A new push to clean up the Great Lakes

It sounds like something out of a bad science-fiction movie: fish that grow up to 100 pounds and six feet long, scour the bottom of lakes and rivers, eating voraciously, and have a tendency to leap onto passing motorboats and jet-skis.

They are Asian carp and they are just one of the many threats facing the Great Lakes these days working their way up the Mississippi River, popping up just 25 miles from Lake Michigan in the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal. Zebra mussels are another threat, littering beaches with their shells and perhaps permanently altering the region's food chain. And the constant infusion of toxins like mercury and PCBs have led to fish-consumption advisories and contaminated sediments.

The Great Lakes, it's safe to say, are in trouble. Residents of Illinois or Michigan or New York don't have to worry about disappearing fish or shorelines anytime soon, but in ecological terms, the lakes have been deteriorating rapidly: invasive species, toxic waste, development, sewage, pollution from agriculture and industry have all been taking a toll.

In response, officials launched a collaborative restoration effort this month that is unprecedented in its scale and bureaucratic complexity. The coalition includes elected officials from eight states and two countries, environmental groups, mayors, and some 30 Indian tribes.

The first meeting may have been largely ceremonial, but many of those trying to protect the region are hopeful that the collaboration will give prominence to an ecoystem that falls under so many different governmental jurisdictions.

"We need a planning process that's fast, that gets everyone on same page and pulling in the right direction, so that we can go back to Congress with one voice and say this is the money we need," says Andy Buchsbaum, director of the National Wildlife Federation's Great Lakes Natural Resource Center.

The scope of the problem is daunting. The Great Lakes are the second-largest surface freshwater system in the world, and they have statistics to match: a $5 billion fishing industry, 20 percent of the world's fresh water, a source of drinking water for 33 million people, and 11,000 miles of shoreline.

"They're not just nationally significant, they're globally significant," says Gary Gulezian, director of the EPA's Great Lakes National Program Office. He's hopeful the collaboration will spur clean-up efforts. "The ecological complexity of the Great Lakes is only rivaled by its institutional complexity," he says. "This effort is designed to bring everyone together."

One of the most concrete successes of the federal government's new focus on the region involves two species of Asian carp. The fish, say experts, completely destroy habitat for native species, and have the potential to turn the Great Lakes into giant carp ponds. When the carp neared the lakes this fall, Congress allocated money for an emergency electronic barrier across the Illinois River, and work is now under way on a permanent barrier.

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