Article published November 09, 2008
Obama needs to deliver on Great Lakes promises
Enjoy the honeymoon, you 64,639,761 or so Americans who voted for Barack Obama.
Once Obamania's over, let's hold him accountable for delivering on his Great Lakes promises.
Like that $5 billion pledge he made for Great Lakes restoration, a downpayment on the $20 billion of work the Bush Administration had 1,500 people spend a year identifying without ever funding.
He could start by restoring massive cuts President Bush made to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Clean Water State Revolving Fund, the bread-and-butter account for sewage work. Sewage improvements are the region's No. 1 infrastructure need, according to that inventory.
Let's get Mr. Obama to - finally - finish off that electrical barrier near Chicago that is to keep Asian carp from entering the Great Lakes via Lake Michigan and destroying the region's multibillion dollar fishery. We've only been in panic mode now for, what, 15 years? Yes, it was the Mississippi River floods of 1993 that allowed imported Asian carp to escape from their Arkansas fish hatcheries, causing us to fear what would happen as they swam upstream.
Speaking of invasive species, how 'bout having Mr. Obama get the U.S. EPA off its duff and start inspecting the shipping industry's ballast water? How nutty is it when environmental groups have to sue that agency because it steadfastly has refused to use the inherent power of the Clean Water Act it has had at its disposal for years? Especially when that very agency declared invasive species the No. 1 ecological threat to the Great Lakes in 2002?Let's remind Mr. Obama he promised to make the United States a leader on the climate issue, as it should be, by putting the country on the path for an 80 percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2050, compared to 1990 levels. From shipping to agriculture, the Great Lakes region stands to be impacted more than most if efforts are not increased to keep the Earth's climate from warming so quickly.
Mr. Obama needs to get tough on all forms of air pollution, including (but not limited to) mercury, sulfur dioxide, ozone, and smog-forming nitrogen oxides. Nobody can truly tout themselves as a Great Lakes guardian if they're lax on air pollution standards. Fallout from the sky is the No. 1 pathway of pollutants into the lakes today.
How about a more discerning look into the impact of concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs, on our water supplies? And an answer to what's fouling beaches and causing algae to make a comeback in areas such as western Lake Erie, whether it's runoff from factory farms or family farms, phosphates in dishwasher detergent, bad sewage operations, faulty septic tanks, or something else.
Mr. Obama needs to use his charisma to woo more congressional support for the Great Lakes Legacy Act, so that contaminated harbors and soil can be cleaned up faster than a snail's pace. With any luck, that act will provide money for restoring North Toledo's Ottawa River, Ohio's most polluted waterway, during Mr. Obama's administration. You can't blame President Bush for this one, folks. Congress never funded it at levels he recommended.
And, of course, we all need to hold Mr. Obama accountable for his promise to jump-start wind, solar, and other forms of renewable energy. Ohio, in particular, stands to gain from his actions on that. With its manufacturing base, it has enormous potential for jobs in that sector.
Speaking of energy, what - if anything - will Mr. Obama do with the shuttered FutureGen project? Sold to the public as the government's $1 billion bonanza for clean-coal research, it was nixed by Mr. Bush after his home state of Texas lost out to Mr. Obama's home state of Illinois for the project.
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