Letter: HLWD and few memory lapses

Talk about it

Having returned from out of town, I was interested to read the account of the Heron Lake Watershed District 10-year plan meeting hosted by the Board of Water and Soil Resources. It appears that things went as usual at this meeting. People, when they do show up at these meetings, seem to have short memories, and that includes your staff writer who always seems to be assigned to these meetings.

The first memory lapse is that no one remembers that the BWSR is the unit of government in charge of watershed districts, and for them to continue to exist they need these units to be in charge of. To speak to them or write letters to them about a non-performing district is nothing but a distraction and part of the damage- control plan which sparked this meeting. They have realized that their support for the new law that made this whole thing possible was a mistake, and giving the watershed districts WMDs is comparable to Saddam Hussein being thought to have WMDs — and look what happened to him.

Also, remember that the only way to get rid of a non-performing watershed district is by petition. Now is the time to get busy on that and not be distracted by a damage-control meeting.

Remember, also, that Mr. Mark Deutschman designed this plan for Houston Engineering, which was paid a lot of taxpayer dollars to do so by BWSR. Does this sound like a government agency that will be opposed to the plan? To continue with Mr. Deutschman, he is quoted as saying that funds generated by the WMD can only be used to implement projects that reduce flooding damage or have been identified in HLWD’s TMDL study. If anyone is willing to buy this one, they don’t remember that the HLWD has never implemented anything, and its favorite projects are testing and studies.

The TMDL process belonged to the MPCA and Cottonwood County until Jan Voit and Kelli Daberkow (now Kelli Nerem) stepped in and wrested it away from Cottonwood County and took it on at HLWD, which is now apparently stuck with implementing a cure for the problems found by the study and paid for by a “fee” charged to the people unlucky enough to be included in the WMD instead of by the MPCA — which was authorized and funded to do this by the Clean Water Act. Also, remember in connection with this that Nerem got her start in all this by working as a summer intern for the NHLGA (jointly funded by the HLWD) and, after employment at HLWD, is now employed by the MPCA.

I see a letter from a person who attended this meeting and had a lot to say on the subject closed his letter with “Enough said.” I will do likewise until I deal with the memory lapses in his letter.

Tags: heron lake, opinion, letters, hlwd