Governor Invites WGF to Statewide Water Events

by Paul Heinen, WGF Policy Director

WGF joins Gov. Evers on Two Tours of Water Treatment Facilities

During the week of July 14, 2025, Governor Evers travelled around the state to talk with local officials about clean water infrastructure. Gov. Evers invited Wisconsin’s Green Fire to attend two of these meetings. Clean water funding is an important part of Wisconsin’s State Budget to maintain safe drinking water and deal with issues like PFAS and other pollutants. (Read more about those budget items here, or listen to the governor’s July 17 radio address here.) The water treatment projects we visited (and others) are funded with the help of State money from the governor’s budgets and Federal money from the Biden administration’s last budget. These funds will continue for at least two more years.

Appleton

Our Executive Director Meleesa Johnson joined the tour of the Appleton Water Treatment Facility located in Menasha. The facility treats water from Lake Winnebago for the drinking water of multiple communities in the Appleton area. Appleton claims to have the ‘best tasting water in the state.’ Although not specific to this facility, Appleton recently celebrated a big milestone related to reducing lead in drinking water. As of fall 2024, all the City’s public and private lead services lines have been removed/replaced.

Madison

Paul Heinen (WGF Policy Director) and Jim Baumann (WGF member and PFAS expert) joined the governor in Madison for a tour of Municipal Well 15. After PFAS was first discovered at Well 15 in 2017, the well shut down in 2019. Since then, it has not been providing drinking water. In general, Madison drinking water does not have a PFAS contamination issue. However, at sites with contaminated conditions like Well 15, the new treatment system is removing the PFAS to improve the quality and safety of the water.

Also present on the tour in Madison were some of our close partner organizations like Clean Wisconsin, Wisconsin Conservation Voters, and River Alliance of Wisconsin.

WGF has a strong relationship with the Governor’s Office

All three of us from WGF were able to spend time talking with the Governor during these meetings. We were encouraged to hear him say, “Please keep up the great work you are doing,” referring to WGF’s work advocating for clean water and dealing with PFAS. We keep in touch with his staff on a weekly basis and regularly share information with them. This relationship with the governor and his office is a win-win. It helps us keep the WGF community abreast of current state policy issues. It also allows us to share our expertise with the governor and his office on important and timely issues.

The recently passed State Budget has been called a “mixed bag” of good and bad items. Nonetheless, the Governor was able to negotiate with the majority party to get better policy included. Now, the state budget has been signed into law. Here are three priorities WGF will continue to work on with Gov. Evers:

• Reauthorize the Knowles-Nelson Stewardship program (it will expire in 2026 otherwise).
• Develop a plan for long term conservation funding.
• Free up the $125 million in PFAS funding currently held up by the Joint Finance Committee in the Legislature.

Future reports from Wisconsin’s Green Fire staff and volunteer-experts will keep you informed.

Jim Baumann of WGF, Governor Tony Evers, and Paul Heinen of WGF at tour of Municipal Well 15, Madison WI