GLIN==> Great Lakes Compact editorials in Ohio

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Halt lake sabotage bills: editorial
Published: Saturday, June 11, 2011, 10:00 AM
[cid:image008.jpg at 01CC2C2A.A61DC840]By The Plain Dealer Editorial Board The Plain Dealer
[cid:image006.jpg at 01CC2C2A.8B4909D0]PD file photoMichigan, Pennsylvania, New York and the Canadian province of Ontario could also suffer from this ill-thought-out legislation concerning the Great Lakes.
Not all the invasive species that threaten the well-being of Lake Erie are aquatic.
Some walk on two legs.
State Sen. Tim Grendell, Republican of Chesterland, and GOP Rep. Lynn Wachtmann, of Napoleon in northwest Ohio, are fast-tracking legislation that would let businesses turn Lake Erie water into a revenue stream -- and jeopardize the hard-won Great Lakes Compact.
Their flotsam and jetsam -- Senate Bill 170 and House Bill 231 -- could also imperil the drinking water of nearly 3 million people and threaten a $10 billion-a-year tourism industry. That's just in Ohio.
Michigan, Pennsylvania, New York and the Canadian province of Ontario could also suffer from this ill-thought-out legislation.
The bills are disguised as "implementation" legislation for the limited water withdrawals permitted under the 2008 Great Lakes Compact, but they would actually open the spigot for commercial withdrawals and lift safeguards in Ohio law. Through exemptions and liberal permitting rules, they appear to set the stage for a run on Lake Erie water.
The bills, introduced last month, clearly violate the spirit of the compact -- a bipartisan agreement ratified by all eight Great Lakes states, approved by Congress and signed into law by President George W. Bush to protect the world's largest collection of fresh water lakes.
Grendell's spurious argument is that allowing businesses to withdraw massive amounts of water from an already stressed ecosystem will attract new industry from such H2O-challenged locales as Silicon Valley.
These bills should not make it out of committee. Call or email Grendell (614-644-7718; SD18 at senate.state.oh.us) and Wachtmann (614-466-3760; district75 at ohr.state.oh.us). Don't let them pour our most valuable liquid assets down the drain.
(c) 2011 cleveland.com. All rights reserved.

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Article published June 12, 2011


Watered-down pact

OHIO belongs to the Great Lakes Compact, a group of eight states that joined in 2008 to work with two Canadian provinces on regional approaches to vital issues of water quality, conservation, and management in the lakes' basin.

Instead, leaders of the Republican-controlled state House and Senate seek to do the bidding of business and industry lobbies - including the Toledo Regional Chamber of Commerce - that have given themselves the Orwellian title "Coalition for Sustainable Water Management." Lawmakers are working to ram through bills that would threaten surface and ground water affecting Lake Erie.


In the name of creating jobs and promoting economic development, the measures would jeopardize as many as 250,000 tourism jobs that depend on a clean and thriving Lake Erie. That shouldn't happen.


The bills, sponsored in the House by Rep. Lynn Wachtmann (R., Napoleon) and in the Senate by Sen. Tim Grendell (R., Chesterland), would regulate withdrawals of water from streams only if they are listed in the outdated Gazetteer of Ohio Streams. Environmental groups note that definition would leave 80 percent of the state's streams - and the drinking water of nearly 3 million Ohioans - unprotected.


The measures would require an industrial facility to get a state permit only if it uses or withdraws at least 5 million gallons a day from Lake Erie or one of its key rivers, 2 million gallons a day from a stream or river "not of high water quality," or 300,000 gallons from small, high-quality rivers and streams. No other state in the Great Lakes Compact has such artificially high regulatory thresholds.


The likely results: greater concentrations of water pollution, including algae blooms; dangerously low water levels in coastal areas, and higher consumer costs for water and wastewater treatment. The flat, one-time permit fees would favor the largest water consumers.


The proposed legislation would conflict with, not support, Great Lakes Compact standards for water conservation, use, and withdrawal. Its voluntary conservation program is so limited as to have little value. It would give lawmakers unwarranted veto power over executive-branch water regulation - not that the Kasich administration's Department of Natural Resources is objecting.
A better approach would regulate water management on the basis of science rather than politics. It would base proper levels of water use and withdrawal on the size and quality of a stream compared with other water supplies in an area.


Legislation sponsored by state Rep. Dennis Murray (D., Sandusky) would do that. It has the support of environmental and small-business groups. But the General Assembly's GOP majority instead appears poised to pass business-friendly legislation without the nuisances of extensive hearings or public debate.


Lake Erie adds more than $10 billion a year to the Ohio economy in revenues from tourism, sport and commercial fishing, boating, and wildlife-related activities. Yet its flow of incoming water is the lowest of the Great Lakes.


Measures that would jeopardize Lake Erie's economic contribution - and the jobs it supports - as well as the environmental values of the Great Lakes Compact will not benefit the vast majority of Ohio's residents or future generations. They should not become law.




Kristy Meyer, M.S.
Director of Agricultural & Clean Water Programs
Ohio Environmental Council
1207 Grandview Ave., Ste. 201
Columbus, OH 43212
Direct Phone: (614) 487-5842
OEC Phone: (614) 487-7506
Kristy at theOEC.org
Twitter.com/AgWaterKristy<http://www.twitter.com/AgWaterKristy>

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