Indiana has a horrible record when it comes to water quality. Our rivers and streams are treated as sewers, and that’s no secret.
Which begs the question, what is the purpose of our state’s environmental protection agency, the Indiana Department of Environmental Management (IDEM)? Is IDEM’s mission to protect our state’s natural resources, or is it to rubber-stamp the ongoing fouling of them?
Those are legitimate questions after the public hearing The Republic’s Mark Webber covered recently. IDEM held the hearing as required by law as it considers whether it will permit a biosolids plant that virtually no one wants, except the proposed facility’s owner, Biocycle LLC. The proposed site for its storage facility is southeast of Columbus at 3788 E. County Road 300S.
“Of the approximately 110 individuals who attended (April 17’s) public hearing on a proposed sewage sludge-holding facility, nobody spoke in favor of it,” Webber reported. “The vast majority of the 80 written comments received prior to the hearing were also negative.”
And yet, as Webber reported, IDEM land application specialist Brenda Stephanoff “said the application can only be denied if it does not meet the criteria set forth in Article 6.1 of Indiana’s Water Pollution Control Division – or if (Biocycle owner Evan Daily) fails to provide information requested by IDEM.
“That prompted an audience member to ask why the public meeting was being held if the criteria has already been established,” Webber wrote.
Hear hear! Why indeed does IDEM go through the motions of public hearings, merely frustrating hardworking taxpayers on their own dime, if the fix is already in? That’s a question for the agency and for our state’s elected leaders. Another question: How much do such attitudes contribute to the chronic degradation of our water, air and land?
Indiana is notoriously permissive toward polluters, and our waters are among the dirtiest in America. Don’t just take our word for it. This is what a 2022 report from the Environmental Integrity Project said regarding the Hoosier State’s waters:
“According to one important method of assessment used by the states – the safety of rivers and streams for swimming and water-contact recreation, based on levels of fecal bacteria or other contaminants in the water — Indiana tops the list of states with the most dirty waterways. Indiana has 24,395 total miles of rivers and streams listed as impaired for swimming and recreation.”
That’s awful, and IDEM bears responsibility. This is not what the public wants.
With regard to the Biocycle facility, the public has persuasively with one voice expressed why IDEM should not permit it. Will IDEM demonstrate a capacity to listen and act in the public’s interest? A decision is expected in June or later.
We refuse to believe that the letter or spirit of the law empowers IDEM to disregard the overwhelming views of the public who take the time to make their views known about a proposal that affects the quality of the environment — and directly, the quality of their lives.
If we’re wrong about that, then something is rotten in the state of Indiana. But then again, we already know there is. Just look at the terrible shape of our state’s waters.
