BIG SPRING - With its gingham curtains, American flag, well-worn maple floorboards and polished tables staffed by those helpful ladies who work all the elections, the New Haven Town Hall could be the centerpiece of a Norman Rockwell painting of rural America. But a minor revolution has taken place here in the heart of rural Wisconsin. The little old ladies (and their men) got mad. Drive around the block, over the bridge, and past the clapboard rural church, and you'll see signs telling Perrier, part of the multinational Nestle corporation, to go away. This week it sounded like Perrier finally got the message - the company acknowledged it was letting its permit to pump groundwater from the Big Spring lapse. A few hours north near Crandon, another group of grassroots activists also heard this week that they'd won a significant victory in their battle to keep a mine from opening near the headwaters of the Wolf River. BHP Billiton announced it was no longer interested in developing the mine; a mining industry spokeswoman said other buyers may be turned off by having to "bang their head against the Wisconsin brick wall" of local opposition. I met this week with part of that "Wisconsin brick wall," and found that the wall that turned back two multinationals was composed of little people retirees, Indians, farmers - and financed by chili suppers, barbershop quartets and people reaching deep into their own pockets. The victories came with costs - both towns threw out chairman deemed to be too cooperative with the corporations; and in both places, neighbors still don't talk to neighbors. And in both situations, the victories may be only temporary. The mine site could find a new buyer and Nestle could renew its permits if it decides its Michigan plant won't meet its needs. Still, both camps felt it was time to celebrate. And I wanted to meet with them and find out how they did it. I haven't covered the Perrier issue because my family owns property along the Mecan River near where Perrier first wanted to pump spring water. I remember how bleak things seemed back in the winter of 2000, when we learned that Perrier had already sunk test wells next to the stream, and that there wasn't much in state law to stop them. But people from all over rallied because of the Mecan's status as a world-class trout stream. So the company concentrated its efforts in Big Spring, where the water was good, but the stream less famous. The outside spotlight faded a bit as the issue moved into Adams County. "What was unfortunate was so many people stepped back," recalled Mary Jane Schmudlach, who lives along the Mecan, but offered help to the Big Spring area. "Those senior citizens had to take up the fight all by themselves. They got dragged through a lot more than we would ever see." About two dozen of those senior citizens, members of the group Waterkeepers of Wisconsin (WOW), gathered at the town hall this past week to talk about how the fight has changed them. For one thing, they're more than a little cynical about corporations and their government. "I'm as upset with the Legislature as I am with Perrier," said Joan Byers, who thinks that stronger ground-water legislation is long overdue. "They heard testimony from (many ground-water experts) and they didn't do anything." Others are planning to vote against Gov. Scott McCallum, who vetoed a provision in the 2001 state budget that would have required Perrier to undergo an environmental impact study before it could sink wells. "He (McCallum) stood up in the Dells and promised us that Perrier would never come here," Dan Bailey said. "He promised us one thing and then turned around and did another." But while the legislative route failed (Perrier spent $59,651 lobbying legislators between January and June 2001, while WOW spent $4,861), the opponents won in court. An allied group, the Concerned Citizens of Newport (CCN) formed in a neighboring town where the water-bottling plant would be built. It sued the Department of Natural Resources, and won a judge's ruling in February that high-capacity wells do, indeed, need environmental impact assessments. Hiroshi and Arlene Kanno, founders of CCN along with one of their neighbors, had to refinance their retirement farm to help pay the legal bills for that lawsuit. "We are the little guys," Hiroshi Kanno said, of their fight. They've also been plunged into the world of water protection, a crusade that has filled their home with environmental books and reports. "This thing," Kanno added, "has really taken over our lives." It's also taken the Kannos to international environmental conferences in Vancouver and, last month, in Johannesburg, South Africa. There, they ran into Mole Lake Ojibwe tribal members from northern Wisconsin who were there to express their concerns over the mine. The Wisconsin activists took each others' photos at a rally against multinational corporations. Each group came home to a big win, but no one thinks either fight is over. Back at the New Haven Town Hall, Margaret Kutzke was selling raffle tickets for a "Santa Luncheon" and craft fair to raise money for WOW. "As long as Nestle Waters (Perrier's parent company) is still active in our area," she said, "we'll keep having fund raisers." Meanwhile, Anna Davis, one of those election poll workers at the town hall, was correcting my notes. She's a human computer who can still recall the vote against the former town chairman, who was ousted for not fighting Perrier hard enough. "We voted him out 263 to 92." "I know," she added, nicely, "because I counted it."
Susan Lampert Smith writes about the people and places that make Wisconsin unique. Send her story ideas at ssmith@madison.com or to Wisconsin State Journal, P.O. Box 8058, Madison, WI 53708.:
