John,
Yesterday, Wisconsin took a step toward clean water for all.
The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources Board (NRB) voted on rules to protect our groundwater, surface water, and drinking water from PFAS. The NRB rejected rules for groundwater protection, passed a surface water rule, and passed a weakened version of the drinking water standard.
This isn’t a comprehensive solution to deliver clean water for all. But, the vote is an important step toward requiring communities to begin testing for PFAS – an important move to protect our health. When communities test for PFAS, they are better equipped to plan for and take on cleanup.
Your months of advocacy and the time you invested in this issue is the primary reason the board voted to protect drinking water. Without a doubt.
The work you put in drove this victory, but it’s not a complete one.
Unfortunately, the NRB weakened the drinking water rule by allowing more than triple the initial recommendation for PFAS parts per trillion. Some members of the NRB sided with corporate polluters and their moneyed allies over the Wisconsinites who are directly impacted by these chemicals.
During the hearing, board member Fred Prehn, who has refused to give up his seat despite his appointment ending, criticized Wausau Mayor Katie Rosenberg – a city in which every drinking well is PFAS-contaminated – for testing the city’s wells for PFAS and advocating to clean up the contamination.
Prehn’s minimization of the PFAS crisis will only harm our health and our communities. This grandstanding and partisanship willfully ignores and minimizes the dangers every person and child encounter by simply drinking the water coming from their taps in Wausau, which is odd, because he lives there.
This issue is clear – human health versus corporate polluters. And this decision, though imperfect, is proof that sustained, grassroots action can make a huge difference.
If these rules make it through the legislature, we will join just a handful of states with a drinking water standard for PFAS. Together, we will continue to protect drinking water and hold those who stand in the way of protecting our health accountable.
