Science Needed at DNR

Read the entire editorial at:
Science is exactly what we need in the DNR,

The Lakeland Times

For those who have not read the DNR’s proposed new shoreland zoning administrative rule, the revised NR115, this would be an important time to do so...

...All its supporters emphasize the so-called ‘science’ that makes this radical revision...

...When it comes to science, the DNR is just like the naked emperor who paraded around the kingdom touting his new suit. Like the emperor’s clothes, the science just isn’t there. They may say it is – and they do – but just looking at the rule quickly tells you what the real purpose is, and that’s to pursue a political agenda...

...For example, water quality should be the agency’s top priority and the central goal of any NR115 revision...

...I was astounded by the lack of attention paid to invasive species or non-point source pollution or acid rain or phosphorous or even to the overall increasing use of our lake resources.

Provision after provision is instead devoted to telling people where they can plant trees on their property or where they can put their non-conforming homes. The agency would use this new law to tell people they can’t expand their lawns or put flags or signs within the setback...

...And none of this deals with the increasing deterioration of water quality. Take septic systems, for instance. According to the United States Environmental Protection Agency, septic system failure rates range from 1 percent to 5 percent a year and septic system failure is now the third most common source of groundwater pollution. This is an especially critical problem in the Northwoods because of the vast number of homes – and the vast number of lake homes – that use septic systems.

To address this problem, we don’t need to think about what is going on above ground so much as we do about what is going on beneath us, underground. There, the water is flowing to the lakes, and, while in some cases it gets trapped, for the most part it moves downhill toward the lowest point. As it does so, it will carry with it contamination from failing septic systems or from underground gasoline tanks.

The point is, a faulty septic system will pollute, whether it is 50 feet from the lake or 1,000 feet from the lake. Water, and the leaking sewage in it, will seek the lowest point, it will contaminate wells along the way, and when it reaches the lake it will, among other things, produce those large algae blooms the DNR loves to talk about...

...Oh, the DNR staff has a pat answer when failing septic systems are brought up. There’s nothing we can do about that, they say, because we don’t regulate septic systems. The Department of Commerce does...

...Then there’s the issue of impervious surfaces and the run-off threat associated with them. The new rule would strictly regulate the amount of impervious surfaces – which include gravel surfaces – on a homeowner’s lot, but that doesn’t stop the agency from routinely and needlessly clearing public shorelines and creating impervious surfaces for boat landings.

If it truly cared about the environmental effects of run-off, the DNR would not have force-fed our area a landing on Lake Kawaguesaga, when several landings already existed on the chain that provided access to the lake.

...If the DNR really cared about surface runoff, it would provide either wastewater treatment or traps to stop the run-off wherever it imposes impervious surfaced or blacktopped landings. But it does not.

Then, too, the DNR doesn’t like lawns and doesn’t want existing ones expanded, when in reality a faulty septic system near a lake, or even hundreds of yards away, will dump more phosphorus into the water than several lawns.

And while the DNR is obsessed with eliminating structures within the shoreline setback, it does not address the miles of concrete and blacktop and buildings built more than 1,000 feet from the shoreline.The truth is, though, if a house pollutes the water from 35 feet, then a house 500 feet away will also pollute the water, no matter what is planted on the shoreline...

...Contouring our properties and using proper soil erosion methods make it difficult for runoff to get to the lake and actually are the best tools we have to protect water quality, but the DNR doesn’t tell anyone that.

They don’t tell anyone because the science isn’t as important to them as how “natural” a shoreline looks. If it is endowed with natural beauty – that is, untouched by human hands – then it’s OK, even if the natural beauty doesn’t do a thing to stop run-off from getting into the lake and the human-created contoured lawn does.

So the agency simply falls back on its flawed science, as it did when it tried to argue in the Tom Baer case that a seawall he had wasn’t needed for erosion control and that it adversely affected water quality.

In that case, a judge rejected both those arguments – and the DNR’s scientific claims supporting them.

The Department, in this case, presented extensive evidence of its concerns about the adverse impacts related to seawalls, the judge concluded. However, the experts retained by the Baers exhaustively studied Alder Lake, especially in the vicinity of the Baers’ shoreline, and demonstrated both that a seawall was warranted and that it would not be detrimental to the public interest. Not only that, the judge added, Baer’s seawall wasn’t harming the environment at least in part because the department itself – using fluctuating water levels on the lake – had already damaged it by killing off amphibians and reptiles and reducing aquatic vegetation. Both of these conclusions rely heavily on the fact that the water level in Alder Lake is elevated above its natural level during the summer season and drawn down in the winter, the judge wrote.

...Not too long ago, I read with interest an article in the Madison State Journal, in which a Madison resident called upon the DNR to make NR115 even stricter than what the agency is proposing. I found that interesting for two reasons:

One, that individual lives in a city that is exempt from NR115 and in which the Monona Terrace juts out significantly over the lake. It’s easy to call for stricter regulation when it doesn’t apply to you.

Second, this individual was asking the bureaucracy rather than the Legislature to enact that stricter law. This, too, is a deformity, when a bureaucracy can make and enact laws without public or legislative approval. What has happened to our democracy?

...Spending more than a quarter-million dollars to harass a law-abiding citizen such as Tom Baer and then to try and codify the same discredited and judicially rejected science in NR115 certainly is not rational, does not make common sense, and will do nothing to protect our water quality, the biggest environmental issue of our time.

Just think if that $250,000 was put toward stopping invasive species. Just think!