Minnesotans Overfill First Oversight Hearing on Polluter Capture

Saint Paul – For the first time in years, the Minnesota Senate held an oversight hearing on Polluter Capture – when polluting companies exert too much influence over how our Minnesota State government agencies do, or do not, enforce the law. Community members overfilled the hearing room joining together to say: this is unacceptable and we can fix it. 

“It’s past time for Minnesota to stop riding on our reputation for good government or environmental protection. Environmental laws are not environmental suggestions. They are laws and need to be enforced against polluters.” Peter Wagenius, Legislative Director, Sierra Club. 

Fundamentally, when the law isn’t enforced, we can’t protect our health and our environment.    

The hearing included expert testimony and personal stories on three case studies of Polluter Capture, agency response, and questions for the agencies including:

• Failure to regulate nitrates in drinking water and nitrogen as a climate pollutant
• Mismanagement of Public Lands (WMAs), benefiting the timber industry and harming wildlife
• Failure to protect people from the health impacts of trash incineration 

When state agencies don’t enforce environmental laws, we all lose. 

• In southeast Minnesota, drinking water has become too polluted to drink.
  • "Minnesotans highly value our communities and waters. We've passed laws to protect them, and we expect our agencies to enforce those laws. 40 years ago, we first started detecting pesticides in our groundwater. Since that time, the legislature has provided the tools and resources necessary to protect our water, but it just hasn’t happened.” - Steve Morse, Minnesota Environmental Partnership
  • “You can’t fix a public health crisis with a suggestion; you fix it with enforceable limits and real data,” said Matthew Kaplan, Senior Attorney for the Nature program at NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council). "Minnesota is clinging to a strategy that puts us on a path to more of the same: dirty surface water, contaminated drinking water and growing nitrous oxide emissions, but there is a better path forward, one that relies on outcome-based reporting limits.” 
• In the metro, air pollution is increasing cancer and asthma.
  • “The disparities are too large to be explained by behavior. Ongoing, preventable harm continues to impact the health of people in poor, mostly black communities. North Minneapolis isn’t just managing its own waste, it's managing the health burden from the waste of Hennepin County. Authority is there to take action to prevent further harm.” - Dr. Joanne Hill, public health nurse
  • “Across the country, aging and outdated incinerators have closed as communities switch to the less harmful practice of landfilling trash instead of burning, polluting the air, and landfilling toxic ash. As we also work to reduce waste, we must follow the science that shows incineration to be many times worse than landfilling for public health. Instead, MPCA and Hennepin County choose to mislead the public into thinking incineration is a sustainable solution.” - Mike Ewall is a national policy expert on incineration.
• Our wildlife management areas have been illegally used for timber production.
  • “State and federal requirements for wildlife areas are clear. Yet, when the timber industry asks for more lumber to be cut, they were given it even in Wildlife Management Areas, regardless of the cuts impact to wildlife. Fish and wildlife staff have lost control of the land.” - Gretchen Mehmel, former DNR Red Lake WMA Manager (retired) 
  • “It’s worth noting that none of us own land. WMAs and public lands are it for us. Without these areas, we wouldn’t have the chance to chase turkeys, deer, pheasants or any other game. And if these areas continue to be impacted by irresponsible, unsustainable timber harvest, we’ll lose those opportunities all the same.” - Alec Olson, hunter

Right now, state agencies are siding with corporate polluters far too often, rather than enforcing existing laws. As Trump weaponizes the federal government against our communities, including by dismantling our basic environmental protections, Minnesota state agencies must hold the line. This hearing was a key step towards agency accountability. 

NRDC (Natural Resources Defense Council) is an international nonprofit environmental organization with more than 3 million members and online activists. Established in 1970, NRDC uses science, policy, law and people power to confront the climate crisis, protect public health and safeguard nature. NRDC has offices in New York City, Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Beijing and Delhi (an office of NRDC India Pvt. Ltd).