(Bowling Green, OH) Cleaning up Lake Erie could be a big topic for Ohio's leaders during a meeting in Bowling Green today.
The Ohio Lake Erie Commission holds its quarterly meeting today at the state EPA's district office in BG. The commission oversee's the state's Lake Erie Protection Fund, a grant program for projects that benefit the Lake Erie watershed economically and environmentally.
The state directors of the EPA, ODOT, health, agriculture, and department of natural resources all are members of the commission-- and their discussion may center on how those projects will help in light of a judge's recent ruling ordering the federal EPA to declare Lake Erie's western basin a distressed waterway, which brings all kinds of rules, regulations, and resources to bear from the federal government toward clean-up.
The meeting comes on the heels of a new Ohio EPA report issued this week.
Voluntary farm incentives to stop nutrient runoff into the Lake Erie watershed don't appear to be working. According to the report, there has been no obvious decrease in phosphorus and nitrogen runoff from Northwest Ohio farms into the Maumee River and other lake tributaries.
In fact, the scientific study shows the Maumee River delivered the highest annual phosphorous load and directly blames agricultural land as the number one cause.