The Lake Erie Bill of Rights, passed in a special election on Feb. 26, gives the lake similar rights to what people have. The initiative is an unprecedented effort by Toledoans for Safe Water to try and speak on behalf on the health of the Lake Erie ecosystem by allowing citizens of the Great Lakes Basin to sue entities that pollute the lake.
Lake Erie Center Director Thomas Bridgeman believes the Lake Erie Bill of Rights is well-intended but not very realistic.
“I would say the major drawbacks, as far as I know them, are that it’s not likely to be held up in courts, so it will probably never go into effect,” he said. “A major benefit, I think, is just promoting a change in attitude that entities such as the Great Lakes don’t exist solely for the benefit of humans, but they have their own intrinsic right to be healthy, and to be a healthy ecosystem for all of the organisms living in and around those water bodies, including humans.”
BGSU microbial physiology professor George Bullerjahn agrees the initiative is a step in the right direction but is overall too idealistic.
“All we’ll be doing is paying a bunch of lawyers to decide in court what we probably already know, which is that Lake Erie is not something that can be given rights,” he said. “It’s hard for me to imagine how a feature on the earth’s surface can be given rights. Where do you draw a line? Does a mountain have rights? Does my back yard have rights? It’s not the best use of resources, especially if this is going to get tied up in the courts.”
Toledo citizens have been facing issues of pollution in Lake Erie for years, such as in 2014 when a toxic algae bloom left hundreds of thousands without potable water. Bullerjahn believes that there are signs of improvement in Lake Erie but still thinks some regulation will be required to manage the nutrients that flow into it.
“Since it’s an agriculturally-driven problem, there are scenarios that achieve or come close to achieving the nutrient reductions which are necessary. I’m optimistic that we can get there, that nutrients can be reduced to the level by which the algae blooms are minor events. Given a few years I think we’ll be in better shape, but we’re not in good shape now,” Bullerjahn said.
Bullerjahn says that the impairment designation for the open waters of Lake Erie, announced last year, is a more realistic halfway point.
“That means we can follow up with lawsuits that demand that the EPA sets a total and maximum load for nutrients, and that’s what’s actually happening right now. There is a lawsuit to push the EPA in that direction. I think that’s the productive pathway,” he said.
Hannah Brickner, a senior environmental science major at BGSU, supports the effort while understanding that the bill is radical and ecocentric, meaning it focuses on nature as having rights but doesn’t concern the economic side of the issue.
“Realistically, environmental policy should have voices from an economic point of view and an environmental point of view. There should be innovations and negotiations that are put together to meet the needs of the environment while also maintaining a healthy economy,” she said.