Wisconsin Public Television

Transcript: In Wisconsin #902

Original Airdate: 14 October 2010

Patty Loew:

Welcome to “In Wisconsin.” I’m Patty Loew. This week, why has the clean-up of a toxic waste site in Ashland dragged on for decades?

Woman:

We’ve spent 28 years sitting here and them telling us nothing.

Patty Loew:

“In Wisconsin” reporter Art Hackett investigates. Plus a monumental threat to bats as a deadly epidemic is set to invade Wisconsin.

Man:

A lot of bats.

Patty Loew:

And football pride runs deep in Cross Plains at this perennial powerhouse. It’s the little church school that could.

Patty Loew:

Those reports next on “In Wisconsin.”

Announcer:

Major funding for “In Wisconsin” is provided by the people of Alliant Energy, who bring safe, reliable and environmentally friendly energy to keep homes, neighborhoods and life in Wisconsin running smoothly. Alliant Energy. We’re on for you. And the Animal Dentistry and Oral Surgery Specialists of Milwaukee and Oshkosh, a veterinary team working with pet owners and family veterinarians throughout Wisconsin, providing care for oral disease and dental problems of small companion animals. With additional funding provided by Bike Wisconsin.

Patty Loew:

We begin this week with our continuing investigation into a hazardous waste site. Lake Superiors Chequamegon Bay is contaminated and unfit for fishing or swimming. The clean-up has taken more than two decades. But why? “In Wisconsin” reporter Art Hackett teams with Kate Golden from the Wisconsin Watch project to get some answers in Ashland.

Pepe Kabasa:

What I’ve seen is the oil slick on the lake out here. Every once in a while you’ll see this slick on top.

Art Hackett:

Ashland city councilwoman Joyce Pepe Kabasa lives in the house that was once the offices of the Schroeder Lumber Company. That business will play a role in this story. She lives across the street from what used to be a manufactured gas plant. From 1885 until 1947, the plant heated coal until it produced gas, which could be used for lighting homes or cooking dinner. The gas plant is also part of the story. And her house overlooks a sewage treatment plant, where a smelly, oily, brown ooze started showing up in trenches nearly 30 years ago. For 30 years she’s watched Ashland try and clean it up.

Pepe Kabasa:

I asked the question when they first started this, I asked, how long if you’re — if you get in contact with this, how long does it take to kill you? And they — Well, we don’t know that it does.

Jamie Dunn:

If you’re to dig down through this material, the deeper you get, the more tar you run into.

Art Hackett:

Jamie Dunn is a hydrologist with the Wisconsin department of natural resources. He says the substance is coal tar. As it degrades, the tar releases chemicals. State department of health documents say they can cause melanoma if you get them on your skin. 14 years ago enough was known to post these signs warning against wading or fishing in the area.

Jamie Dunn:

We know what’s buried under the parking lot is a lot of the plumbing, the piping and some of the old foundations from the manufactured gas plant.

Art Hackett:

And the DNR knew the manufactured gas plant across from the Kabasas’ house might be the source of the problem.

Jamie Dunn:

There was an old gas holder back in this area. There was also an old tar well where the waste tars went. And that was removed back in the late ’80s, but there’s still remnants of that contamination from that.

Art Hackett:

In March of 1995, the DNR named Northern States Power of Wisconsin as a potentially responsible party. Long ago, NSP bought the company which operated the gas plant. That made NSP potentially liable for cleaning up the waste. NSP denied any and all responsibility for both soil and groundwater impact from solid wastes, including coal tar and creosote disposed of on the parks site. NSP points the finger elsewhere. Creosote pits used by the Schroeder Lumber Company.

David Donovan:

We believe that they did operate a wood treatment facility, a rather extensive wood treatment facility, and that they did contribute large quantities of contaminated material and contamination to the site. We have eyewitness testimony that says they did run and operate a wood treatment facility.

John Radloff:

There were pits they soaked the logs in. Where the creosote came from, I don’t know. Im assuming it was shipped in.

Joe Kabasa:

It was right from the railroad bed all the way to the road, probably 100 yards to 150 yards long and probably 40 or 50 yards wide.

