Waupaca Citizens for Public Response v. Department of Natural Resources

Background: According to the government’s Toxic Release Inventory, ThyssenKrupp’s Waupaca Foundry 2/3 is the single largest source of air toxins in the Waupaca, Weyauwega, and Clintonville areas. A national environmental ranking system found at www.scorecard.org says that this facility is one of the worst in the country in terms of cancer risk from air and water releases.

Yet in early 2003, the DNR gave the foundry a variance from state air toxin requirements that limit benzene emissions due to their carcinogenic nature. This means that the DNR allowed the foundry to emit more benzene, despite the fact that benzene emissions from the facility are one of the reasons the facility ranks so poorly on Scorecard’s assessment of health risk.

Local Waupaca residents are concerned and have formed a community group, Waupaca Citizens for Public Response (CPR). The group is comprised of people who have lived in Waupaca for many generations. They are taking aim at DNR’s decision to allow more emissions of benzene from the ThyssenKrupp Foundry 2/3 in Waupaca.

Status: Waupaca CPR, with the help of Midwest Environmental Advocates and the law firm Porter & Jablonski, initiated legal actions on Friday, February 14, 2003. The group challenged the DNR’s decision to grant the benzene variance through an administrative legal process called a Contested Case Hearing. The group also filed a lawsuit (Petition for Judicial Review) in Waupaca County Circuit Court to challenge the environmental analysis the DNR did on this project. In February of 2004, the Circuit Court ruled in favor of the DNR. Then the petitioners voluntarily dismissed the contested case because the industry had succeeded in changing both state and federal law to make their previously challenged conduct legal.