FITCHBURG, Wis. (AP) – State environmental officials adopted sweeping regulations Wednesday to control phosphorus pollution in Wisconsin waters, hoping to slow runaway algae growth and preserve water-based tourism and recreation.

The package creates new restrictions on a wide range of potential sources, from farm fields and barnyards to large-scale wastewater producers. The Natural Resources Board adopted the regulations unanimously after about four hours of discussion.

“In the long run, this may be the single most important action on water quality the Natural Resources Board has ever done,” said Jonathan Ela, the board’s chairman. “This takes us a long ways.”

Biologists believe phosphorus, a chemical commonly found in fertilizer and manure, can cause ugly algae blooms that deplete water oxygen levels, killing aquatic life. The blooms also can cause health problems, including rashes, headaches and nausea. The DNR considers 172 Wisconsin lakes, rivers and streams “impaired waters” because of phosphorus pollution.

The Department of Natural Resources generally prohibits excessive phosphorus in state waters, but the agency hasn’t set out any hard limits.

The federal Environmental Protection Agency has been pushing states for over a decade to impose more precise standards, known as numeric limits, on the total amount of phosphorus allowed in a water body, but only a few states have done it.

Last year, the EPA imposed standards on a state for the first time after environmentalists sued for action in Florida. And in November, several groups, including the Sierra Club and the Wisconsin Wildlife Federation, warned the EPA they also planned to sue in Wisconsin unless action was taken.

DNR water experts have been working on phosphorus controls since the early 1980s, but they say research didn’t advance enough to develop solid, science-based numeric limits until recently.

The new rules impose the state’s first phosphorus limits on the agricultural sector.

They restrict phosphorus run-off from fields to 6 pounds per acre annually over an eight-year average. Farmers would not be allowed to plow within 5 feet of a stream bank to prevent erosion and would have to install equipment such as sump pumps to prevent wastewater from milk houses and feed storage structures from running off. Farmers wouldn’t have to abide by the requirements unless the state covers 70 percent of compliance costs.

The rules also lay out per-liter limits in rivers, streams and lakes. River water, for example, could not contain more than 100 micrograms per liter. Municipal wastewater plants, food processors, paper mills and other factories would be allowed to work with farmers to achieve those limits.

Organizations lined up at the board meeting to express support for the rules, including the Wisconsin Farm Bureau Federation and the Municipal Environmental Group Wastewater Division.

Still, Amber Meyer Smith, program director for Clean Wisconsin, told the board the field run-off standard wasn’t tough enough. She said 84 percent of state farms already meet it. Smith also complained the 5-foot plowing setback wasn’t enough.
Scott Manley is the environmental policy director for Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce. He warned the board the regulations would make Wisconsin a regulatory island in the Midwest and put the state at a competitive disadvantage.

He also complained the rules would slam businesses with new costs. The DNR estimates up to 163 municipal plants alone may need new filtration systems that could run a total of $300 million to $1.13 billion.

“That’s an awful lot of money to add to the cost of doing business in this state,” Manley said.

But Don Hammes of Middleton, a member of the Yahara Fishing Club’s board of directors, backs the rules. He said fishing on Madison-area lakes is disgusting.

“The surface of the lakes will be covered with a green-blue-turquoise scum that makes it impossible to cast a line out without it getting slimed up,” Hammes said. “Please support these rules for my grandchildren and my children.”

The rules are still subject to legislative review. Sen. Kathleen Vinehoult, D-Alama, chairwoman of the Senate agriculture committee, said the rules look substantial enough to warrant a hearing by the end of July.

The EPA also must sign off on the numeric standards.

Democratic Gov. Jim Doyle last year signed bills that limited phosphorus in residential dishwater soap and banned the sale of fertilizer containing phosphorus except for use on first-year lawns and phosphorus-poor soils.

via Wisconsin Natural Resources Board approves phosphorus regulations; could cost municipalities billions | thenorthwestern.com | Oshkosh Northwestern.

Almost every time someone has died in a boating accident in Wisconsin, the victim was not wearing a life jacket.

Yet, Wisconsin and Virginia are the only two states that do not require boaters to wear life preservers — not even children, according to the National Transportation Safety Board.

A proposed bill in the Legislature that would require children younger than 13 years old to wear a life jacket failed to go to a vote last session. Department of Natural Resources recreation safety warden Jeff Dauterman said he was encouraged by attempts to create a life jacket law for children, but said it comes down to common sense for all boaters.

Mike Chadderdon, 37, of Kronenwetter takes his boat out at least once or twice a week in the summer. He said he makes sure he has enough life jackets available and within reach for everyone on board. If his kids or their friends are skiing or tubing, they must wear a life jacket.

“Always, if theyre in the water,” he said.

Its a practice his kids dont mind.

“Its what you do unless you want to drown,” said his son, Ryan, 12.

Sixteen people died in boating accidents in Wisconsin in 2009 and 15 of them did not wear a life jacket, according to the DNR. The 16th person has not been found, but Dauterman said all 16 likely could have survived had they worn a life jacket. All the deaths resulted from the person falling overboard, or the boat capsizing.

“I cant stress that its not enough to have life jackets on board; its wearing them,” Dauterman said. “It's a split second from being on a boat to struggling for your life.”