Art Hackett:

Jamie Dunn says there may have been some treatment at the site, but historic maps show no facility that would have contributed the amount of contamination found under this parkland and in the bay. Still, the DNR and NSP have tried at least three times to agree on a clean-up plan. The former mayor says one problem was the utility wanted to set a fixed cost for the project.

Ed Monroe:

So if you come up with, we’re going to spend $60 million, we’re going to clean it up, well, okay, $60 million is gone and still half the stuff is there. Well, now what?

Art Hackett:

In addition, the two sides couldn’t reach agreement on clean-up methods. Above all, there was the ultimate question. Who is going to pick up the check?

David Donovan:

I think part of it had to do with the level of responsibility that was going to be assigned to not only NSP Wisconsin, but its customers as well.

Jamie Dunn:

This area here in the documents is always denoted as the seep area.

Art Hackett:

But as a partial clean-up got underway, the DNR found what turned out to be a direct connection between the contaminated area at the base of the bluff and the site of the gas plant.

Jamie Dunn:

This was a direct contact risk, free product tar bubbling to the surface. And that was I guess a reflection of, one, the ravine emptied out here, so you had water moving down the ravine, but also this 12-inch clay tile pipe discharged to right down here.

Art Hackett:

The pipe, which contained tar, was eventually traced up to the area where the gas plant stood. NSP contends the pipe was part of the city of Ashland’s wastewater system.

David Donovan:

It conveyed a lot of the municipal waste onto the lakefront. It certainly would have included some of the waterways coming from the manufactured gas plant site. I don’t know whether it is the major source.

Art Hackett:

As the investigation neared the 10-year mark, Ashland residents started taking note of the city council discussions. People like Kathy Allen, who we found at a Pies and Politics event at Big Top Chautauqua.

Kathy Allen:

So I went to one of their meetings and they started talking about dead zones. Now, I’m not really, really bright. But when you talk about dead zones, I thought about a whole collapsing of the ecosystem.

Art Hackett:

A citizens group, Bay Area North Guard, asked the US environmental protection agency to evaluate the site for a spot on the federal superfund list. The superfund was created to clean up abandoned hazardous waste sites.

Ed Monroe:

Instantly everything stopped. Everything that we were talking about collapsed and went to sleep for several years.

Kathy Allen:

I think more eyes on something like this is always better. The more people who know, the more you can make a rational decision.

Art Hackett:

Jamie Dunn says the EPAs eyes gave the site a high enough score to land it on the national priorities list.

Jamie Dunn:

I think in 2002 it became a superfund site. Once we’re there, we have to follow the process.

Art Hackett:

In 2007 as part of the superfund investigation, NSP hired its own consultant, which called the gas plant the main source. The tar from the MGP was potentially disposed of in the ravine and discharged to the park. Following the installation of the pipe, the tar was disposed of through the pipe to the former lakebed. That is the current bay.

Pepe Kabasa:

I just think it’s a joke as far as I’m concerned because we’ve spent 28 years sitting here and them telling us nothing. Same old, same old.

Art Hackett:

And so it is with the investigators. Jamie Dunn began his investigation in Ashland less than a year after he went to work for the DNR. That was 1989.

Jamie Dunn:

Yes. I would like to retire someday. But I will stay until this is — until this is moved to a point where I’m sure it’s going to be cleaned up.

Art Hackett:

Did you realize it was going to take this long?

Jamie Dunn:

Not a chance.

Patty Loew:

Earlier this month, the US environmental protection agency issued a clean-up plan for Chequamegon Bay. However, DNR project manager Jamie Dunn says it doesn’t settle who’s responsible for picking up the cost. That issue will be referred to the US justice department. You can get additional information from our partner by checking out its website, Wisconsinwatch.org. Its report on the Ashland superfund site will be available October 24. An environmental threat of another kind takes aim at Wisconsin’s bat population. Keep in mind, bats are vital to our ecosystem and to Wisconsin agriculture, not to mention they feast on mosquitoes. “In Wisconsin” reporter Jo Garrett has been tracking new developments and she joins us now. What’s going on with bats?

Jo Garrett:

It’s a very serious situation, Patty. Nationwide, bats face an unprecedented threat of extinction. And this epidemic could reach Wisconsin much sooner than first thought. Local researchers are on the front lines as battle lines are drawn in Juneau County.

