From the Duluth News Tribune, by John Myers
Bush administration officials will be in Duluth today to announce an unprecedented plan to clean up the Great Lakes environment -- a lofty goal with a potential $20 billion price tag over 15 years.
The draft proposal is expected to call for cleaning up polluted port hot spots by 2020, and for creation of a joint state and federal grant program to pay for municipal sewer repairs to stop sewage overflows from entering the lakes.
It's also expected that the plan will call for a net increase of a half-million acres of wetlands and acquisition and preservation of another 1 million acresof uplands in areas around the five lakes.
And it probably will demand legislation to stop new exotic species from entering the lakes by requiring new standards for ship ballast waters and enforcement of on-board treatment of ballast water.
The Environmental Protection Agency will release the draft plan this afternoon in Leif Erickson Park on the shores of Lake Superior as part of the third meeting of the Great Lakes Regional Collaborative.
Formed by presidential declaration in May 2004, the collaborative calls on officials representing the federal government, cities, states, American Indian tribes and environmental groups to join forces to restore the Great Lakes environment.
``It's an outstanding idea, to coordinate the 140-some programs we have now and focus efforts on the Great Lakes,'' said Minnesota state Rep. Tom Huntley, chairman of the Great Lakes Commission.
The collaborative first met in Chicago in December and pledged to work on nine key issues, including invasive species that hitchhike on ships, sewage system overflows that spur beach contamination and closings, water diversion out of the region, reducing new pollution and cleaning up old hot spots.
Teams were formed on each issue in the winter. They submitted their plans to the EPA in June.
The EPA will hold a 60-day public comment period on the proposal, including several regional public hearings. A final plan is expected to be published by December and packaged for Congress to begin action early in 2006.
But environmental watchdogs say it's what's in the final EPA version of the plan, along with Congress' willingness to act, that are the most critical elements.
``This is a potential watershed moment in the history of the Great Lakes. . . . We view this as a tremendous opportunity to nurse the Great Lakes back to health,'' said Jordan Lubetkin, spokesman for the National Wildlife Federation. ``The big question is not the ideas in the plan, it's whether the plan will be funded. Industry leaders, elected officials and conservationists can come together to solve the problems. But the work still needs to be funded.''
EPA Assistant Administrator Ben Grumbles, Duluth Mayor Herb Bergson and a host of other government and tribal officials will announce the plan today.
``The best thing about this collaborative is that it covers such a huge (geographic) area and has such bipartisan support -- from mayors and governors and congressmen all across the Great Lakes on both sides of the aisle. That's going to give it a better chance,'' Bergson said. ``I'm cautiously optimistic Congress will take this plan and make it work . . . that we can stop talking about restoring the Great Lakes and start doing it.''
But it won't be a quick fix, and it's probable that only pieces of the cleanup will be accomplished within a few years. The entire effort could take decades.
``I guarantee you, I won't be mayor when the restoration is complete. But I do hope I'm alive to see it,'' Bergson said.
In reports to the EPA that were used to form the overall plan, collaborative teams recommended spending an additional $150 million annually on habitat conservation, $150 million annually to clean up contaminated sediments and $6.2 billion over five years to stop sewage overflows from entering the lakes.
The report advocates creating a federal and state fund, with the federal government paying 55 percent of the cost to upgrade systems to keep rainfall from overwhelming municipal systems sending untreated sewage into the lakes. The goal is for a 95 percent reduction in those overflows, and accompanying bacterial pollution, in just five years.
In all, recommendations in the team reports total about $20 billion, much of it during the next five years.
The big question, officials say, is how much Congress and the Bush administration will actually fund.
The reality, Huntley said, ``is that Washington has a lot of other demands, and asking for so many billions during a time of huge federal budget deficits. Is it realistic?''
Supporters say the Great Lakes plan needs the same support as federal efforts to clean up Chesapeake Bay and restore the Florida Everglades. In October 2000, the federal government approved $1.4 billion to start a landmark, 36-year restoration of the Everglades.
The bill for Everglades projects is expected to top $8 billion. And that's for a relatively small area. Supporters of a federal Great Lakes effort say it will cost many billions more to do the lakes job right.
``There's momentum now, and we need to seize this opportunity to restore the Great Lakes, not just for us now, but for future generations, for their drinking water and fishing and the economy,'' Lubetkin said.
Critics say the Great Lakes plan fails to address other key issues -- such asd mercury contamination in fish, caused in part by pollution from coal-fired power plants, and global warming from greenhouse gases that may affect Great Lakes water levels and temperatures.
