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 Running Head; PROJECT MILWAUKEE: THE OVERALL HEALTH OF OUR WATER

Project Milwaukee: The Overall Health of our Water

Name

Institution

Abstract
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Last year in May of 2019, WUWM's Project Milwaukee series began to address the issue of

water or lack of it in the south3rn parts of Wisconsin in America. WUMW presenters

collaborated with The Lake Effects media producers to evaluate the major issues that affect the

safe water; safety of drinking water, the threats that are emergent and affects the waterways, the

consequences of contaminated water on the environment and most likely remedies.

Project Milwaukee: The Overall Health of our Water

WUWM is shades light on the subject of safe water and or lack of it in Wisconsin for the

podcast Project Milwaukee Series; Great Lakes, Troubled Waters.

Gov. Tony Evers announced 2019 as the year in which clean water should be responded

to as an emergency across Wisconsin. The issue of safe water however requires resources

allocation to finance the infrastructure. Unfortunately, there are a lot of convincing reasons from

different sources of information from diverse residential and commercial sites in the state that the

residents have little or no confidence on the water they use for daily chores as alleged by Todd

Ambs, assistant deputy secretary for the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR).

The main issues that are being looked into by the DNR are the contamination from the

industrial effluents, lead elements, the contamination at the downstream due to runoff, the

contamination from other packaged commodities and substances like cosmetics and food stuff.

Despite the fact that there has never been anything close to 1993 cryptosporidium that has been

in occurrence currently, the residents of Milwaukee still have little confidence from the tap water

even as the government continues to assure them of the safety of the water they are served.

The health of Wisconsin's water sources

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While it does not exist any specific study identifying the level of health of water systems

and sources such as Lake Michigan, agency responsible for the protection of the environment

(Environmental Protection agency) addresses the subject matters like the Lakeside Actions and

Management plans, use of the habitat and land, the level of zooplanktons, and great Lake Areas

of Concerns such as the official boundaries and restoration. The 2009 Great Lakes Restoration

Initiative goes on to finance the projects that are impactive to Lake Michigan systems and

pathways, the botanical and zoological environment, quality of water and reduction of

contamination resulting from floodplains and rivers.

The Milwaukee, Menomonee and Kinnickinnic sources of water are associated with long

histories relating pollution from industrial effluents and pollutants from water runoffs from the

urban areas, toxic in nature. While these sources of river are apparently clean, the clean water

Acts suggests that they should support aquatic life, navigable and safe for drinking. These have

not been achieved though and WUMW attempts to bring the matter into light through Project

Milwaukee: The Overall Health of our Water rivers podcast.

John Luczaj, head of UW-Green Bay’s geosciences program argues that water is critical for all the

biosystems. He questions whether the water we use is actually clean for consumption. And says it

depends on the consumer’s perspective. In geological view, he thinks of groundwater systems and that

affect their quality. he further talks about the depth of soils an acquiffers and bed rocks and their

sequential influence on the quality of water. Luczaj argues that these factors affects the manner in

which the underground water is filtered and how they freely flow beneath in as in The Emerging Threats

To Wisconsin's Water podcast

Emerging Threats
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One of the major concerns is the upstream runoff from the residential and commercial urban areas

and agricultural activities. For instance, the Ulao Creek is an analogy of the Milwaukee River in Ozaukee

County. Just like other sources of water in Milwaukee, there is little vegetation that may create the

opportunity for soil to settle down as sediments as addressed in the WUMW Project Milwaukee: The

Overall Health of our Water.

Fertilizers used for agricultural purposes upstream are as the result of human activities.

Phosphorus compounds are the biggest problems in homestead watersheds as claimed by the

residents given the platform through the WUMW Project Milwaukee: The Overall Health of our

Water. Residents of Wisconsin have no confidence with the water they use for consumption

because they are said to have elements of lead, runoff from agricultural activities upstream and

industrial effluents.

Proposed solutions and public participation

There is 70 million U.S dollars in Gov Tony Evers’ budget to address water quality. He

has declared 2019 to be a year of drinking clean water. The laid out proposed rule of the

Environmental Protection Agency ends confusion about waterways falling under federal

protection of clean water.

Debate over how water regulations in U.S. should be is not new. Recently, the Obama

administration started a project named States. Land use near systems of water is regulated.

Property owners need to apply for a permit if they need to spread pesticides which can run off

and pollute water bodies.According to Andrew Wheeler, the EPA’s acting Administrator;
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the new rules would give the right directions. The government has a responsibility of protecting

its people, but not running their lives.

Wheeler says that President Trump started a process to do away with and replace undo

regulatory burdens immediately after he took office. Regulatory burdens suppress economic

development and American innovation. The Obama’s administration 2015 defines the Waters of

The United States as what would remain under the protection of federal. According to Wheeler,

Traditional passable waters and their analogies, certain ditches for example those used for

navigation and certain lakes and ponds, wetlands and impoundments are federally

regulated.Wheeler says that this plan clearly defines most roadside or farm ditches to be

federally regulated. For instance, if a farmer dug a ditch on their property, this won’t be a water

of the U.S.

