High-Capacity Well Language Stays In Budget

Gov. Scott Walker didn’t veto a measure in the new budget that makes it harder for citizens to challenge high-capacity well permits.

The budget language prohibits citizens from challenging high-capacity well permits based on the cumulative effect of all wells on a regional water table. The language seems designed to help two proposed large-scale dairy operations in the Adams County town of Richfield, and in the Wood County town of Saratoga.

Rep. Scot Krug, R-Wisconsin Rapids, couldn’t get the language stripped out of the budget, but was able to get the policy delayed for one year. Krug says the one year reprieve gives citizens groups time for court challenges.

Nancy Koch, who’s fighting the dairy operation planned for Saratoga, says she wasn’t surprised that Governor Walker didn’t strike it with his veto pen.

Koch: “Big ag is very influential in the state of Wisconsin. It’s the stripping of the rights away of the individual citizen. Personally I think it’s pathetic. Our groundwater supply is not unlimited.”

But supporters of the provision say it only clarifies existing law, which doesn’t allow the Department of Natural Resources to consider the cumulative effect of wells.

Scott Manley, vice president of government relations for Wisconsin Manufacturing and Commerce, said in a column: “The Legislature was right to short circuit activist litigation aimed at shutting down economic growth and job creation in key sectors of our economy.”