Schuette opposes Wisconsin city’s bid to tap lake water →

The Detroit News, March 31, 2016
Author: Jim Lynch

International law governing withdrawals from the lakes set a series of requirements for any diversions to areas outside the basin. They include:

■Diversions must go to public water supplies.

■Applying communities must be without enough potable water.

■Communities must have no reasonable alternative within their own basin.

■Diversions must not “endanger the integrity of the Great Lakes Basin ecosystem.”

Schuette is questioning whether all of the communities that would receive water from Waukesha’s diversion are without other alternatives. In addition, he wants a clarification about whether Waukesha’s plan meets criteria for returning water flow to the Great Lakes.

“Because Waukesha’s application is the first of its kind under the (Great Lakes Compact), it is essential to get this right,” according to Schuette’s letter to the governing councils. “My basic position is to oppose water diversion from the Great Lakes in order to preserve this precious resource for future generations.”