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As I See It

Time to spend the money they set aside to address PFAS

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One fundamental right we should all be able to agree on is the right to enjoy clean drinking water. Everyone in Wisconsin deserves the right to pour themselves a clean glass of water straight from their tap without having to worry about how it could impact their health. There should be no politics involved. But in Wisconsin, it has been more than one year since the state set aside $125 million to help battle contamination from forever-chemicals known as PFAS. While the money has been allocated, the Legislature has given itself the power to decide how the money should actually be spent, and day after day they continue to squander that opportunity. Meanwhile, people on French Island an in more than 100 other Wisconsin communities continue to see PFAS contamination in their water supply. On French Island they have been drinking only bottled water for years now. Our neighbors have been more proactive. Michigan and Minnesota have started groundwater PFAS detection programs. The Wisconsin Legislature has the power to do the same, but continues to ignore the problem, yet all they have to do is sign a check and spend the money they have already allocated.

Scott Robert Shaw serves as WIZM Program Director and News Director, and delivers the morning news on WKTY, Z-93 and 95.7 The Rock. Scott has been at Mid-West Family La Crosse since 1989, and authors Wisconsin's only daily radio editorial, "As I See It" heard on WIZM each weekday morning and afternoon.

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3 Comments

3 Comments

  1. walden

    August 26, 2024 at 11:16 pm

    So, what exactly do you want to spend the money on, Mr. Shaw? Some specificity about your request would help. A statement like “spend the money on PFAS” provides no insight and adds nothing to the discussion.

    Please consider the WI DNR already has over 2,500 employees and a budget over $1 Billion to work with yet failed for decades to prevent PFAS contamination. If Gov Evers and the DNR see PFAS contamination as high priority, it isn’t showing.

    Cleaning up high levels of PFAS groundwater contamination is beyond current technology; the problem will likely be with us for decades.

  2. Barb Stanke

    August 26, 2024 at 11:33 pm

    So Scott, who is holding up the signing of this legislation into law?

    • walden

      August 27, 2024 at 4:00 pm

      Barb, it’s my understanding the funding and the provisions attached thereto were signed into law by the Governor in the last state budget.

      Gov Evers signed the budget but has refused to submit a PFAS plan to the legislature as agreed in that very budget. If we had any actual journalists locally…well never mind because we don’t…but if we did they might editorialize on Evers’ playing politics with this matter. At this time, it is impossible to know if the lack of spending has any impact at all on PFAS because the Gov and DNR have not disclosed how they would spend the $125 million. Shaw has written about this subject about 10 times but no-one reading his editorial is any smarter for having done so…its just performative “Repubs bad, Dems good.”

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