Hello, you devilish do-gooders!

Another bad idea from last year has risen from the dead. AB 935/SB 789 would allow destructive and unregulated dredging on any Wisconsin water body that is “affected by a man-made impoundment.” That phrase is not well defined which increases the number of waters this bill could apply to.  For example, the Chippewa Flowage is affected by a man-made structure so it could apply.
 
What the Bill Does
This bill would allow a landowner to remove up to 50 cubic yards of material from waters affected by a man-made impoundment every year. This is the equivalent of removing five dump truck loads of material by every landowner every year without any review.

Without a permit, adjacent landowners, other users of the water and interests of the public will not be protected; dredging of this kind should be done, as it is now, through an individual permit. This bill will eliminate the review of these activities by the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) to prevent adverse effects on the state's resources.  
 
Why this bill is bad
Removing material from a lakebed can cause a number of problems, including the destruction of spawning areas or other important habitat and resuspension of silt and any contaminants present in the material.  These changes can adversely affect the lake, neighbors and other users of the water body such as swimmers, boaters, and fishermen.  In some cases, the damage would be permanent. It will create needless conflict between neighbors on Wisconsin lakes, and conflicts between landowners and users of our lakes.  For example, with no notice requirements, a neighboring riparian landowner will not know of the proposed dredging until it is underway, leading to personal conflicts and lawsuits. 
 
In addition to being able to remove the material, landowners will not have to measure the amount of sediment dredged or test it for contaminants. This needlessly causes three potential problems:

1. No authority will even know of the dredging, so no one will be able to ensure that the landowner has stayed within his 50 cubic yard limit.
2. Dredging to remove the material will re-suspend lake-bottom sediment, which could contain the old waste of whatever industry might have been upstream such as pesticides, asbestos, lead or other heavy metals, and substances such as PCBs.
3. No one would track the disposal of potentially contaminated sediment, which could lead to pollution of soil, groundwater or other water bodies.

To find your state senators:

1. Go to http://maps.legis.wisconsin.gov/, select “Senate Districts” and zoom in on Dane County. 
    
2. Click the district that overlaps your residence, and you’ll see your Senator's email and phone number!
   
   We recommend saving this in your phone and email contacts for easy lookup next time.

 DEMAND THE CIA RELEASE HASPEL'S TORTURE RECORD

President Trump’s pick for CIA director has a dark history of leading state-sponsored torture – and the Senate must not even start her confirmation hearings until that history is declassified and publicly released. 

Gina Haspel is best known for running a “black site” torture prison in Thailand during the George W. Bush administration. The prison she ran was the first to test some of the CIA’s most brutal and criminal tactics – including waterboarding, beatings, starvation, and locking men for hours in coffin-like confinement boxes. Press reports place Haspel in charge of the prison when a man was waterboarded multiple times. These torture methods became a template for a program applied to scores of detainees held in a network of secret CIA prisons. 

Haspel played a key role not only in the torture program, but also in destroying the evidence. While her job title may be listed in a study about the torture program released by the Senate in 2014 and in documents released in the ACLU’s torture survivor clients’ litigation, her name and important aspects of her wrongdoing are still blacked out, with many documents locked away entirely. A memoir by a former CIA official also reports Haspel drafted the cable ordering the use of an industrial-strength shredder to destroy evidence of torture. The general counsel of the 9/11 Commission has stated that the destruction of the torture videos may have amounted to obstruction of justice.

That Haspel was able to keep her job at the CIA and rise through its ranks shows a shocking level of impunity. It’s even more disturbing that she could be sworn in as the head of the entire agency – very soon. The Senate – and more importantly, the American people – should know the full extent of Haspel’s role in one of the darkest chapters in modern American history. Only then can senators understand the full scope of her torture record, and decide whether she deserves a promotion to CIA director.

Now is the time to act: The Senate is preparing to confirm Haspel as CIA director. Demand that senators not even start the confirmation hearing until the CIA comes clean, and declassifies Haspel’s torture record.

(source, source, source)

• Sen. Baldwin:
  https://www.tammybaldwin.com/contact/
   
• Sen. Johnson: 
  https://www.ronjohnson.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/email-the-senator