Representatives to homebuilders, farmers and manufacturers joined those makers of law

and officials in EPA to applaud the rule change which was proposed. But criticism quickly

followed. Mike Kuhr of Wisconsin Trout Unlimited says that he wants clean water access for

future generations regardless of whether they are farmers, fishermen or work with a factory.

  Wisconsin is a home to 13,000 miles of trout streams, 5 million acres of wetland, and

approximately 1 million of the wetland acres are considered isolated. In other words, they are not

connected through surface water but are connected underground through groundwater according

to Mike.

Kuhr says that isolated wetlands protection would varnish under the proposed rule if one is going

to try work hand in hand with the intended Clean Water Act .To clean up water for use by all

citizens in the country, our ephemeral streams and other isolated wetlands connected through
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groundwater need to be protected also. Kuhr says that Trout Unlimited works with communities

and farmers in restoring stream systems. He fears if the EPA rule is taken into practice such

projects might end up undone. Miles of restoring work in the Blue River of Grant County have

been done. People from far away come to fish because it feels good. A lot of this could go into

jeopardy if you allow pollution to run into our available waterways. The EPA proposal is going

to be published in the Federal Register. Once published, anyone who has got concern will be

given about 60 days to comment on the change.

Trump EPA Proposes Major Rollback of Federal Water Protections

The Trump administration aim is to limit the scope of a major rule of clean water. It

criticizes President Obama’s EPA for going too far in regulating isolated waters and wetlands far

upstream from passable lakes and rivers. Big amounts of wetlands and a thousand miles of U.S.

waterways, according to Trump administration, would be federally no longer protected by the

Clean Water Act.

The proposal which announces Tuesday on WUMW radio about the Environmental

Protection Agency would change the definition of waters of the United States of EPA or in other

words WOTUS, confines the types of waterways which fall under federal protection to be major

waterfalls, their analogies, adjacent wetlands and a few other categories.

Andrew Wheeler says the aim of the change is to provide landowners and states with the

confidence needed in managing their natural resources and growing local economies. Wheeler

said a simple approach would allow farmers to decide on which property water is subject to
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federal regulation without hiring consultants and engineers. He also said that it will also let them

avoid expensive and time-consuming permits for power grab, an Obama-era regulation.

The proposed change opposes the definition of the Obama administration in 2015, whose

main aim was to expand federal protections of clean water to include the large waterways, the

smaller streams and tributaries that feed into them. Republican opponents, real estate developers

and agriculture groups have condemned this move as a regulatory overreach.Donald Trump

paints the era of Obama rule as one of the worst examples in federal regulation and makes its

revision and repeals his administration priority.

Dave Ross argues that the water rule restoration will achieve the careful balance which

was intended by the Congress when passing the Clean Water Act some decades ago.Randy Noel,

the Home Builders of the National Association chairman, said the new proposal should easy

things for development to take place. He said that he was excited as a home builder, because it

had no lots to build on.

Noel lives in an area around south Louisiana with a lot of wetlands. He says that the

clarity issues about which wetlands were to be federally regulated and which were not made

developers run scared. He said that this re-definition will hopefully fix that. Federally protected

wetlands under EPA proposal are those which are adjacent to a major body of water and the ones

which are connected through surface water to major waterways.

The latest restoration is one of the Trump administration’s environmental regulations that

have aimed in curtailing or replacing efforts to develop industry and boost fossil fuel production.

The administration is hoping to have final the rule by next year though environmental groups are
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already in a state of threatening legal challenges. The Natural Resources Defense Council's, Jon

Devine says that the proposal is careless with the problems facing our streams, lakes and

wetlands all the way from the beaches of Florida to the water of Toledo used for drinking

purposes. It is time we strengthen the protection of our waterways.

One of the biggest satisfactory points is doing away with protections for ephemeral or

intermittent waterways in the new plan. Ephemeral streams constitute a major water system part

despite the fact that they only flow after precipitation. A study referenced under President

Obama by EPA suggests that nearly 60 percent of all U.S. waterways flow seasonally and 81

percent are ephemeral in the arid Southwest. Wheeler disputes these figures in his announcement

claiming they cannot be backed up. EPA officials when asked for a figure which is more

accurate, they said that they did not have a precise number.

Chris Wood, who is the president of Trout Unlimited, an organization dealing with

conservation, said that is just one of the problems in the proposal. He said that a lot of

environmental issues are complicated and are confounding. In addition to implicating the living

area for our wildlife and recreational areas, Wood said the rule could affect the people's habit of

drinking water. He said that due to this if there was a need and the rule is found to be flawed

deeply enough, they would definitely litigate.

