Barack Obama

Drop in the bucket compared to Iraq, Great Lakes need money

Thursday, December 15, 2005

DAILY HERALD
Burt Constable

This could turn out to be the most important week in Lake Michigan's history since the glaciers left town.

"It's been a good week," says Congressman Mark Kirk, one of the leaders in a suddenly cohesive movement to protect and improve Lake Michigan and the other Great Lakes. A Republican from Highland Park, Kirk has joined forces with Congressman Rahm Emanuel, a Chicago Democrat, to help forge an energized, bipartisan coalition with help from Rep. Vernon Ehlers, a Republican from Michigan.

In a flurry of agreements and pacts signed this week, congressmen and senators, the Great Lakes governors, bureaucrats and environmentalists came together. They touted plans to ban outside areas from siphoning off Great Lakes water, protect the lakes from alien species, eliminate pollution and clean up harbors.

"We are a very powerful force as long as we have a common vision," Kirk says.

Converting that vision into reality is expected to take $20 billion over the next 15 years. To put that in perspective, President Bush has said he'll ask Congress for $21 billion in the next year alone just for reconstruction costs -- much of that spent on water programs -- in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In these times of record debt and deficit, should our tax dollars go to rebuild water systems in Iraq, or to preserve the five Great Lakes that represent one-fifth of the world's fresh water and provide drinking water to 30 million people?

"They're both important," Kirk says, adding it's misguided to pit Iraq spending against Lake Michigan's needs.

"That's the Washington way of thinking -- that it's all about spending money," Kirk says. "I'm more interested in meeting our key agenda and then finding out what it costs."

Instead of telling taxpayers to cough up $20 billion for the Great Lakes, Kirk says leaders need to provide specifics that will convince people the projects are necessary.

For starters, Kirk says he'd like to get $2 million to make a permanent electric barrier aimed at keeping the destructive Asian carp from getting into Lake Michigan.

"Once you win the policy argument, it's easy to win the budget argument," Kirk says.

The "red states" and "blue states" in the Great Lakes region have more senators and representatives than areas that procured $15 billion in federal funds to restore Chesapeake Bay or $7.8 billion for the Everglades, Kirk notes.

"Every day our nation waits, restoration of the Great Lakes becomes more difficult and more expensive," Sen. Barack Obama says in a letter requesting Senate hearings on the plans for the Great Lakes.

The Bush Administration -- which recently abandoned an unpopular "blending" plan to allow more dumping of partially treated sewage into lakes, rivers and streams -- now recognizes the Great Lakes as one giant ecosystem, Kirk says. Progress is being made.

"This year, we banned all oil drilling in the Great Lakes," Kirk says.

Government also has started cleaning up the 31 polluted harbors. Kirk says the $30 million cleanup of Waukegan Harbor will result in an $800 million increase in property value.

More improvements are planned -- including stopping mercury emissions and other pollution, whether it comes from the pipes of a local factory or drops out of the air from a plant in China, Kirk says.

"It's time to bite the bullet and stop all dumping in the lake," Kirk says. "Within five years, we will fine the bejesus out of you if you ever dump again."

Because of the damage caused by alien species such as zebra mussels or Asian carp, Kirk says he plans to introduce legislature in January requiring all foreign freighters to undergo a thorough decontamination before entering the Great Lakes water system.

Protecting the valuable asset of water, which is worth more than oil, makes sense.

"Now is the time for us to lead," Kirk says of Congress and others in the coalition. "We now have the vision."

All they need is money.