The director of the state’s Pollution Control Agency had encouraging news for area cities that operate wastewater treatment facilities. For the past few years, some officials in our area have issued dire warnings about the impact of enforcing the state’s longstanding, but little enforced, sulfate limit for wild rice waters. They have argued that enforcement could shut down the state’s mining industry and cost area cities millions if they’re forced to comply.

PCA director John Linc Stine helped clarify the issue this week before a nice crowd at an issues forum sponsored by Range Area Municipalities and Schools, or RAMS, held in Virginia. He noted, and IRRRB Commissioner Tony Sertich repeated, a very important caveat in the federal Clean Water Act— namely that the affordability of a treatment solution is a significant factor when determining how and when a publicly-owned and operated treatment facility is required to come into compliance. In other words, claims that enforcement would very soon cost small cities in our region hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars, aren’t grounded in reality.

If anything, their message to area cities was: don’t worry. And if, at some point years down the line, cities need to upgrade their treatment systems, it’s likely that the IRRRB or other state agencies would be able to offer financial assistance.

We’ve already addressed the hyperbole surrounding this issue and its potential impact on mining in previous editorials. It was never going to shut down mining, and it won’t deter any financially-viable mining operation from starting up, either. PolyMet, for example, has long maintained that it can meet the standard, so there has never been a reason to weaken the law, as some have argued.

What’s more, Director Stine offered the latest in his agency’s effort to learn more about the link between sulfate and the decline of wild rice. The agency’s initial findings, as we’ve previously reported, supported the 10 parts per million limit currently in law. Peer review of those findings, while offering some mild criticism and a number of suggestions for additional research, did nothing to undermine the PCA’s original conclusion. Director Stine said he won’t allow data to be cherry-picked to move the standard towards a specific target, and that’s a good thing. Doing otherwise sets up the state for a lawsuit, one that they would likely lose.

While we’ve witnessed plenty of hand-wringing by local officials over this issue, this week’s forum should calm most fears. Any enforcement is likely still years away and municipalities, in either case, will be given substantial flexibility, time, and (likely) funding to come into compliance.

At this point, arguing for weakening the standard is inappropriate. Why would anyone seek to weaken a standard that would protect wild rice from disappearing? We’ve already seen the loss of too much wild rice from the Minnesota landscape. That’s not just an issue of the human economy; it also affects the many waterfowl that rely on wild rice for food. There’s simply nothing standing in the way of doing the right thing. So let’s allow the research to continue and let the data, not the politics, guide our decision-making. Whatever the result, the standard will almost certainly be one that everyone can live with.