Make MI a Conservation Leader Once More
Make “Pure Michigan” real with clean water and parks, outdoors, and wonderful places to enjoy with our families.
In Michigan we treasure our outdoors and our Great Lakes. Michigan was once the model for conservation, a leader in creating incredible parks, and turning the state’s beautiful outdoors into destinations. “Pure Michigan” speaks to us so powerfully—because it is the “ideal” Michigan, the one that we have all tasted growing up, enjoying that escape with our families to some favorite lake, cottage, river, or park. We love that Michigan, and It’s a big part of the Michigan Dream.
That Michigan we know and love has to made real again. It’s been diminished and remains under threat. We know our once first-rate parks system — our beautiful rivers, lakes, Great Lakes and coastline — perhaps a source of our greatest pride — are in jeopardy. We’ve cut funding for clean water, parks and conservation. Pure Michigan is not real when fecal matter fouls water, and beaches are closed. It’s not real when Parks aren’t maintained, and oil spills into the rivers, and threatens our Great Lakes. And most horrifically, here in a state surrounded by the most clean freshwater on earth, failures of state leadership led to our water poisoning our own people.
This is why I led the efforts to make clear Great Lakes cleanup was an essential priority for both our economy and environment—creating new jobs and economic development by cleaning and reconnecting communities to our water, where people want to live, work, play. I pulled people together, made the economic argument and helped build the coalition that pushed Great Lakes funding through Congress, and has led to more than $500 million dollars spent in Michigan on Great Lakes restoration. That is why I am also leading work to eliminate current threats to our waters and this economy—like the oil pipelines under the lakes; and bringing the best experts to help fix our water infrastructure so what happened in Flint doesn’t happen again. And why I am heading the charge in making the same economic arguments—that our parks, outdoors and waters—are key drivers of economic activity and job creation, and help make Michigan the choice location for people to stay, and more people to come.
But there is more work to do to make Michigan a conservation leader again. That is why I am leading the fight for a “real” Pure Michigan Fund— more robust support for outdoors, recreation, clean water, parks, tourism promotion— that makes “Pure Michigan” a reality again, and helps our natural assets serve as economic development drivers. We can expand and liberalize the use of the existing Natural Resource Trust Fund to rebuild our parks system, and our commitment to our beautiful state outdoors, including clean and well-maintained parks and green spaces in Detroit and our urban cities. We can do more work to clean our water, help reconnect communities to their water and remake crumbling water infrastructure. We also must make Michigan a leader in the coming green and blue economy—by embracing and leading the nation in policies that drive renewable energies, and water conservation—to improve the health of our people and our planet—and creating new jobs in the process. And we must lift threats like oil pipelines under our Great Lakes that threaten to destroy what is special about Michigan and to wreck our growing Blue Economy.
In Michigan we treasure our outdoors and our Great Lakes. Michigan was once the model for conservation, a leader in creating incredible parks, and turning the state’s beautiful outdoors into destinations. “Pure Michigan” speaks to us so powerfully—because it is the “ideal” Michigan, the one that we have all tasted growing up, enjoying that escape with our families to some favorite lake, cottage, river, or park. We love that Michigan, and It’s a big part of the Michigan Dream.
That Michigan we know and love has to made real again. It’s been diminished and remains under threat. We know our once first-rate parks system — our beautiful rivers, lakes, Great Lakes and coastline — perhaps a source of our greatest pride — are in jeopardy. We’ve cut funding for clean water, parks and conservation. Pure Michigan is not real when fecal matter fouls water, and beaches are closed. It’s not real when Parks aren’t maintained, and oil spills into the rivers, and threatens our Great Lakes. And most horrifically, here in a state surrounded by the most clean freshwater on earth, failures of state leadership led to our water poisoning our own people.
This is why I led the efforts to make clear Great Lakes cleanup was an essential priority for both our economy and environment—creating new jobs and economic development by cleaning and reconnecting communities to our water, where people want to live, work, play. I pulled people together, made the economic argument and helped build the coalition that pushed Great Lakes funding through Congress, and has led to more than $500 million dollars spent in Michigan on Great Lakes restoration. That is why I am also leading work to eliminate current threats to our waters and this economy—like the oil pipelines under the lakes; and bringing the best experts to help fix our water infrastructure so what happened in Flint doesn’t happen again. And why I am heading the charge in making the same economic arguments—that our parks, outdoors and waters—are key drivers of economic activity and job creation, and help make Michigan the choice location for people to stay, and more people to come.
But there is more work to do to make Michigan a conservation leader again. That is why I am leading the fight for a “real” Pure Michigan Fund— more robust support for outdoors, recreation, clean water, parks, tourism promotion— that makes “Pure Michigan” a reality again, and helps our natural assets serve as economic development drivers. We can expand and liberalize the use of the existing Natural Resource Trust Fund to rebuild our parks system, and our commitment to our beautiful state outdoors, including clean and well-maintained parks and green spaces in Detroit and our urban cities. We can do more work to clean our water, help reconnect communities to their water and remake crumbling water infrastructure. We also must make Michigan a leader in the coming green and blue economy—by embracing and leading the nation in policies that drive renewable energies, and water conservation—to improve the health of our people and our planet—and creating new jobs in the process. And we must lift threats like oil pipelines under our Great Lakes that threaten to destroy what is special about Michigan and to wreck our growing Blue Economy.