Notes from the West Wing
By
State Representative Garey Bies
The Great Lakes Compact
It has been almost a month since the end of the regular legislative session and my last Notes from the West Wing update. During this period, my central focus has been The Great Lakes Compact. Needless to say it has been a busy few weeks and I am happy to report that on Wednesday, April 9th, the Governor and legislative members announced a bi-partisan agreement concerning The Great Lakes Compact. The stage is now set for the legislature to pass the Compact and for the Governor to sign it into law.
I know that many people out there were upset that the Assembly did not pass The Great Lakes Compact bill during the last week of session. As many of you know, the Compact legislation is almost 150 pages long with the actual Compact language comprising of less than 50 of those pages with the remainder being rules and regulations. It was within these 100 pages of rules and regulations where the Assembly had concern and why the legislation was not passed. The Assembly received the Senate-modified Compact language on Friday, March 7th. On Monday, March 10th the Assembly Natural Resources Committee held a public hearing on the language until 8:30 pm. With the Assembly meeting on the floor both Tuesday the 11th and Wednesday the 12th, which was the last day of Session, there was simply no time for the Committee to review and act on the legislation, much less for the whole Assembly. We simply did not know what was contained in those 100 pages and we were not willing to simply pass the Compact to grab a headline. Instead, we paused, and for that Assembly Republicans took a lot of heat in the media from environmental groups claiming that we were trying to block the Compact.
It was unfortunate that these groups and others tried to make the Compact deliberations into a political debate. In this case politics had nothing to do with it. Instead, it was the fact that we needed to make sure that when we passed the Compact that we did it right, that the areas that use the water and would be affected by the Compact knew exactly what was in the Compact and that there were no unintended consequences. If a mistake was made and the Compact was passed, it would be far more difficult to come back after the fact to fix the language rather than take care of the issue before passage.
Let me give you an example of one such unintended consequence. Around the country, Wisconsin is synonymous with cheese and beer. There is a well-founded reason for this. Milwaukee is known as the brew-city with the industry having played a central role in its history. Having a cold beer with burgers and brats from the grill is a Wisconsin pastime. But in the original Compact legislation, buried down in the rules and regulations, was a provision that had the potential to force Miller Brewing out of Wisconsin. Because Miller uses Great Lakes water in brewing their beer, any of that beer shipped out of Wisconsin could have been viewed as an unlawful diversion of Great Lakes water. Whether you like a beer or not, forcing Miller out of Milwaukee would have been a very serious unintended consequence and that’s why it was important for the Assembly to do its due diligence.
For Wisconsin, I can think of no better example of why it was so important for the legislature to not rush through the Compact language. I know the environmentalists were salivating at the opportunity to lambaste the Assembly Republicans, but we were not going to simply pass the Compact just to grab a headline or avoid their criticism. It is unfortunate that the detractors tried to play the political game with this issue, but the agreement this week just proves it wasn’t about politics, but about making sure, as legislators, we did our job for all of Wisconsin.
With the agreement in place, the legislature will, as I anticipated, be called into Special Session on Thursday, April 17th to act on The Great Lakes Compact. I fully expect the Compact to pass both houses of the legislature with overwhelming majorities and I expect the Governor to sign the Compact into law shortly thereafter.
The Great Lakes Compact is one of the most important environmental protection proposals ever for the Great Lakes Region. Wisconsin’s version of the Compact is the most protective of any version yet passed. The Compact will also be profoundly important to the communities and economies in the Great Lakes region. The Compact is too important to have rushed through the legislature and it was worth it to take the time we needed to get it right. Now we stand ready to be the fifth of eight states to enact the Great Lakes Compact.
As always, I can be reached by e-mail at Rep.Bies@legis.wisconsin.gov or by telephone, toll-free at 1-888-482-0001. You can also visit my website at http://www.legis.state.wi.us/assembly/asm01/news/.