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Waukesha Officials May Convince Governor of Right to Tap Great Lakes Water

Posted on: Monday, 22 August 2005, 00:00 CDT

Aug. 22--Gov. Jim Doyle says that Waukesha officials are making credible scientific claims that the city is entitled to tap Great Lakes water because the groundwater beneath them flows into Lake Michigan.

In an interview, Doyle stopped short of endorsing Waukesha's bid to one day tap the lake as a source of drinking water.

But Doyle said he wants Great Lakes governors and premiers who are reviewing a revised water management agreement to consider the scientific merits of water requests from communities such as Waukesha, which are outside the surface water basin of the lakes.

Saddled with dwindling water supplies, Waukesha officials say the city lies within the groundwater divide of Lake Michigan. Groundwater, they say, eventually trickles back into the lake and plays a major role in recharging it.

The city will be making its case Monday at a public meeting at Wisconsin State Fair Park on Great Lakes matters -- one of a series of meetings on the lakes being held across the region.

The Great Lakes are getting more attention than they have in years. The newfound interest: M ounting concerns over water use and the lakes' worsening environmental problems are driving the agenda.

Those concerns have prompted two separate initiatives.

The first is a revised water management agreement under development by Doyle and seven other Great Lakes governors and the premiers of Ontario and Quebec. This agreement updates an existing one that, with few exceptions, has prohibited communities outside the Great Lakes basin from tapping the lakes.

The second initiative, dubbed the "Great Lakes regional collaboration," involves a draft strategy crafted by governments, environmentalists, businesses and tribes to clean up the lakes. The long-term plan has an estimated price tag of $20 billion.

Now officials are seeking additional comments from residents . In Wisconsin, the Department of Natural Resources is holding meetings to discuss both matters jointly.

"For those of us who have lived and breathed Great Lakes issues for many years, this is really an exciting time," said Todd Ambs, the top water regulator for the DNR. "There really seems to be an alignment of the stars."

Emily Green, director of the Sierra Club's Great Lakes program, agreed.

"The two processes are very much linked," Green said. "Together they represent an unparalleled opportunity to protect the lakes."

The water management accord is further along, and in Wisconsin, it has generated far more attention because some fast-growing communities in Waukesha County are running out of water.

In the Great Lakes region, policy-makers have been concerned that growing Sun Belt states will someday find themselves short of water and thirst for the Great Lakes.

On June 30, the governors and premiers proposed new regulations to allow the movement of water outside the basin. The measures are tougher than a proposal a year ago, but out-of-basin communities could use water if they returned it to the lake.

Waukesha, however, is reluctant to go that route. The capital costs of building pipes to link to the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District would be expensive.

In addition, Daniel S. Duchniak, general manager of the Waukesha Water Utility, said that sending water back to Lake Michigan would harm the ecosystem of the Fox River and the Vernon Marsh downstream. Treated effluent is dumped in the river.

Using government data, Duchniak calculated that on Aug. 1 -- admittedly when water levels were low -- 71 percent of the water in the Fox River came from wastewater treated by Waukesha, Brookfield and Sussex.

Waukesha also is pushing hard to convince Doyle that the governors and premiers should consider the lakes' groundwater divide as the determining factor for who gets Great Lakes water.

In metropolitan Milwaukee, the surface water divide of Lake Michigan runs through eastern Waukesha County, while the groundwater divide is in eastern Jefferson County.

Doyle says he's listening to Waukesha's arguments.

He said he would like to see scientists, not politicians, make such decisions. "If Waukesha is right in their claim, then they ought to be able to demonstrate they would actually be able to help the Great Lakes with their proposal," Doyle said last week.

Ambs said the governor must push for changes with governors who have their own unique set of political considerations.

"At the end of the day, the question is going to be what can an eight-state jurisdiction and two provinces agree on," Ambs said.

Indeed, many environmental groups are pushing for more restrictions on water use. Michigan and Canada are expected to show little sympathy for Waukesha.

Business, too, has its considerations.

"It's not there yet," said George Kuper, executive director of the Council of Great Lakes Industries, an Ann Arbor, Mich.-based organization of major regional corporations that includes Wisconsin Energy Corp.

The agreement's commitment to water conservation, though admirable, is too restrictive, Kuper said. "It ignores how we can use water to our economic advantage," he said.

Eventually, the agreement will require approval from Wisconsin and the seven other state legislatures.

"There is no reason this has to be a partisan football," said Rep. Jon Richards (D-Milwaukee).

With backing from Ohio Republican Gov. Bob Taft and Democrats such as Doyle, Richards thinks the governors' proposal has the credibility to move quickly.

The second initiative, to clean up the lakes, comes when the lakes are probably cleaner than they were 30 years ago. But today they are beset with a host of new problems.

One needs to venture no farther than Milwaukee's foul-smelling lakefront. There, zebra mussels, an invasive mollusk, have filtered algae so well that clearer water has spurred the growth of more lake weeds, which rot and pile up on shore.

The oxygen-starved "dead zone" in Lake Erie continues to grow as well.

And across the Great Lakes, municipalities are grappling with overtaxed sewer systems. The $20 billion cleanup includes a tentative price tag of $13.7 billion earmarked for improvements to waste treatment plants. Other high priorities: fighting invasive species and cleaning up toxic hotspots, such as in Milwaukee's harbor.

"I've seen three different plans over the past 20 years," said Dave Dempsey, author of "On the Brink: The Great Lakes in the 21st Century." He is also Great Lakes water policy adviser for the environmental group Clean Water Action in St. Paul, Minn.

"But I think there is more of a chance this time because of the public's interest, and there is a certain expectation that something will happen."

The region's large water users like the restoration plan, as far as it goes, Kuper said. But the proposal raises many questions.

He said the $13.7 million to upgrade sewer systems needs more specifics: How much sewage is going untreated, and what is the projected growth in population that the existing systems will miss?

"The challenge for all of us in the Great Lakes is to engineer all of this into a real set of priorities," Ambs said.

The state Department of Natural Resources will hold two meetings on the Great Lakes this month:

--West Allis, Monday at Wisconsin State Fair Park Youth Center, 640 S. 84th St. Enter Gate 5. Open house at 6:30 p.m. Presentation and public comment starts at 7 p.m.

--Ashwaubenon, Aug. 29 at Ashwaubenon Village Hall, 2155 Holmgren Way. Open house at 5 p.m. Presentation and public comment starts at 5:30 p.m.

To comment on the Great Lakes Regional Collaboration online, go to www.glrc.us/ , or write Comments/Great Lakes Regional Collaboration, c/o U.S. EPA, Great Lakes National Program Office, 77 W. Jackson Blvd., G-17J, Chicago, IL 60604. The public comment period ends Sept. 9.

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Source: The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

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