Federal jurisdiction arguments and the "waters of the U.S." definition have been taking

place for years. The Clean Water Act which was passed in 1972 was aimed at maintaining the

physical, chemical, and biological integrity of the known Nation's waters a few years after the

burning of Ohio's Cuyahoga River. Doing so largely prohibits pollution discharge into the
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country's passable waters. Interest groups, successive administrations and the U.S. Supreme

Court fought over navigable waters definition and their scope since years back.

The administration of Obama argues that upstream pollution can find its way downstream

and should therefore be regulated embracing a broader definition. The Trump administration

proposes a more restrictive interpretation on the basis of an opinion made by Antonin Scalia who

is the late justice of supreme court in 2006.Antonio believed that the Clean Water Act could only

be applied to relatively more permanent waters. He argued that other waterways and bodies had a

need to be regulated by states. A clarity need and regulatory certainty was cited by both

administrations in announcing their regulatory rules. The Obama administration was up to

bringing clarity and imposing a broad definition that would include wetlands and upstream water

sources in 2015. The Trump administration does the opposite in seeking its own clarity through

proposing severe restriction of the number of waterways getting federal protection. Here is

Andrew Wheeler who is the acting administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency.

The administration's proposal is far away from becoming a law since there are likely

lawsuits and 60 days for the p [public to comment. Pollution in the waterways of the nation is

regulated by the Clean Water Act. Politicians, activists and lawyers argued about which waters

should be federally protected for decades. Today the Trump administration weighed in with a

proposal to strip federal protections from thousands of miles of waterways and vast areas of

wetlands. NPR's Nathan Rott

The Clean Water Act was direct in pollution restriction in navigable waters of the nation

when it was passed in 1972. Think of waterways that were big enough to have a boat floating.

What was a bit unclear is the extent to which the federal government is supposed to go to stop
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pollution. Does this mean analogies to bigger waterways need to be protected or the waterways

themselves?

EPA and the Army Corps propose a new definition of waters in the United States that

ends the previous power grab of the administration today. Wheeler, surrounded by agriculture

interests, Republican lawmakers and manufacturing groups with folks decrying the Obama rule

to be a regulatory overreach, signs the proposal. Randy Noel, the National Association of Home

Builders chairman, says that this new proposal should ease the environment for development

projects to take place. He was a pretty excited home builder because they hadn’t had a lot to

build on.

Noel who lives in south Louisiana says developers were scared for the last few years due

to the clarity issues on which wetlands were to be and weren’t to be federally regulated. This

redefinition will hopefully fix that. Under the new proposal, the only federally protected

wetlands are those adjacent to a major water body or the ones which are connected by surface

water to a major waterway .Millions of untold acres of wetlands will now lack that federal

protection. Miles of waterways that only flow after precipitation will also be subject to this. The

EPA claims that it does not have an accurate number for either. Chris wood, the Trout Unlimited

president, says that this is one of the problems of the proposal.

The Clean Water Act regulates, UW-Green Bay’s geosciences program, Wisconsin

Department of Natural Resources (DNR), The Environmental protection agency and Both the

Obama’s and Donald Trump's administration, the city lawyers have all weighed the indifference

and have reached a consensus that the water sources must be safequarede. Todday, the Trump's
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administration has put in place several protection policies and regulations to protect water

sources, water and waterways as NPR’s nathan airs to the public.

References

Dunning, C., & Robertson, D. M. (2016). Shifting currents: Progress, setbacks, and shifts in

policy and practice. Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts & Letters.

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Friedman, K. B., Laurent, K. L., Krantzberg, G., Scavia, D., & Creed, I. F. (2015). The Great

Lakes Futures Project: principles and policy recommendations for making the lakes

great. Journal of Great Lakes Research, 41, 171-179.

Li, S., Villeneuve, D. L., Berninger, J. P., Blackwell, B. R., Cavallin, J. E., Hughes, M. N., ... &

Stevens, K. E. (2017). An integrated approach for identifying priority contaminant in the

Great Lakes Basin–Investigations in the Lower Green Bay/Fox River and Milwaukee

Estuary areas of concern. Science of the Total Environment, 579, 825-837.

Strathmann, M., Horstkott, M., Koch, C., Gayer, U., & Wingender, J. (2016). The River Ruhr–an

urban river under particular interest for recreational use and as a raw water source for

drinking water: The collaborative research project “Safe Ruhr”–microbiological

aspects. International journal of hygiene and environmental health, 219(7), 643-661.

Wilson, R., Cutts, B., Lower, E., Williams, J., Norris, C., Lutsch, K., ... & Fang, A. G. (2018).

Urban Environmental Equity Project Field Report 1: Issues, Stakeholders, and Equity in

Milwaukee's Urban River Management.

Wood, A. R., Harten, T., & Gutierrez, S. C. (2018). Approaches to Identifying the Emerging

Innovative Water Technology Industry in the United States. Journal‐American Water

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