By Jeff Kart
October 13, 2010
The public has a seat at the table in the International Upper Great Lakes Study. Currently, there are 20 people from the U.S. and Canada that make up the Public Interest Advisory Group. One seat remains open for First Nations participation.
The group is called PIAG for short. The group's members represent a wide range of Great Lakes' interests, including shoreline property owners, boaters, anglers, governments, Native Americans, First Nations and environmental and shipping organizations.
PIAG was created in 2007 by the International Joint Commission to advise a Study Board that's directing a $14.6 million (U.S.) study of Great Lakes' water levels.
The Study Board and PIAG have worked hand-in-hand with hundreds of scientists on the project, to investigate the physical processes driving current Great Lakes water level conditions and possible improvements to the regulation of the Lake Superior outflows.
Dr. James Bruce, PIAG's Canadian co-chair, also sits on the Study Board with PIAG's U.S. Co-chair, David Powers of Bay City, Michigan.
“Our role is to provide a link between the general public, interest groups and the Study Board,” said Bruce, who lives in Ottawa, Ontario.
“We do that by having meetings with (PIAG) members who represent broadly based organizations that have legitimate concerns about Great Lakes levels,” added Bruce, also Canadian policy representative of the Soil and Water Conservation Society of North America.
Powers, an attorney for and member of Save Our Shoreline, a property rights group, said the PIAG also has held dozens of public meetings on an as-needed basis since 2007.
“Ultimately, our goal is to serve the public, and we can best serve them if we know what they want,” Powers said.
Members of the advisory group sit on a half-dozen Technical Working Groups involved with the Study “to insert a public view,” Bruce added. PIAG members also help gather input from various groups they are linked with, to make sure the Study is well-rounded and thorough.
Bruce said the process has worked well. The Study Board is reviewing alternatives for an improved and flexible regulation plan for Lake Superior outflows to be released in the summer of 2011. A series of public input sessions are planned throughout the basin. Adaptive management strategies also are being developed to respond to climate change.
“The Study intends to be sensitive to the various interests,” Bruce said. “The Study Board and PIAG are striving to ensure that the Study has been conducted in a fair and independent way and that the results are seen by the public as being scientifically sound and legitimate.”
Possibilities and effects of some water level restoration measures are being explored on a basin-wide basis.