Thank you for the full-page article, carried in the Quad-City Times on Jan. 1 (“Coping with reaction of climate, chemicals”). The reporters did a fine public service, describing in granular detail the constant challenges of supplying Iowa’s largest metropolitan area with clean drinking water from water sources set in a landscape of intensive, large-scale agriculture.

The water supply problems of Des Moines aren’t unique to that local area. Iowa’s Department of Natural Resources (DNR) classified two-thirds of the state’s waterways as too impaired for swimming, fishing, or as drinking water sources.

Clean water should be a highly-prized resource in our society, as basic as it is to our individual and collective health. The evidence from the DNR shows we don’t much prize, or care, about water quality.

The upcoming session of the Iowa Legislature gives us another opportunity to push for systems to improve our water quality. If the state treasury is so flush with cash that some leaders want to eliminate income taxes, don’t we have money to get serious about clean water?

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Originally Appeared Here