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Clean Water Bill Hits Snag, Still on Course: Environmentalists' Influence on Advisory Council at Issue

Posted on: Wednesday, 22 March 2006, 06:00 CST

By Dennis Lien, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.

Mar. 22--Minnesota's clean water bill had enough baggage last year to sink to the bottom of Lake Minnetonka.

Thanks in part to a $20 million recommendation from Gov. Tim Pawlenty, a retooled version was all primed to go Tuesday, setting the tone for quick passage this session. Then, the head of a House environment committee tried to limit the influence of environmentalists, and a decision was put off for yet another day.

Welcome to the sometimes wacky world of Minnesota's lakes and rivers, where lots of people say they want clean water, but lawmakers haven't figured out how to make it happen.

After faltering in the House last year when legislators couldn't decide how to pay for it, prospects for the Clean Water Legacy Act appear to be better this year.

For starters, Pawlenty included the measure in his supplemental budget. There's also wide support among legislators to add another $20 million in an upcoming bonding bill.

That infusion would help the state comply faster with the federal Clean Water Act. It says states must determine which lakes and rivers are "impaired" by pollutants such as mercury and then close off the waters to more of those contaminants until a cleanup plan is in place.

That requirement is causing headaches. The state has lots of water -- more than 12,000 lakes and 92,000 miles of rivers and streams. An estimated 40 percent of them don't meet federal clean-water standards.

Figuring out which ones don't, preparing the cleanup plans and doing the work will cost an estimated $80 million a year for a decade or more.

Timing, meanwhile, has become more urgent.

Last summer, the Minnesota Court of Appeals stalled plans for a joint wastewater treatment plant west of the Twin Cities by revoking a waste-discharge permit. The decision has been appealed, but more than 60 cities and businesses have had to put their development plans on hold.

"We perceive this to be an ongoing threat that will be there for many years to come," Craig Johnson, a lobbyist for the League of Minnesota Cities, told the House Agriculture, Environment and Natural Resources Finance Committee.

Rep. Dennis Ozment, R-Rosemount, who chairs the environment finance committee, recommended a bill Tuesday that seemed to have strong support.

Besides appropriating $20 million from the general fund for the coming year, it creates a 20-member council to advise state agencies and the Legislature on the cleanup effort.

The Senate approved its water cleanup bill last session, but no funding decisions in either body have been made beyond July 2007.

One organization after another told the committee it supported the bill.

But Rep. Tom Hackbarth, R-Cedar, head of a separate environmental policy committee, threw in a last-minute wrinkle. He argued that someone from a hunting organization should replace one of two environmentalists on the council.

With the committee running out of time and no pressing need to vote, Ozment opted against debating it.

"We certainly wouldn't want that to be a holdup to not getting the bill done," said Ozment, who expects the committee to reconcile the matter and approve the bill today or Thursday.

Then, he said, it almost certainly will face competition from at least one other cleanup approach floating through the House.

Still, he said he's optimistic his bill will prevail.

"That would be my expectation," he said. "I think we have answered just about everyone's questions."

Dennis Lien can be reached at dlien@pioneerpress.com or 651-228-5588.

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Copyright (c) 2006, Pioneer Press, St. Paul, Minn.

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Source: Saint Paul Pioneer Press (St. Paul, Minn.)

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