What we're talking about is the Great Lakes-Saint Lawrence River Water Resources Compact. This is a proposed agreement among the eight Great Lakes states and two Canadian provinces to prevent future large scale water diversions and conserve the Great Lakes Watershed.
The agreement is about a decade in the making, and so far, the Canadian Provinces--Ontario and Quebec--are on board. So too are Minnesota, Illinois, Indiana, New York, and, as of this week, Wisconsin. Michigan and Pennsylvania have yet to pass Legislation, but the compact is expected to eventually pass in both of those states. So what's been the problem in Ohio? Here's State Senator Tim Grendell
Senator Grendell: If all the compact said was thou shalt not divert water out of the great lakes basin, we wouldn't be having this conversation, but, the compact also... has some language that creates a certainty, or at least an uncertainty that private water rights in Ohio would be converted to public trust property, so that farm wells, groundwater, privately owned ponds, through this language problem in the compact, would somehow become public trust property."
It actually comes down to changing five or six words in the compact, Grendell says. But that's the kind of thing that lawyers can build cases, if not careers, on. Something that small might seems like it ought to be an easy fix. Not so, says State representative Matt Dolan who sponsored the bill in the General Assembly.
Representative Dolan:: If we make a change to the compact it destroys the four states that have already passed it. We go back to square one. It is wrong to think this is the only change that it's going to make.
Dolan says if the compact is reopened there's more than a risk that legislatures in other states, along with Quebec and Montreal, might insist on their own changes as well.
Representative Dolan: It's not just a risk, it's a certainty. Talk to them. They're all going to want their own changes. And it will dramatically stall the contract.
So, that would seem to be an impasse. But listen to this from my interview with Grendell :
Moulthrop: Is there any possibility of some sort of compromise here, something that would address your concerns about private property but still allow Ohio to sign on to the compact.
Senator Grendell: Yes, and I'm going to propose that here which is to make an amendment to the Ohio constitution making it clear that the well settled law of Ohio is that private water rights are private water rights and can't be taken by public trust. And then we can pass the compact in its flawed form but protect Ohio's private property rights.
Grendell says if he is able to move fast enough, that Constitutional Amendment could be on the November ballot.
Author Peter Annin who has chronicled decades of battles over Great Lakes Water and has been closely following the Great Lakes Compact says this could be a landmark deal.
Peter Annin:If Senator Grendell can come up with a way of appeasing his concerns through some other method than changing the compact that completely changes the scenario in Ohio and throughout the Great Lakes Basin. That completely changes the situation.
Should the Compact be approved in Ohio--and by the legislatures of Michigan and Pennsylvania--it will then be up for a vote in the US Congress.