Groups Applaud Granholm’s Stand On Proposed Great Lakes Diversion
Wisconsin City Wants Access To Lake Michigan Water
LANSING, MI—Ten organizations today applauded Governor Granholm’s refusal to endorse a major new proposal from a Wisconsin city to divert nearly 2 millions gallons a day from Lake Michigan.
In a June 28 letter to Michigan Legislative leaders and in a news release, the Granholm administration noted that the kind of diversion being proposed by the City of New Berlin, WI would be unlawful under Michigan statutes and that Governor Granholm would reject any diversion requested under a federal law covering the Great Lakes.
“New Berlin is just the first of many communities on the edge of the Great Lakes Basin that want to tap into the Lakes, said Cyndi Roper, Clean Water Action Great Lakes Policy Director. “We should not move forward on any diversion application until the criteria and review process for water use requests have been adopted by the states through implementing legislation for the Compact. Until that happens, we need to follow existing federal law and the laws of the states on water use.”
In addition to Clean Water Action, Granholm’s decision was endorsed today by the Alliance for the Great Lakes, Detroit Audubon Society, the Ecology Center, East Michigan Environmental Action Council, Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation, Sierra Club, The Watershed Center Grand Traverse Bay, Voices for Earth Justice and the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom/Detroit Branch.
In its proposal, New Berlin says by 2050 it would use 2.48 million gallons of Lake Michigan water each day. The immediate effect of the proposal would result in 1.875 million gallons of water a day being diverted from Lake Michigan. Under current federal law, all eight Great Lakes basin governors must approve any request for such a water diversion. A new proposed Great Lakes Compact has been signed by Gov. Granholm but must be approved by the Legislatures of all eight Great Lakes basin states, and the U.S. Congress, for it to take effect.
Granholm’s refusal to grant the New Berlin diversion is in response to the first such request since a new Compact was proposed regulating large-scale water use within the Great Lakes basin late last year.
"Communities in southeast Wisconsin have known for decades they were overusing water supplies. We cannot simply reward bad management with Great Lakes water,” said Cheryl Mendoza, Project Manager, Alliance for the Great Lakes "We must enact the Governors' plan before entertaining such a proposal."
The New Berlin proposal comes before any of the eight Great Lakes states has ratified the proposed Compact, which was signed late last year by the governors of the eight states. “What was the point of five years of negotiations over a water compact if we’re now going to disregard it to benefit a particular community?” said Terry Swier, President, Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation.
The New Berlin proposal is prohibited by a federal law passed in 1986 that bans diversions or exports of water from the Great Lakes Basin. The proposed Compact provides for some diversions of Great Lakes waters to so-called “straddling” communities just outside the Great Lakes basin, but only under clearly defined rules and a review process.
Lawmakers will have a chance to strengthen Michigan’s water use laws next year when they consider implementing legislation for the proposed Great Lakes Compact.
Clean Water Action and other environmental groups have called on Michigan lawmakers to eliminate a provision in Michigan water law that would exempt any amount of Great Lakes water packaged in bottles or any other small containers and exported out of the state’s watersheds and the Basin from controls on diversion. A legislative proposal to raise penalties for unlawfully diverting Great Lakes waters and to eliminate the diversion exemption was introduced earlier this year by House Democrats.