Jo Garrett:

Seldom seen by the naked eye, but with the use of an infrared lens at night in the middle of what’s called fall swarm, you can see, you can get a sense of the tens of thousands of bats that pour through our skies on their way to their hibernaculum, the cave, in this case an old mine in Dodge County, where they spend their winter in metabolic slumber. Every year, some 143,000 bats wing their way into this one and it’s just one on Wisconsin’s landscape.

Dave Redell:

They’re just starting to swarm.

Jo Garrett:

Take a good look, because this scene, bats cascading through the nighttime sky, could soon be a rare sight. Dave Redell is a bat researcher for the DNR.

Dave Redell:

There’s basically a crisis in front of us. We don’t have a lot of time.

Dave Redell:

Look at the belly on this one.

Jo Garrett:

The it is white nose syndrome. Look at these bats. See that ring of white fungus around their nose? Whether this fungus causes white nose syndrome or is just a side effect isn’t known. But look at this carpet of dead bats in a cave in Vermont. They know this about white nose syndrome. The mortality rate is devastating.

Dave Redell:

75% to 99%, so it could clear out the entire hibernaculum of multiple species.

Jo Garrett:

And that’s what it’s done every year since 2006, starting with one individual cave in New York state.

Dave Redell:

Spreading south all the way to Virginia, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. We’ve got nine states now. So that’s the leading edge right now. Every one of the northeast states except for Maine has been affected.

Jo Garrett:

Scientists are stunned and scrambling for answers. Redell and his research work here in Wisconsin are in the thick of it.

Dave Redell:

What we’re doing tonight is looking at post-hibernation weights. As soon as they get through the first one, they hit the second and flutter down into the collecting bay.

Dave Redell:

They just went through that hibernation period. We want to see how much do they weigh coming out, so how much fat do they have remaining? The reason we’re doing it here in Wisconsin is because we still have healthy bats and this is sort of our attempt to describe what a normal bat is like.

Jo Garrett:

They need to know what’s baseline for bats as part of their campaign to cure or even contain white nose syndrome. And they have a deadline, an awful deadline.

Dave Redell:

That’s our biggest enemy, is the timeline. If in three years you can get nine states, does that mean it will be here in Wisconsin in three years? Worst outcome is multiple species of bats going extinct, more bats being listed as endangered or threatened.

Jo Garrett:

Spring, 2009. Redell and his long-time assistant, Paul White, have spent hours, days, weeks in the field capturing and then garnering information on bats.

Dave Redell:

Female northern long eared. These are species of greatest conservation need in the state.

Jo Garrett:

But this story sadly is not just about losing bats that are rare, like this northern long-eared.

Dave Redell:

A lot of people focus their attention on endangered species and tend to just assume that the common bat will always be common. Got a female little brown bat, ornery.

Jo Garrett:

It’s about common bats, like this little brown bat, becoming uncommon or even disappearing.

Dave Redell:

You know, little brown bats are the most abundant bats in the eastern part of North America. Think of a common bat like that going either endangered or extinct is hard to fathom.

Jo Garrett:

And the consequences could be catastrophic not just for bats, but for us.

Dave Redell:

It’s the common bats that are out there doing the most work.

Jo Garrett:

Work eating insects.

Dave Redell:

Ask yourself the question, what happens when this number of insects is not eaten anymore? You know, maybe a single bat eats 5,000 insects per night, up to its body weight. You’ve got a couple hundred thousand bats in just one area. Now you take away the free service of the bats. We’re talking about tons of insects.

Jo Garrett:

Lose these bats and farmers and foresters pay out more for pesticides to tackle those insects.

Dave Redell:

Generally one young per female per year so it could take hundreds of years if we lose this number of bats to actually recover, assuming that we don’t lose them all. You don’t want to sit here and document extinction.

Paul White:

They’re talking 95% and greater reductions in populations. I think everybody is just sort of in a hurry right now.

Jo Garrett:

Research has already revealed some clues about white nose syndrome.

Dave Redell:

We know through the transmission studies right here in Wisconsin, it is possible for bat to bat transmission of the fungus through face-to-face contact or through the air. So that was a big finding.

