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SD public defense duties shift from counties to state; SCOTUS appears skeptical of restricting government communications with social media companies; Trump lawyers say he can't make bond; new scholarships aim to connect class of 2024 to high-demand jobs.

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The SCOTUS weighs government influence on social media, and who groups like the NRA can do business with. Biden signs an executive order to advance women's health research and the White House tells Israel it's responsible for the Gaza humanitarian crisis.

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Midwest regenerative farmers are rethinking chicken production, Medicare Advantage is squeezing the finances of rural hospitals and California's extreme swing from floods to drought has some thinking it's time to turn rural farm parcels into floodplains.

Concern About Nitrate Levels At Huge Central Wisconsin Farm

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Monday, April 14, 2014   

MADISON, Wis. – The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (DNR) will hold a hearing Tuesday afternoon at the Adams County Community Center in Adams regarding a pollutant discharge permit for Burr Oak Heifers, a huge farm with thousands of head of cattle.

The farm already has paid a fine of $65,000 for groundwater contamination, and many environmentalists say the farm has not made necessary improvements and is still discharging nitrates that get into the groundwater.

Elizabeth Wheeler is staff attorney for the state's largest environmental advocacy group, Clean Wisconsin. Her group and others are opposed to the DNR granting another permit to the farm.

"Exception that the DNR is giving them for the nitrate standard is almost three times higher than the health-based enforcement standard that exists under current law,” she points out. “I don't believe that there's any way that they can actually make a finding that's going to be protective of public health."

Nitrates in groundwater are known to cause blue baby disease, which affects the ability of a baby's blood to carry oxygen.

According to Wheeler, groundwater at the site remains contaminated, and she says rather than granting a permit, the DNR should force the operation to clean up its site.

Owners of the farm say their new plans and construction will address the issue.

Wheeler disagrees, saying to issue the permit the DNR would have to prove that the facility is protective of public health and that it is designed in the best possible way to prevent any future groundwater contamination.

She says the DNR has not made any of those official findings in this permit proceeding.

Wheeler says this is the latest example in a trend of the DNR not following its own rules.

"They are continuing to be lax in their enforcement, and now we're seeing them continue to be lax in their permitting as well,” she maintains. “Just because DNR is saying that the activity is legal doesn't necessarily make it the right thing to do."

Wheeler says it's shocking to think that given what we know about the dangers of nitrate contamination that allowing more pollution from the farm is even considered an option.





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