Asian Carp: Disappointment, Delay and a Wrestler at Play

Another day, another disappointment. Earlier this year, Congress gave the Army Corps of Engineers clear orders to sort out a plan to deal with the movement of Asian carp in Chicago’s waterways to prevent the invasive fish from infesting Lake Michigan and the Great Lakes. Today, they released a mandated interim report that, unsurprisingly, signaled that the Corps would be late on the final product. The Corps had been stating it would take until 2015 to come up with the plan for a fix, but are now on the hook for a 2014 deadline... But according to today's update, the Corps is offering something less actionable at the deadline. They now promise a report that will outline a variety of potential solutions---but they will require further study and detail work before anything can move forward. 

While they don’t agree on much in DC these days, the early response to today's report from Great Lakes Republicans and Democrats in Congress is uniformly miffed. And they are right to be. Our coalition sent a letter to the Corps noting what we thought the law mandated a proper final study would consist of---and this isn’t it. Normally, an announcement like this would not get much attention, especially during election season. But this is not a normal issue: after all, Animal Planet just ran a show that featured a former professional wrestler doing battle with Asian carp using a trident from whilst waterskiing in the Illinois River. So, expect some fireworks on this one…