Jo Garrett:

But sadly a daunting one. It suggests air-borne transmission of the disease. Not good.

Dave Redell:

But at least now we know what we’re up against.

Jo Garrett:

And what are you up against?

Dave Redell:

Fungus that is quite easily spread.

Jo Garrett:

What they’re finding out east, the devastation and the losses, serves as a spur for Wisconsin’s researchers.

Dave Redell:

We don’t have much time and we can’t really afford to sit back and say, wow, there’s nothing we can do. We got to give everything that we can.

Patty Loew:

Jo, what’s the current status of Wisconsin bats?

Jo Garrett:

Well, it’s pretty perilous, Patty. At this point the syndrome is in 14 states and two Canadian provinces. Sadly, the syndrome has been found within 300 miles of our northern border and 220 miles from the south. So given a range that bats can fly, scientists now fear that will affect Wisconsin’s bats as early as this coming January.

Patty Loew:

So it’s definitely headed our way. What does the state do to combat that?

Jo Garrett:

In September, the DNR met and decided to list all four of Wisconsins cave-dwelling bats as an endangered species. And they voted to list the fungus itself as an invasive species. So it’s kind of a preemptive strike that will give the agency the greatest flexibility to combat the problem.

Patty Loew:

Thank you for this report, Jo. If you’re interested in becoming a volunteer citizen monitor or you want to watch our other reports on Wisconsin bats, just go to wpt.org/inwisconsin. Volunteers are at the heart of another fall tradition here in Wisconsin, youth football. Former Packers football coach Vince Lombardi once said, A school without football is in danger of deteriorating into a medieval study hall. So this week the story of the little church school that embraced that idea in a big way in Cross Plains.

Patty Loew:

At the end of Church Street in Cross Plains you’ll find a house of prayer. Where on certain days in autumn, the spirit emerges. Where Hail Mary takes on new meaning. Where the whole point is to trespass against others. This is St. Francis Oriole football, proof that big things do come in small packages. The school has fewer than 200 students and an equal number of football players. There are just five boys in one 5th grade class, but 34 football players. So many, in fact, the school has two 5th grade teams.

Tom Young:

We have kids from the other public schools, from outside of the Middleton/Cross Plains area that want to play football for St. Francis. I know kids come from Madison, Heights. Nothing against any other programs, but because of buddies they have, possibly playing on other teams, but also knowing that St. Francis Xavier, not because of the cool new field we have, but because of the program we have people want to be a part of it.

Patty Loew:

What’s the most fun thing about playing football?

Jack Stormer:

Hitting people. You don’t really get to hit people at home.

Tom Murphy:

The highest total we had, we had about 240 kids one season, and that was a real challenge for all of us to find practice space, game times. All of that was a real challenge. But since then it’s leveled off to 160 to about 190 kids per year.

Patty Loew:

The program began in 1968. Since then, it’s become one of the state’s premiere youth sports organizations. Among its alums, numerous all-state high school players, Badger recruits, even one who made it to the big time.

Jay Wilson:

There have been some great players. One guy made it all the way to the NFL, Casey Cramer, a name and a person a lot of these kids still look up to. They know that somebody can play on a football field in Cross Plains and make it to the NFL. That’s kind of cool.

Patty Loew:

The St. Francis summer football camp looks like the NFL. More than 250 boys and girls spent two weeks high-stepping, shuffling and blocking their way toward the season.

Stephanie Ballweg:

I think they’ve got it down to a science now. So they have their stations set up and they have their horn blowing and they have an 8th grader in every group that shows the younger kids what to do and it’s organized.

Patty Loew:

The Orioles are powered by parents. Dads as coaches, even a mom or two. 15 minutes learning to catch a pass. Then it’s off to the ropes and leg strengthening.

Coach:

Super high knees.

Patty Loew:

15 minutes later, it’s three-point slams. The goal here: learn to do unto others before they do unto you.

Coach:

You come up like this, just like this, and you’re hitting the guy right in the number.

Patty Loew:

With apologies to Vince Lombardi, who once said winning is the only thing, success in the St. Francis program is not measured in wins and losses. It’s about building character as well as muscle. It’s about gaining confidence along with yardage. In this program, nobody sits. Everyone plays.

