A judge dismissed a lawsuit on Thursday that had been filed against the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources over mining exploration in northwestern Wisconsin.
Eight residents of the Penokee Hills filed the lawsuit earlier this year, alleging that the Wisconsin DNR should have issued an industrial stormwater runoff permit when Gogebic Taconite took bulk samples of rock in Iron County.
Taylor County Circuit Court Judge Ann Knox Bauer dismissed the suit. Attorney Dennis Grzezinski, who represented the eight people who filed the petition against the DNR, said he hadn’t seen the ruling yet, and therefore wasn’t able to comment on it.
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The DNR’s attorney Anthony Russomanno declined to comment as well, though he confirmed that the petition has been dismissed. He deferred comment to the Wisconsin Department of Justice.
A spokeswoman with the Justice Department deferred comment on the matter to the DNR.
In the judge’s ruling, Bauer wrote: “This court cannot conclude that the DNR’s decision was without a rational basis, or that there was an error in the application of the law.”
The DNR’s Ann Coakley told Wisconsin Public Radio in May that they found no problems at the three pits GTAC sampled.
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