PESHTIGO — What started as a listening session became a back-and-forth between a PFAS activist and Sens. Eric Wimberger, Mary Felzkowski and Rep. Jeff Mursau.
The three legislators visited the Town of Peshtigo Town Hall last Friday and heard from residents on the issues concerning them.
Wimberger, R-De Pere, is the senator for the 30th District, which includes Marinette County. However, the county will be handed over to the 12th District after new legislative maps take over next year. Felzkowski, R-Tomahawk, the incumbent, has announced she will campaign for the district, which now has new borders.
Most of the 16 attendees in the audience were quiet during the exchange with the politicians — one woman said she just came to say hi.
Doug Oitzinger, Marinette Common Council Alderperson and member of S.O.H2O, a local activist group, was in attendance to ask a question on Senate Bill 312, a bill authored by Wimberger that prevents private landowners, or “innocent landowners,” from being held accountable for PFAS pollution on their property.
The topic was discussed for about 30 minutes as Oitzinger and the group of three exchanged in a civil discussion.
Oitzinger mentioned that activists were urging Gov. Tony Evers to veto SB 312. He said the bill’s language strips the Department of Natural Resources’ authority to enforce PFAS cleanup for corporate polluters like Johnson Controls Inc./Tyco.
It all came down to a sentence under 292.32 in the bill that said the department couldn’t take action on someone’s land unless the PFAS levels exceeded a certain level or “promulgated standard.”
“Everything the DNR has done up until this very minute, they could not have done because you prevent them from taking any enforcement action on those certain promulgated standards. To this day, there isn’t a promulgated standard,” Oitzinger said.
“I would not have supported that bill if it meant that,” Wimberger said.
Wisconsin must set its own groundwater standards, and they don’t have them yet. Therefore, without a standard, his reasoning explained that people wouldn’t be held accountable.
Oitzinger said his biggest takeaway was that all three legislators said there wasn’t a chance to get PFAS groundwater standards in 2024. He mentioned the time that residents have spent living with the knowledge of contaminated groundwater — getting a standard set for groundwater would help move the process along in getting safer options.
“We’ve suffered under this for seven years, and you can understand our skepticism that after seven years, there’s still not a PFAS standard in the state of Wisconsin,” Oitzinger said.
Wimberger mentioned the need for a scientific connection to cement a standard in law, which could be difficult. He said the government relies on the 70 parts per trillion drinking water standard to regulate, but even that wasn’t based on a scientific connection.
Oitzinger politely asked back.
“We’ve had a scientific recommendation since, I believe it was 2019, for 20 parts per trillion on PFOA and PFOS combined, and you’re saying that’s not scientific enough from the Department of Health Services?” Oitzinger said.
Wimberger said he often asked the governor for an emergency order to set a groundwater standard, but Gov. Evers declined.
“He’s the one not taking this seriously, to be honest,” Wimberger said.
Mursau, R-Crivitz, asked why Oitzinger would ask the governor to veto when the polluter was identified as Johnson Controls Inc./Tyco in the Marinette area. He said the time it takes to settle issues in court with the known polluter could also be spent cleaning up the issue.
“Johnson Controls is not going to get off the hook for what they did,” Mursau said.
“We believe that the next Johnson Controls that comes along would be left off the hook because of this language,” Oitzinger said.
“We can demonize the companies that manufacture and utilize PFAS, but I want you to think about something,” Felzkowski said. “This is a chemical that the FDA put their stamp of approval on and said, ‘This is awesome. Please utilize it.’ We, as a government, are just as erroneous on this as our private sector businesses. In my role, this is a public-private partnership to clean it up.”
Wimberger said that the language that Oitzinger and S.O.H2O had problems with didn’t come up as an issue when formulating the bill. He agreed with Oitzinger and said the DNR said it’s rare to enforce action on innocent landowners — but that depends on how many have come forward, which may have been very few people.
“I do not understand why you have to have that sentence in there,” Oitzinger said. “If that one sentence had not been in there, I know those of us who had been urging the governor to veto this bill would not be doing that.”
“Eric explained it. You don’t agree with it, but he explained it,” Felzkowski said.
Wimberger said the DNR can rely on plenty of involuntary tests regardless of SB 312 or a promulgated rule.
He reiterated that the bill encourages private landowners to get their land tested without fear.
“A business will be subject to so many involuntary water tests that the DNR can use through permitting processes that a point source polluter won’t be able to skirt through,” Wimberger said.
“I don’t buy any of this that we shouldn’t be quote-unquote ‘demonizing’ when for at least three years they (JCI/Tyco) knew they had a problem in our area and didn’t tell the public,” Oitzinger said.
Mursau followed up.
“Me personally, if that sentence isn’t in there, I don’t give a damn if it’s in there or not,” Mursau said. “As long as the money gets out to the people so they can start cleaning up their wells. That’s what I want.”
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