Wisconsin Clean Water Supporters Score First Major Electoral Victory

Communities in central Wisconsin await the decision of
the Wisconsin Supreme Court in a case that would
effectually halt a massive factory farm from beginning
operations with the consequences being economic
devastation for an entire Wisconsin region. Clean
water activists fear the decision will be corruptly
decided by five Republican-linked judges on the
seven-member court.

Madison, Wisconsin — Families and communities fighting for fresh water have scored their first electoral victory over Republicans and the industrial polluters for whom the GOP is transforming Wisconsin statutory and administrative law to make it easier to poison water without accountability.

Water is necessary for human life, but the Republican Party dismissive of this fact has not faced an electoral reckoning to this point, (Ecological Economics, Principles and Applications, Water, Mayo Clinic).

A special state senate election from northwestern Wisconsin signals a change that sent political newcomer State Senator-elect Patty Schachtner, (D-Somerset, Wisconsin) into the gerrymandered state legislature this week.

Notes Matthew DeFour this morning in the Wisconsin State Journal:

Some [political observers and environmental activists] ... said voters were tuned into local issues and angered by [defeated the Republican] Jarchow’s sponsorship of bills that have reduced environmental protections and local zoning control.

'We absolutely believe local issues motivated people in this race. All of our communications were very positive about Patty and the impact she can have on the local environment. We heard a lot from our members about Jarchow’s anti-conservation background,' said Staush Gruszynski, political director for the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters.

Jeff Smith, an organizer for liberal advocacy group Citizen Action of Wisconsin, said efforts to clean up the Red Cedar Watershed have been hampered by bills Jarchow has championed limiting local zoning control.

'There is a lot of angst toward Jarchow because of his anti-environment/pro-corporate stance,' Smith said.

Angst and anger because multi-generational families have children rushed to the hospital after bathing in water poisoned by factory farms vectoring manure into the environment. Consider this, children poisoned from bathing.

The Republican Party has become so pathologically removed from the health of families and communities that its office-holders are willing to see children poisoned in exchange for Big Ag's money.

Writes John Ikerd in Rural Communities of Necessity:

Rural America once had strong communities. It would have been very difficult for anyone who built a CAFO, (factory farm), in a rural area in earlier times. It wasn’t socially or morally acceptable for one person in the community to benefit at the expense of others.

A Wisconsin state senate district signals a return to the days when it mattered if you poisoned your neighbor.

From a piece here from May 2017 on the work of Wisconsin Republicans to methodically vector manure into rural communties, while depelting groundwater for the sole benefit of Big Ag:

Clean water activists in Saratoga, Wisconsin fight for
water and oppose the siting of a proposed factory farm

An impressive feat the last six years during Wisconsin's lost decade is the organization of citizen groups around the state to defend clean and abundant water.

The citizens' worst enemy are the state representatives who should be working for citizens.

In central Wisconsin, local representatives run political interference for Big Ag which pollutes and depletes ground and surface waters. [State Rep. Scott Krug, (R-Nekoosa), threatened this site with a libel suit in 2014 when I noted Krug running this "political interference," a threat Krug dropped after I advised him truth is an absolute defense against defamation actions, among other defects in Krug's threat with respect to libel law, (Mal Contends), (Capital Times), (Crooks and Liars).]

Defiling Wisconsin's waters has the political support of local State Rep. Scott Krug, (R-Nekoosa) and State Sen. Patrick Testin, (R-Stevens Point) who represent the gerrymandered districts drawn to elect Republicans. These legislators also lend their support to the proposed Wysocki factory farm. 

Wysocki and his family bankrolled State Sen. Testin with $10,000 in contributions for his successful 2016 run. Krug's 2016 campaign received heavy funding from Wisconsin Assembly Speaker Ron Vos Gov. Scott Walker and other Republican interests aligned with Big Ag, (Wisconsin Democracy Campaign),

After Krug and Testin helped ram through the Big Ag-supported Senate Bill 76 last week, Krug complained in his current constituent newsletter that, "The misinformation campaign by several area groups make this sound like a massively different bill than it is. I am happy to sit down with anyone and walk through the actual bill."

The groups Krug complains about include: Rome-Saratoga Friendly, Protect Wood County and Its Neighbors, Central Sands Water Action Coalition, Sustain Rural Wisconsin Network, and the Citizens' Water Coalition of Wisconsin.

Wisconsin Senate Bill 76 "is good only for the handful of really large growers, [Big Ag], who have as much concern for their fellow farmers as they have for others who need access to clean and abundant water - none!," notes Saratoga (Wisconsin), Concerned last year, (Facebook).

Of note is the fact clean and safe water groups increasingly work in concert statewide. As noted by Criste Greening in the Green Bay Progressive in late April, clean water citizen groups include the following:
Citizens' Water Coalition of Wisconsin
Sustain Rural Wisconsin Network
Wild Rivers Chapter Trout Unlimited
Friends of the Central Sands
Frac Sand Mining Awareness
Crawford Stewardship Project
Protect Wood County & Its Neighbors
Save The Hills Alliance
Kewaunee CARES
People Empowered Protect the Land (PEPL) of Rosendale
Green County Defending Our Farmland
Central Wisconsin Nature Foundation
Citizen Action Organizing Cooperative
Facing Forward Vernon Our Wisconsin Revolution
Inland Sea Society
From the Earth
Indivisible Fond du Lac
Protect Our Water
Friends of the Kinni
Concerned Rome Citizens
Rome Saratoga Friendly
Indivisible Winnebago
Central Sands Water Action Coalition
Forward Kenosha
Rinehart Lake Association
Farms Not Factories
Spirit Creek Water Protectors
Indivisible Milwaukee ~ South Side
Bad River Watershed Association
Frac Sand Sentinels
Indivisible Solon Springs
Indivisible DeForest
Concerned Citizens of Princeton
Citizens for a Better Environment Lake Mills
Emerald Clean Water For All
Penokee Hills Education Project
Penokee Hills Light Brigade
Water Protectors of Milwaukee
Friends of the Eau Claire Lakes Area
Citizens for Environmental Stewardship
Indivisible Ashland
Heartland Land Creations
League of Women Voters of Ashland and Bayfield Counties
LCO/Sawyer County Dems
Preserve Waupaca County
League of Women Voters Upper Mississippi RIver Region
Crystal Lake Club
Friends of the Tomorrow /Waupaca River
Waupaca Commoners Caucus
Constituents Only
Defending Our Ixonia Countryside
Vernon County Democratic Party
Citizens for Safe Water Around Badger
Gaia Coalition
Concerned Citizens of Easton
League of Women Voters/Greater Chippewa Valley
Clean Water Action Council of Northeast Wisconsin
Organic Consumers Association
Blue Jean Nation
Wisconsin Resources Protection Council
Echo Valley Hope
Madison Action for Mining Alternatives
Reedsburg Area Concerned Citizens