'It takes a while to educate people': GOP chair determined to tackle PFAS contamination

 

MADISON, Wis. (CBS 58) -- The Republican chair of Senate's natural resources committee said he's committed to convincing his colleagues about the need to tackle "forever chemicals" in Wisconsin's ground and drinking water when crafting the next state budget.

On Tuesday, Senator Robert Cowles (R-Green Bay) held the first informal committee hearing on PFAS with expert testimony about challenges of breaking down the toxic chemicals and the harmful health impacts it can have on communities.

"It takes a while to educate people," Cowles told reporters after the hearing. "If there's going to be a piece of legislation, and I think there will be, you have to get support from our committee members…and now we have a better baseline understanding."

The committee hearing comes a week after Governor Tony Evers called on lawmakers to believe PFAS are "a pressing threat to our state's economy" during his State of the State address.

Evers proposed spending $100 million on PFAS testing and mitigation in the next budget, a measure Cowles said he could support.

"Without knowing all the fine points, I think we have a good chance of making it happen, whether it’s a separate bill or in the budget," Cowles said.

For some time, regulators and experts have been aware of the harmful health impacts and how widespread PFAS can be from water, fish, soil and other everyday products, but Cowles said he wants more lawmakers to understand why there's urgency to act.

UW-Madison environmental researcher Christy Remucal, who conducted a PFAS study in Green Bay, told members how difficult it is to eliminate PFAS.

"PFAS are really tricky," Remucal said. "We have a lot of different water treatment methods and none of our usual approaches work on these chemicals…the good news is there's a ton of research going on both in the U.S. and across the world to destroy these chemicals, but we are not quite there yet."

Cowles has been supportive of PFAS regulatory measures, but some of his colleagues have not.

Two years ago, Republicans on the budget committee rejected several key initiatives to address PFAS contamination. Bipartisan legislation called the CLEAR Act also failed to pass the Senate and later died.

One area both sides agree on was imposing new restrictions on firefighting foam to curb pollution in PFAS contamination. In 2020, Gov. Evers signed that bill into law.