That was the case May 30 when a 33-year-old Rhinelander woman died while trying to rescue her 9-year-old daughter, who fell from a boat on Lake Minocqua in Oneida County. The child was rescued by boaters, but the woman, Jaime L. Pontell, disappeared in the water. Her body was found the next day. Pontell was not wearing a life jacket, authorities said. Dauterman said DNR wardens still are trying to learn if the child was wearing a life jacket.

Unsafe boating is not just a Wisconsin problem. Kim Elverum, a boat and water safety coordinator for the Minnesota DNR, said 14 of that states 15 boating deaths involved victims not wearing a life jacket. The one person who wore a life jacket died of internal injuries when the tube he was being pulled on hit a docked pontoon boat.

“If we could convince people to wear (a life jacket), wed cut our fatalities by 80 percent,” Elverum said.

Wisconsin law enforcement officials hope to improve boaters; driving and safety habits by targeting the younger generation. The Mandatory Education Law that was put in place in September 2007 requires people born on or after Jan. 1, 1989, and who are at least 16 years old, to have a DNR boating safety education certificate to operate a motorboat or personal water craft.

Boaters 12 to 15 years old must either have a boating safety certificate or have an adult on board.

Classes are available on the Internet or offered in the community and offer information about the rules and regulations, how to operate a boat, and the importance of safety.

Marathon County Sheriffs Lt. Randy Albert, who oversees the countys boat patrol program, said the department had taught as many as 120 people a year in boater safety classes. The program was discontinued this year for budgetary reasons and as participation numbers dropped because of the popularity of the Internet course, Albert said.

Eye on the water

DNR wardens try to keep an eye on area waterways, looking for intoxicated boat drivers and overloaded boats, and conducting safety checks of watercraft. To help the wardens, the DNR has $1.4 million this year to give to local law enforcement agencies to conduct its own boat patrols.

In 2009, Marathon County officers recorded 207.5 hours for boat patrol by patrolling the water, training, conducting investigations or completing boat-related paperwork, Dauterman said. The county can be reimbursed up to 75 percent for the more than $8,100 it spent on boat patrol.

Lincoln County, which has one recreational officer compared with the multiple officers used by Marathon County, spent almost $15,000 while recording 307.5 hours in 2009.

Albert said the Marathon County Sheriffs Department tries to put officers in areas where there are a number of complaints or high boater traffic, but staffing schedules and the need to respond to calls of greater importance take priority.

“We dont have a set pattern. We pop up here and will pop up there,” Albert said. “If people boat responsibly, they dont have to fear where we are.”

– Everest Herald reporter Amy Ryan contributed to this report.

via Wisconsin one of two states that doesn’t require life jackets for boaters | postcrescent.com | Appleton Post Crescent.

MENASHA — Jim Lingnofski has lived on Paris Street along the Fox River for 32 years and has never seen the abundance of aquatic plants that have emerged this year.

He and other boaters find themselves plowing through thick mats of vegetation to get from the channel to their shoreline properties as the weeds entangle the engines.

“Ive never seen them that thick,” said Lingnofski, who ties up his 26-foot boat along a concrete bulk head wall behind his home.

Although rain and wind on Tuesday helped break up some of the dense growth, waterfront residents are concerned that a spate of hot weather could lead to algae growth on the top of the aquatic plants. “Then it will turn putrid and give off a really foul smell,” Lingnofski said.

The buildup of the plants — primarily Eurasian water milfoil and curly-leaf pondweed, which are two major invasive species — is a problem throughout Lake Winnebago because the water is so clean, said Chuck Fitzgibbon, aquatic plant manager for the state Department of Natural Resources. Coontail, a common Winnebago plant, also is thriving.

“The clearer the water is the more active aquatic plants get in their growth cycle” because they get more sunlight, said Fitzgibbon, who visited the main Fox River channel from the lake Monday at the request of concerned riverfront residents. “Many of those types of aquatic plants are not firmly rooted to the (lake) bottom. As they reach the end of their growth cycle they might become dislodged and go wherever they feel like it.”

Lingnofski called it a Catch 22. “The water is clear as can be, but you cant see through the water because the weeds are so high.”

While the plants are a nuisance for boaters and waterfront residents, Fitzgibbon said they are mostly harmless.

“Its;s more of a cosmetic issue,” he said. “And how temporary it is, is really dependent on Mother Nature.”

Lingnofski raked some of the weeds from the water in front of his home this spring but they grew back. On Wednesday, he saw more riverfront residents raking in the plants, and drying and disposing of them.

“The rivers been overtaken and inundated with weed growth,” said Mike Taylor, a Menasha alderman who has lived on the river 13 years and contacted the DNR after talking to neighbors. “I don;t know if its going to get worse.”

The boating channels are mostly clear but boaters struggle outside of them, he said.

“By the time you get out to the mouth of the river, the weeds are wrapped around your impeller and you actually have to go into reverse thrust to clear the weeds before you go into high speed.”

Fitzgibbons advice: Dont panic. “Its nothing to be alarmed about.”

Michael King: 920-729-6622, ext. 33, or mking@postcrescent.com

via Lake Winnebago, Fox River aquatic plant bloom raises algae concerns | postcrescent.com | Appleton Post Crescent.