Traverse City Record-Eagle

Opinion Columnists

May 8, 2009

Forum: Great Lakes in great peril

BY DAVE DEMPSEY

When last we heard of the Great Lakes Compact in October, its advocates were throwing a party to celebrate ratification of the agreement to protect Great Lakes water by Congress and former President Bush.

"The future of the Great Lakes is secure," proclaimed the National Wildlife Federation.

Well, the party's over.

Less than seven months later two Wisconsin communities, New Berlin and Waukesha, want to take Lake Michigan water. In the case of Waukesha, the water is needed in part to support urban sprawl.

Great Lakes advocates cannot afford another diversion -- of their own attention from a giant loophole in the compact that could render the entire document null and void.

A few voices, including Congressman Bart Stupak, of Menominee, pointed out that the compact could be interpreted (and will be exploited by private water interests) as defining Great Lakes water to be a product once extracted and packaged. It exempts the shipment of such water from restrictions on diversion and export of water.

The compact originated from a Canadian firm's proposal in 1998 to export 50 tankers per year of Lake Superior water to Asia. Groups like NWF worked tirelessly to craft an agreement they hoped and believed would prevent the depletion of the Lakes. But that doesn't mean the Compact prohibits proposals to take Great Lakes water.

While it is now illegal to export 50 tankers per year without permission of all Great Lakes governors, it is perfectly legal to export 50 tankers per year of bottles or other containers holding Lake Superior water.

To put it another way, the compact appears to open the door to wholesale capture of Great Lakes water and its sale for private profit. The work that went into crafting detailed rules defining whether and when water should be diverted or conserved is undermined.

The specter of large-scale private claims on the Great Lakes is not mere worry. The scarcity of water not only in developing nations, but in the Southeast and Southwest United States, could make it supremely valuable on an open market. If T. Boone Pickens is buying Texas groundwater in the hope of selling it to parched Texas communities, how long before tycoons snap up Great Lakes water rights?

Fortunately, it's not too late to close the loophole.

n Correct the intentional oversight in Michigan and other Great Lakes states' laws that fails to assert that water is a public resource that cannot be privately owned, any more than the air can.

n Enact a Congressional resolution expressing the interpretation of the House, Senate and president that the Great Lakes Compact cannot be interpreted or used by any party to claim private water ownership.

William Ashworth wrote, "Children of a culture born in a water-rich environment, we have never really learned how important water is to us. We understand it, but we do not respect it."

That's not true in Michigan, where water commands the respect of all. It's time to put that respect to work by correcting the Great Lakes Compact.

About the author: Dave Dempsey is author of "Great Lakes for Sale: From Whitecaps to Bottlecaps." He currently serves as Great Lakes policy advisor for Clean Water Action. He served as executive director of the Michigan Environmental Council in 1982-83 and as environmental advisor to Michigan Gov. James J. Blanchard from 1983-89.

About the forum: The forum is a periodic column of opinion written by Record-Eagle readers in their areas of interest or expertise. Submissions of 500 words or less may be made by e-mailing letters@record-eagle.com. Please include biographical information and a photo.

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