Cole Connolly:

You get to play a lot, and you can do what you like.

Brett Wipfli:

They have a lot of good coaches, and I just — I played. I did this last year. So I was going to — I wanted to do it again.

Randy Lowenberg:

Nobody sits. No. They all will play. Our philosophy is to be safe also. So they will play in a safe position, but they always play. They’ll always play somewhere.

Patty Loew:

And as the Oriole black team goes to work on the Vikings from Mt. Horeb, their parents also go to work.

Terra Hollfelder:

There’s jobs for parents to do. We come to the game. Usually a parent will pick up the scoreboard. Couple parents will volunteer to pick up markers and the chain gang.

Steve Schunk:

Doing the time clock and the score and doing some chain gang and all that sort of stuff. I wouldn’t call it roped in because those are some of the best spots and the best way to stay plugged into the whole operation.

Patty Loew:

Many of these 10-year-olds will go on to play for Middleton high school. The wings they test now will help them fly as Middleton Cardinals, a perennial football powerhouse.

Jay Wilson:

It’s one of the premiere high school teams in the state. They made it to semifinals last year. They’re always in the playoffs and always contending in the Big 8 conference championship. It all starts here.

Tom Young:

This program in a small community with less than 200 kids in the whole school thrives because of relationships, good coaches, good men and women teaching these kids and the fundamentals of football that they learn, but the fundamentals of being a good teammate and being a sportsman-like athlete, good work discipline that pays off in the classroom and life. Employers say, you played football as a youth? You know what it means to work hard.

Patty Loew:

As for this game, well, St. Francis needed a miracle and it never materialized. But if you ask the folks here, football in the biggest little program in southern Wisconsin, win or lose, is still a blessing.

Coach:

One, two, three!

Patty Loew:

Go, team! Now here’s a look at some of the reports for the next edition of “In Wisconsin.”

Frederica Freyberg:

This is Frederica Freyberg. I’ll investigate what some are calling a heroin epidemic in Wisconsin. It’s spreading to small towns across Wisconsin. We’ll look at why it’s called the gateway drug.

Art Hackett:

I’m Art Hackett. I’ll show you why it takes a researcher from halfway around the world to save one of Wisconsin’s native languages. Find out what the Ho-Chunk language, Germany and the University of Wisconsin have in common.

Liz Koerner:

The tiny Kirtland’s warbler is trying to make a comeback by moving to Wisconsin. Their nemesis here is the brown-headed cowbird. Im Liz Koerner. Find out what wildlife managers are doing to help balance the scales.

Patty Loew:

Those “In Wisconsin” reports and an intriguing photo tour of Sauk County’s Parfrey’s Glen next Thursday at 7:30 right here on Wisconsin Public Television. This week, a new exhibit opens in Madison about a woman born in Milwaukee. She is UW educated and the only American woman executed on the direct orders of Adolf Hitler. There’s a school and a street named for her in Berlin, but yet in her home state of Wisconsin, she’s all but forgotten. The exhibit, with a chosen few, In Memoriam: Mildred Fisch, is by German artist Franz Rudolph Knubel.

Franz Rudolph Knubel:

She must have stepped to this place or from this side to this place because this was the guillotine and this was the sink where her blood was going in when she was beheaded.

Patty Loew:

The exhibit will be on display at the UW Hillel Center for Jewish student life and runs through December 3. Wisconsin Public Television is developing a documentary about her amazing story. Finally this week, we leave you with a journey through Kettle Moraine state park’s southern unit. It spans more than 20,000 acres of glacial hills, lakes, prairie restoration sites, kettles and hardwood forests. Enjoy the view and have a great week in Wisconsin.

Announcer:

Major funding for “In Wisconsin” is provided by the people of Alliant Energy, who bring safe, reliable and environmentally friendly energy to keep homes, neighborhoods and life in Wisconsin running smoothly. Alliant Energy. We’re on for you. And the Animal Dentistry and Oral Surgery Specialists of Milwaukee and Oshkosh, a veterinary team working with pet owners and family veterinarians throughout Wisconsin, providing care for oral disease and dental problems of small companion animals. With additional funding provided by Bike Wisconsin.