In December of 2002, MEA and the Sierra Club filed a petition with the U.S. EPA on behalf of a coalition of environmental, community and religious groups requesting action to fix Wisconsin's Title V clean air operating permits program. The petition highlighted the fact that Wisconsin was allowing almost half of the major sources of air pollution to operate without the required Title V permits.

SUCCESS! In response to our petition, on February 24, 2004, the EPA issued a Notice of Deficiency to the state of Wisconsin for its failure to adequately enforce its Title V program. The deficiencies found by the EPA include:

If the deficiencies are not addressed within two years, Wisconsin will lose the opportunity to run the program and the federal government will take responsibility for issuing permits. This is an important step in ensuring that the Governor and the Legislature restore adequate funding for this necessary program and keep our air clean.

To read the Wisconsin State Journal article on the Notice of Deficiency, click here.

MEA and Garvey & Stoddard helped give a voice to a group of conservationists and the Menominee Tribe in their challenge of the DNR's approval of a high capacity well permit for Polar Ice. The DNR approval would have allowed Polar Ice to pump up to 1.5 million gallons of spring water a day for water bottling and export from the watershed. This is twice the size of the defeated Perrier proposal for Big Springs, Wisconsin.

The DNR denied the public's right to a contested case hearing on the potential impacts the project would have on trout streams (public trust resources). We challenged that decision in state court.

SUCCESS! As a result, the DNR changed its position and granted the group a contested case hearing. Then, on February 27, 2004, Polar Ice withdrew its application to bottle spring water from this system.

Protecting Local Democracy
MEA, along with family farmers, town and county board members, conservationists, and other concerned Wisconsin residents are working to stop a bill that ignores public health and safety, limits the rights of neighbors to livestock factories, and replaces local democracy with state bureaucracy. The Livestock Siting Bill (AB 868), also known as the "Undermine Local Democracy Act," would create a statewide siting review board that could overturn the livestock siting decisions of a local government.

On February 23, 2004, MEA helped mobilize more than 80 people from around the state to come to Madison and voice their opposition at the Joint Committee on Agriculture's hearing on the bill. While special interests and big agribusiness expected to dominate the debate, they were met by a group of committed, vocal citizens who gave first hand accounts of the stifling smell, ongoing threat of air and water pollution, and vital need for local participation in livestock siting decisions. To read more, click here.

While the Assembly has already voted on the bill, it is critical that people call their senators and encourage them to support amendments that would include air and odor standards and protect public health and safety. As the bill is currently written, the requested statewide standards will likely be inadequate to meet the health and safety needs of local communities. You can call your senators, toll-free, at 1-800-362-9472. To find out who your senators are, click here.

To learn more about what you can do to protect your right to clean air and water, email advocate@midwestadvocates.org.

Empowering Local Residents

Ann Zelinski, of Manitowoc County, is MEA's Featured Advocate. Ann is an active member of Citizens For Responsible Agriculture and a Clean Environment (CFRACE), a grassroots group that, with the representation of MEA, stopped the expansion of a 5,000 head beef livestock factory proposal in the town of Gibson. Since that victory, Ann has been instrumental in mobilizing activists on livestock factory issues around the state. In addition to speaking with legislators, contacting local media, and introducing resolutions at town and county board meetings, Ann helped organized a bus of Manitowoc County residents to travel to Madison and speak out against the Livestock Siting Bill. Although her local fight may be over, Ann has not stopped working to protect other residents from polluting livestock factories.