Author: Mark Brush

More Money to Clean Brownfields

For many cities in the Midwest, one of the greatest challenges is how to re-develop old, abandoned industrial land. Known as ‘brownfields’ – these areas often host signs of days gone by – shells of old factories; rusting railroad tracks; or grain elevators that are falling apart. They are also often contaminated. And now a bill that was recently signed into law by President Bush will give more money to cities to clean up their brownfields. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports:

Transcript

For many cities in the Midwest, one of the greatest challenges is how to re-develop old, abandoned industrial land. Known as ‘brownfields’- these areas often host signs of days gone by – shells of old factories, rusting railroad tracks, or grain elevators that are falling apart. They are also often contaminated. And now a bill that was recently signed into law by President Bush will give more money to cities to clean up their brownfields. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has details:

The law will double the amount of funding available for fiscal year 2003. The money will help cover the costs of assessing and cleaning up brownfields. Officials are pleased with the increased funding, but they say environmental clean up is just one hurdle in re-selling, and ultimately re-using, the land. Donna Duscharme is the co-director of the Delta Institute in Chicago:

“Well, it takes an enormous amount of work and knowledge to get through a lot of the barriers that are facing the re-development of these sites. The EPA really focuses very heavily on the environmental barriers, but there are also often other barriers.”

Duscharme says these barriers include things like demolition of old buildings, debris removal, legal work to clear the land of outstanding liens, and the legwork necessary to find potential buyers for the land. These costs often can’t be re-couped in the sale of the property. So other sources of funding need to be found before the land can be re-used. For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mark Brush.

Engineering a Cleaner Pig

Like most farmers, hog farmers have seen a shift from small, family-owned farms, to large-scale hog operations, but more pigs on less land creates some major environmental problems – especially, what to do with all that manure. Bio-tech researchers in Canada believe they have created an animal that will help. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has more:

An International Wildlife Refuge?

An effort to create North America’s first international wildlife refuge is gathering speed. The refuge will be a partnership between Canada and the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has more:

Transcript

An effort to create North America’s first international wildlife refuge is gathering speed. The refuge will be a partnership between Canada and the U-S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has details:


The Detroit River was once home to a thriving set of coastal wetlands and marshes. It was an area teeming with wildlife. But after more than a century of development – most of that habitat has been lost. The proposed international wildlife refuge hopes to turn back the pressures for more development.


The refuge would include the Canadian and U-S sides of the lower Detroit River – lands from the coal-choked Zug Island to the mouth of Lake Erie.


If established, the refuge will be a patchwork federal, state, and privately owned land. And so far, they’ve had some success. Several small islands have been donated or are being bought for inclusion into the refuge.


The first step will be to set up the boundaries of the refuge. Once established, funds may be appropriated for things like buying more land, establishing conservation agreements, and re-creating wildlife habitat.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium I’m Mark Brush.

Wolf Takes Long Trip South

  • Canis lupus: Gray Wolf – Photo courtesy of Michigan Department of Natural Resources © 2001.

The gray wolf is making a comeback in the upper Midwest, and for some young wolves the area may be getting a little too crowded. It’s not unusual for young wolves to travel long distances to stake out a territory of their own, but as the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports… one wolf’s trip has surprised everyone:

Transcript

The gray wolf is making a comeback in the upper Midwest. And for some young wolves the area may be getting a little too crowded. It’s not unusual for young wolves to travel long distances to stake out a territory of their own, but as the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports… one wolf’s trip has surprised everyone:


The wolf was first seen two and half years ago as a young pup in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. At that time he was caught in a trap, and wildlife officials tagged him as “Wolf No. 18.” They fitted him with a radio collar and followed his movements for nine months before they lost track of him.


About a year and a half… and over 450 miles later, the wolf’s luck came to an end. A bow hunter from central Missouri saw the wolf snooping around his sheep pen. The hunter shot and killed the wolf – apparently mistaking it for a coyote. He realized his mistake when he noticed the radio collar.


Typically, young wolves travel west or northwest from Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, so when Michigan Wildlife Division Supervisor Jim Hammill heard the news that one of their wolves had turned up in Missouri… he could only think of one explanation:


“My first reaction was that somebody possibly killed the wolf in Michigan and transported it to Missouri and they found the carcass of the animal down there… but that was not what happened… and you know this animal was seen alive in Missouri before it was killed, so you know, it’s obvious that this was a natural movement and, uh, really sort of a stunning thing to have happened.”


Stunning because Hammill has never heard of a wolf traveling this far south before. They’ve seen wolves travel as far west… and northwest, but typically those wolves have an easier trip. Wolf Number 18 would have had to overcome huge obstacles, such as a number of major highways, a number of rivers including the Mississippi, and large open spaces like farms.


Hammill says this wolf’s trip will likely shed some light on the gray wolf’s behavior. And that may be especially helpful to biologists in the northeast – a region that hasn’t heard the howl of a wolf for some time:


“A lot of folks up there feel that there’s no way that wolves could re-populate the area without a trap and translocation program. But, you know, I wonder about that because of the kinds of movements that we’ve been seeing here in the Midwest.”


Wolf 18’s body has been shipped back to a Michigan Department of Natural Resources lab. There – they’ll try to piece together just what this wolf encountered on his historic trip south. For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mark Brush.

Hope for Kirtland’s Warbler

Next month, Kirtland’s Warblers will begin their yearly winter trek. They’ll be flying more than eleven hundred miles from their only known nesting ground in Michigan to their wintering grounds in the Caribbean Islands. The bird was one of the first species to be listed as endangered in 1973. But thanks to several decades worth of forest and wildlife management, the bird’s numbers are increasing. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush has more:

Combined Sewers Under Pressure (Part 1)

  • An overflow point in a combined sewer line. The overflow is designed to relieve pressure on an overburdened sewer system. Photo courtesy of the USEPA.

Over the last century, cities across the nation have built an intricate web of underground sewers. These sewers originally channeled waste directly into nearby streams, but with the advent of the environmental movement, and along with it, the Clean Water Act, treatment plants were built to clean the sewage before it reached the streams. Today, a growing population and a continuing boom in development has placed increasing pressure on our underground network of pipes. In the first of a two-part series, the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports the aging systems are in need of help:

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Massive Sewer Projects Drain Funds (Part 2)

  • A new sewer line north of Detroit in the Clinton River watershed. The new interceptor-sewer is being built by Jay Dee contractors for the city of Detroit. Photo by Mark Brush.

Cities across the region are feeling more and more pressure to fix their aging sewer systems. Most of the cities in the Midwest have what’s called ‘combined’ sewer systems. That’s where sewage from homes and industries mixes together with water flowing off city streets after a rainstorm. The rush of water is often more than treatment plants can handle, and when that happens, the dirty water overflows into nearby streams or into people’s basements. In the second of a two-part series, the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports that cities are trying to solve these enormous problems at a time when federal money is hard to find:

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Faster E. Coli Test in the Works

Summer beach closings can spoil a family outing. Beaches are
often closed when high levels of E. coli bacteria are found in the
water.
The trouble is – current tests don’t show how much bacteria is in the
water until a day or two later. That’s too late for people who’ve
already been swimming in the polluted water. But now, as the
Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mark Brush reports, researchers may
have found a way to get faster results: