Water is a Human Right by Sura, December 5

Yesterday, I attended a small group meeting with Betsy Damon, internationally known artist and water visionary.

Betsy’s interest is to reveal the interdependence and synergy of species surrounding water issues.

Betsy is a powerful figure, a rare truth-teller among environmentalists who doesn’t water down (no pun intended) her message. Water is a human right, a life-giver, and the most important thing, she said, is to “save as much greenspace around the river as you can.” She even went as far as saying, “Take back greenspace. It should never belong to developers.”*

Betsy said if you can’t sell people on the value of water (oh my) you can sell them on keeping the trees because it counters global warming. Pathetic, isn’t it, that we have to strategize about our planet’s lifeblood?

She pointed to the benefits of a revitalized river, that it creates a better economy, healthier people and ecosystem and cleaner water, of course. Start with waste water management, she suggested.  Betsy said water and energy should be thought of together, since it takes energy to clean and move water and energy pollutes water. Her suggestion? Smaller, more localized wastewater treatment facilities, so the water doesn’t have to move as far.

She also said we have to stop using pesticides on our lawns, which make their way into our water. We should post “pesticide-free lawn” signs to encourage others to kick the habit (Or might the city take leadership and ban pesticide application?).

There was so much more…

People in attendance included artists, like Thea Kovac who organized the meeting, environmental and political artist Nicolas Lampert and performance artist, writer and chair of IN:SITE, Pegi Taylor; several people who work in the environmental field, like Ken Leinbach of the Urban Ecology Center and Ann Brummitt, co-ordinator of the Milwaukee River Work Group and people from city government, including Ann Beier from the Milwaukee Office of Sustainability and Alder Nik Kovac.

Now that we have a core group interested, it is possible for us to get artists, community organizers, city govt representatives and environmentalists together to form a vision for water in this city, perhaps one that uses art to educate people about water, to make them feel proprietary and help people understand how important the situation is and how dire it’s becoming.

My personal concerns around water are growing:
1. Milwaukee sits on the largest fresh water body in the world (Great Lakes). Water is the new oil. We can live without oil, we cannot live without water.
2. There are more wars being fought over water than over oil. If we don’t protect our water with precision, political discipline and foresight, we will see the beginning of war here. The weapons will initiallly be private corporations making land and water grabs around our lake and waterways. It will include information technology used to keep the “wrong” (i.e. non-corporate) people out.
3. The Great Lakes Compact, as wonderful as it is, has loopholes. In the city, we have a handful alders who are protecting our water. Alder Kovac is one of very few.
4. The city of Milwaukee is hurting financially. Privatizing all aspects of our water is tempting, but in the long run, it’s much more expensive. To maximize profits, private corporations forgo necessary repairs and put the public at risk of disease and higher costs in the long run.
5. The city of Milwaukee is neck and neck with Detroit, vying for highest unemployment rate in the nation. When corporations want to steal our water, they will sell the idea to us as job creation and making Milwaukee the “premier water research and education center” or something like that. It’s candy-coating a very bad thing.
6. Despite the Public Trust Doctrine, which is supposed to protect our land along the lake and keep it public, we’re already seeing attempts to create a private-public land grab. Beware of “water industries” that are looking to increase profits. Especially those that are information technology corporations, the face of a new kind of warfare.

*As far as the Milwaukee River goes, let’s hope that Alder Kovac, and members of the Milwaukee River Work Group who have praised and aided in the upcoming high-density development on the river, heard this message loud and clear and that river development comes to a screeching halt. Or is it already a “done deal”?

5 Dec 2008 | 10:40 am | Art, Environmental Sustainability, Water

1 comment

1. Sura wrote:
   December 5, 2008 at 1:16 pm

   One more thing Betsy said: Every human being needs a minimum of 20 Liters of water to survive, and every human should receive 40L free. People who use more water should pay a lot for it, and businesses should pay even more. I wonder what the average use per person in the city is…

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