Coalition puts forward plan to protect and restore Ohio River basin waters
Republished from Kentucky Lantern
A coalition representing universities, environmental conservation nonprofits and more has released what it says is a roadmap to protecting and conserving waterways in the Ohio River basin.
The 96-page draft plan released Thursday details numerous challenges ranging from industrial and coal mining pollution to the proliferation of invasive species and extreme flooding driven by climate change.
The report also calls for more funding for water infrastructure and water quality monitoring and for more collaboration among the federal government and local, tribal and state governments.
Jordan Lubetkin, the senior director of Ohio River restoration at the National Wildlife Federation, during a Thursday press conference said trying to fix “serious and complex environmental problems across vast geographies” is hard, expensive and takes time.
“This report is premised on a concept that has proven wildly successful in other parts of the country. That is namely, when local, state and tribal governments partner with the federal government to restore large landscapes, good things happen,” Luketkin said.
The coalition points to coordinated efforts that have worked to restore waters and wetlands such as the Chesapeake Bay, the Everglades, the Great Lakes and Puget Sound as examples of what could be possible. Democratic U.S. Rep. Morgan McGarvey of Louisville introduced a bill last year, co-sponsored by Republican U.S. Rep. Erin Houchin of Southern Indiana, that sought to create a new federal office overseeing the restoration of the Ohio River basin.
The plan was released by the Ohio River Basin Alliance, the University of Louisville’s Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute and the National Wildlife Federation but had contributions from hundreds of people across West Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Illinois, Tennessee and other states. The plan also pulled feedback from community listening sessions in the Ohio River Basin over the course of 2022 and 2023.
The problems facing waterways and wetlands across the 204,000 square miles of the Ohio River basin are multifold: Waterways have been altered through the digging of ditches, drainage of wetlands and construction of dams and levees. Wastewater, stormwater and drinking water infrastructure is complex, aging and failing. Pollution into waters comes from acid mine drainage, agriculture, fracking and other industries.
Ted Smith, director of the Center for Healthy Air, Water and Soil at the University of Louisville’s Christina Lee Brown Envirome Institute, said hundreds of toxic Superfund sites in the Ohio River basin have yet to be fully remediated.
“We’ve all experienced more extreme weather events, and here in Kentucky we’ve had regular, significant flooding, 100 year floods every few years,” Smith said. Not cleaning up those Superfund sites, he said, puts “the whole water system at significant risk every year.”
“The future of the country is really going to hang on our ability to address the integrity of these water systems and do it in a way that’s going to work for generations to come,” Smith said.
Despite waters throughout Kentucky and the Ohio River basin already being impaired by pollution, Smith said he’s optimistic that “this is something that can be addressed.”
The report also notes the need to strengthen and enforce water quality regulations.
“The failure to update and enforce clean water protections threatens to not only undermine restoration progress (e.g., investing in wetland restoration while allowing wetlands to be filled and destroyed), but also jeopardizes public health, restricts outdoor recreation activities, and suppresses economic growth,” the report states.
When asked how the current weakening of federal and state water quality regulations played a role in the coalition’s plan, Ohio River Basin Alliance chair Chris Lorentz said “regulations to couple with these recommendations are absolutely necessary.”
“We’re focusing on showcasing the benefits that these investments will result in and hopefully gain stronger support for tighter regulations,” said Lorentz, a professor of biological sciences at Thomas More University in Northern Kentucky.
Kentucky state lawmakers passed a law this year that significantly limited the state’s ability to regulate water pollution, and the Trump administration is looking at scaling back oversight of waters and wetlands under the Clean Water Act.
The coalition is seeking public comments on the draft plan through July 7.
Kentucky Lantern is part of States Newsroom, a network of news bureaus supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Kentucky Lantern maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jamie Lucke for questions: [email protected]. Follow Kentucky Lantern on Facebook and Twitter. Kentucky Lantern stories may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0.
Donate to Kentucky Lantern here.
