APRIL 18, 2015
MANSON, IOWA
The flat, endless acres of black dirt here in northern Iowa
will soon be filled with corn and soybean seeds. But as farmers tuned up their
tractors and waited for the perfect moment to plant, another topic weighed on
their minds: a lawsuit filed in federal court by the state’s largest water
utility.
After years of mounting frustration, the utility, Des Moines
Water Works, sued the leaders of three rural Iowa counties last month. Too
little has been done, the lawsuit says, to prevent nitrates from flowing out of
farm fields into the Raccoon River and, eventually, into the drinking water
supply for roughly 500,000 Iowans. The suit seeks to make farmers comply with federal
clean-water standards for nitrates that apply to factories and commercial
users, and requests unspecified damages.
“It’s very clear to me that traditional, industrial
agriculture has no real interest in taking the steps that are necessary to
radically change their operations in a way that will protect our drinking water,”
said Bill Stowe, the chief executive of Des Moines Water Works. High nitrate
runoff, which can result from nitrogen-rich soil and applied fertilizer, places
Des Moines’s drinking water in danger of violating federal quality standards,
Mr. Stowe said, and increases costs and poses health risks for customers.
Des Moines Water Works, the state’s largest utility said
nitrate levels had put drinking water in danger of violating federal standards
The lawsuit raises not only the legal question of whether
the government should regulate the water that drains off farmers’ land, but
also the existential issue of whether rural and urban Iowans can collaborate to
solve vexing problems. In a state where agriculture drives the economy, grain
silos are featured on license plates and people pride themselves on a certain
brand of “Iowa nice,” farmers like Brent Johnson have criticized the litigation
as an antagonistic overreach that comes at the expense of cooperation and
neighborliness.
“It’s a confrontational approach,” said Mr. Johnson, who
farms corn and soybeans here in Calhoun County, one of three counties whose
boards of supervisors were named as defendants in the lawsuit. “I think there’s
been a lot of progress made. I don’t know any farmer who wants to increase
nitrates in the river.”
The nitrate issue is, in many ways, an unfortunate side
effect of one of Iowa’s great assets: the nutrient-rich dirt that makes for
some of the world’s most productive cropland. Though that nitrogen-filled soil
helps Mr. Johnson and others grow prodigious amounts of corn and soybeans, a significant
rainstorm can wash many of those nutrients, along with nitrates applied as
fertilizer, into tributaries of the Raccoon River. The Raccoon is one of two
rivers that provide drinking water for Des Moines, the state’s capital and
urban center.
Notably, most everyone involved agrees that the nitrates in
the water supply are a problem, and that farmers can play a role in solving it.
But while Mr. Stowe and the utility want to hold farmers to strict federal
water quality standards, Mr. Johnson and the state’s powerful agricultural
groups favor a voluntary system.
Last year, months before the lawsuit was filed, the state
associations for corn, soybean and pork producers formed the Iowa Agriculture
Water Alliance, which bills itself as a farmer-led effort to improve water
quality. The group’s executive director, Sean McMahon, said that many farmers
were eager to employ conservation practices, but that education and time were
needed to see more results. Money, he said, would be better spent on outreach
and cost-sharing programs than on lawyers for the lawsuit.
Leaders of other agricultural associations expressed similar
sentiments, while saying they still appreciated the urgency of the problem.
“We need to scale it up,” said Roger Wolf, director of
environmental programs and services for the Iowa Soybean Association. “We know
that.”
Mr. Johnson, whose family has worked these fields for more
than 100 years, says he and his neighbors care deeply about the land and
understand the concerns raised in the lawsuit. On his property, Mr. Johnson uses
a limited-tilling method, and he has planted rows of switch grass on the edge
of one field and has filled wetlands with native grasses. Experts say those
tactics can help keep nutrients in the field and out of the water system.
Mr. Johnson, who serves on the county soil and water
conservation commission, made those changes on his own. He said he feared that
the lawsuit, if successful, would add a regulatory burden just as many farmers
were making voluntary changes. “That’s not healthy for agriculture, I don’t
think, to take the voluntary out,” he said.
In Des Moines, Mr. Stowe said years of encouraging changes
through voluntary programs had simply not brought about significant results.
Nitrate levels in the Raccoon River remain stubbornly high, which required the
utility to run its nitrate removal facilities for three months last winter, a
rarity. In 2013, he said, Des Moines was barely able to remove nitrates quickly
enough to keep up with demand, and nearly violated federal regulations. Just
last Thursday, the utility turned its nitrate removal tanks back on, citing
high levels of runoff upstream.
The Des Moines Water Works utility wants to hold farmers to
federal standards to limit nitrates, but agricultural groups favor a voluntary
system.
However the issue is addressed, there are costs. Mr.
Johnson’s conservation practices required taking land out of production,
potentially reducing profits at harvest time. For Des Moines Water Works,
operating the tanks that remove nitrates is expensive.
The lawsuit, filed in federal court for the Northern
District of Iowa, names the boards of supervisors in Buena Vista and Sac
Counties, along with the board in Calhoun County, as defendants, saying they
are responsible for overseeing drainage districts that have allowed nitrate-heavy
water to make its way into rivers.
Water with excessive nitrates can cause serious health
problems, especially in infants, and some environmental groups, including
the Iowa Environmental Council and the Sierra Club’s Iowa
chapter, have expressed skepticism about the effectiveness of voluntary
reductions.
Individual farmers’ efforts and anecdotal reports of
success, Mr. Stowe said, have not been enough to counter others’ reluctance to
make major changes. At this point, he said, collaboration with agricultural
groups would have to come in addition to regulation, not instead of it.
“Talking the game and walking the game were two very
different issues,” Mr. Stowe said. “This is not ‘Alice in Wonderland.’ This is
Iowa. Our water’s getting worse, and we’re going to fight forward to protect
it.”
That fight, however, has drawn the ire of many politicians.
State Senator Randy Feenstra, a Republican, wrote in a recent blog post that
the lawsuit was proof of an “arrogant mentality against rural Iowa.” He called
for rural Iowans to start an economic boycott of Des Moines.
Iowa’s elected agriculture secretary, Bill Northey, has also
criticized the lawsuit, though with less pointed language. Mr. Northey, a
Republican who farms corn and soybeans, said the effects of the lawsuit could
resound far beyond the three counties named as defendants if the water utility
succeeded. The state has recently invested in programs to limit nitrate runoff,
he said, and more time should be allowed for those programs to work.
Several farmers agreed, and many said they had seen
significant progress in just the past few years. On his farm in Greene County,
in central Iowa, David Ausberger planted cover crops last fall, which can help
keep dirt in place between the harvest and planting seasons. In Ida and Sac
Counties, Jolene Riessen said her family was reducing tilling and using other
methods to limit runoff.
“Farmers want to do the right thing,” said Ms. Riessen, a
farmer and seed dealer. “But sometimes, it’s learning what is the right thing,
or the combination of right things, and having the finances to do it.”
In the meantime, as planting season begins, farmers say they
are discussing the lawsuit, figuring out what it could mean for them and
bracing for a contentious court battle that could last years.
“Some guys are mad; some guys are sad,” Mr. Johnson said.
“Everybody’s concerned.”
Source: http://www.nytimes.com