Great Lakes, Big Stakes

In late January, Chicago WILDERNESS Editor Debra Shore sat down with two representatives from Illinois’ Congressional delegation, Democrat Melissa Bean (IL-8) and Republican Mark Kirk (IL-10), to discuss their environmental agendas, their favorite places, and the prospects for the Great Lakes Restoration Act.

When Melissa Bean won a seat in Congress in November 2004, it was considered one of the biggest upsets of that election. She defeated the longest-serving Republican member of the House of Representatives, Phil Crane, and the environment was one of her strongest issues.

Bean, 44, lives with her husband, Alan, and two daughters, Victoria and Michelle, in Barrington in northwest Cook County. “We actually live out on a small lake,” Bean said. “My daughters love it. They can fish and go out on the water. When we bike, we go to Cuba Marsh by Ela and Cuba Roads. My in-laws have a place in Hayward, Wisconsin, which is where we disconnect best because it’s just so quiet.

“People who’ve moved to the 8th District really appreciate the value of open space,” Bean said. “Air quality and water quality are big issues. And people have had some really sad stories to tell. There were some people living in Wauconda near a Superfund site that may have been leaking vinyl chloride into their wells, contaminating their water. With Senator Durbin’s help, we were able to get them about $750,000 in federal funding so they could get access to city water.” This issue remains contentious for many residents who appreciate access to safe water supplies but still want the contaminated site cleaned up. Bean says she is continuing to seek a solution.

Bean and Congressman Mark Kirk are both sponsors of the Great Lakes Restoration Act of 2005 (HR 792); introduced by Illinois’ Rahm Emanuel), along with most other members of the Illinois delegation and many from the Great Lakes states. The Act recognizes the vital importance of the Great Lakes as a source of fresh water for more than 40 million residents of the United States and Canada and seeks funding to restore health to the fishery, protect against invasive species, clean shorelines of polluted sediments, and reduce beach closings, among other things. In 2003, for instance, there were a record 1,473 beach closings due to high bacteria levels in Lake Michigan alone.

Bean has begun an initiative to involve area small businesses in Lake Michigan restoration. By recruiting local companies with an interest in the lake’s quality, she is working to bring residents, government entities, and the business community together in common purpose.

“If we can get the Great Lakes Restoration Act through,” Bean says, “it calls for a public education campaign. That legislation is about committing to the concept of moving forward. It’s more about planning and targeting than appropriations at this point. Without pay-as-you-go budget rules, it’s just harder to even find the money to do anything you want to do. Once we get our fiscal house back in order, we can do so much more.”

Still, Bean is proud of her efforts to defeat proposals to permit drilling for oil in the Great Lakes, and she saluted her fellow Congressman’s support. “Mark Kirk came out to our press conference when we talked about drilling for oil in the Great Lakes,” she pointed out. “He may have been the only Republican to do so.”

Mark Kirk was elected to Congress in 2000 from Illinois’ 10th District, encompassing the eastern part of Lake County and northern Cook County. Part of a group of moderate Republicans seeking to promote environmental protection and fiscal responsibility in Congress, Kirk is one of three representatives from the Chicago Wilderness region to serve on the powerful House Appropriations Committee. The others are Representative Jesse Jackson, Jr. (IL) and Peter Visclosky (IN).

An intelligence officer in the Naval Reserves and an attorney, Kirk lives with his wife Kimberly at the former Fort Sheridan in Highland Park. He has been a strong advocate for open space preservation, helping to ensure that the bluffs of Fort Sheridan remain protected from development, voting in favor of a provision in the energy bill that permanently bans drilling for oil in the Great Lakes, and opposing drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. “Anybody who seeks to drill [in the Great Lakes] now needs an Act of Congress,” Kirk said, stressing how difficult that will be.

Kirk has a great affinity for Lake Michigan, paradoxically because he nearly drowned in the lake at age 16. His favorite place now, he says, is the bluffs along the Winnetka shoreline. In working to save the bluffs and ravines of Fort Sheridan, Kirk notes that the primary threat to the site was not invasive species, but developers.

Lately he’s been drafting a bill in Congress to provide more favorable tax treatment for landowners who donate open space. “Especially in exurbia,” Kirk says, “you’ve got land holdings owned by people with strong aesthetic values. We don’t want a life in which the entire ride to school is along a strip mall.”

Kirk was cautiously optimistic about the prospect of bringing the Great Lakes restoration legislation to the House floor this spring. Even without that important new initiative, Kirk points out, we already have 69 federal programs devoted to protecting the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes Legacy Act, for instance, has provided money — up to $30 million — for cleaning contaminated sediments in harbors, from which Waukegan has benefited greatly. “As a result of the $21 million we will be able to spend to clean up Waukegan Harbor,” Kirk said, “property values in Lake County will go up by $800 million and the average house value in Waukegan will increase by $53,000.” The federal government can pay up to two-thirds of the cleanup costs, but the state and local authorities will need to pick up the rest, which has been the obstacle so far.

The Great Lakes Restoration plan could potentially engage 128 members of Congress (those whose districts touch upon or are affected by the Great Lakes). “If they all share a dream,” Kirk said, “you have a force far wider and more powerful than what we had for the Everglades.”

To protect the Great Lakes from the further introduction of invasive species, Kirk plans to introduce legislation that will require all foreign freighters entering the Great Lakes to disinfect their ballast tanks. The U.S. Coast Guard and the Canadian Mounted Police would share responsibility for enforcing this law.

“Sometimes I look at Lake Michigan,” Kirk mused, “and I wonder what was the wildlife like, what was the shoreline like, what was the lake like when Marquette paddled here. And in 100 years, could a lot of the lake look like that again?”