deer farms or through carcass contacts with soil in which the CWD linked culprit proteins called prions can lurk. 

His legislative allies, no doubt with his go-head, effectively blocked even those commonsense measures - - like better deer farm fencing - -  allowing 'good cop' Walker to have it both ways, as I find no news coverages about any disappointed or angry response by Walker, or fresh remedial responses. 

As the must-read outdoors and CWD expert journalist Patrick Durkin observed:

The governor did little to defend the emergency rules he issued May 2, even as his own agency appointees and fellow Republicans decided CWD wasn’t all that urgent. After all, it’s been 16½ years since CWD’s discovery in Iowa County, and 7½ years since Walker’s inauguration. 

If it took until May 2018 for him to declare the emergency, why not wait another six months and discuss it over coffee and cream cheese during the 2019 state budget process? Besides, the elections are a month away. Let sleeping prions rest, right?

The state sure does have CWD - - chronic Walker disease.

Here is a link to the series' previous installment published on October 24, 2018.

Here is a link to a post with the previous seven installments.