EPA Clean Water Rule: Minnesota will now be the Land of 10,000 Cleaner Lakes

By Steve Schultz, Minnesota Program Organizer Minnesota is the land of 10,000 lakes, and water is an integral part of any Minnesota summer – cannonballs off the dock, mornings on the lake fishing, afternoons on the pontoon, lazy days at the beach. Minnesotans value our water for so many reasons. That’s why we were so excited when the EPA released the Clean Water Protection Rule on Wednesday, May 27. For more than 12 years Clean Water Action has been leading the fight to close loopholes, created during the Bush Administration, in the Clean Water Act that left more than half of our nation’s streams and more than 20 million acres of wetlands vulnerable to polluters and developers. Now these vital water resources are once again clearly protected by the Clean Water Act. Now nearly one million Minnesotan’s drinking water sources will be protected again. Hundreds of miles of streams and many of our wetlands now have the protection to keep our water clean. Here in Minnesota we value our water, we mobilized tens of thousands of Minnesotans to take a stand for clean water by urging the administration to protect our water and our health. The Clean Water Rule is a strong, commonsense plan to make clean water a priority by restoring protections to the sources that feed the drinking water for more than 117 million Americans, including nearly 1 million in MN. Many polluting industries and the politicians they back still oppose the rule and we expect that to continue. We loved the way that Brian Deese, White House senior advisor, summed up the opposition to the rule, “There is a lot of misinformation about what this rule does and doesn’t do. But what becomes clear…is that the only people with reason to oppose the rule are polluters who knowingly threaten our clean water.” If there was ever a time to pay attention to what our politicians in Washington are doing in order to protect what we value here in Minnesota, now is that time, for clean water. We thank the Obama Administration for making our health and our clean water a priority!