Wisconsin needs to more assertively use its drunk driving laws to protect the innocent rather than enabling repeat offenders.

It has to treat repeat OWI offenders the same way it deals with people who discharge firearms in public without regard for other people's safety: Lock 'em up and don't give their gun back.

It's a three-step reform of OWI laws, tougher than what is proposed by some legislators:

1. Criminalize a first offense, making it a misdemeanor, and no longer a ticket. Treat that first offense seriously. And make it clear that when it comes to OWI, two strikes and you're out.

2. Turn a second offense into a felony and make vehicle confiscation mandatory. That's how you help a repeat offender see sobriety as desirable and also how you profoundly help deter others from a first or second offense.

3. Turn one or two vehicle confiscations every month or so into very public salvage yard crushings, then auction off the other seized vehicles and turn the proceeds over to law enforcement to help finance equipment purchases, or operating expenses of check points and other anti-OWN actions.

Even this winter's heavy snows did not bring the Great Lakes back to their historic average depths, as a warming climate increases evaporation.

Lower lake levels mean navigation troubles and lighter, less-profitable loads for shippers, heightening the need for coordinated efforts to maintain the waters' quality and quantity.

And despite the growing awareness across the region, and certainly worldwide, that all water is absolutely precious, radical Republicans carrying political water for business interests in Waukesha County, with allies in the conservative fringes in the Ohio legislature, are blocking an eight-state water conservation agreement for Great Lakes management.

What they want are Great Lakes diversions with few standards and controls, even though four of the eight Great Lakes staes have approved the agreement - - known as the Great Lakes Compact - - and further delay could easily kill it.

Details here.

Dane County Executive Kathleen Falk talked sense to Madison's Downtown Rotary on the subject of alcohol abuse.

Details here.

Waukesha County GOP legislative leaders act out, and act badly, when a bi-partisan water conservation measure doesn't go their way in the State Senate.

Since one of their major complaints is that the measure jeopardizes their sense of sovereignty, perhaps they should consider seceding from Wisconsin, and setting up the 51st state, Exceptionalonia, just for special people.  

Two states have fully-approved The Great Lakes compact, two more states' legislatures have passed it and bills are on their Governors' desks, so with four states left to finish off this seven-year process, what is happening in Wisconsin?

On Thursday, the day a bill finally was produced for legislators at the State Capitol for an informational hearing, Assembly Republican leaders announced they wanted the whole package sent back to the eight Great Lakes states for more negotiating.

In other words, death by tabling.

Now there's regional cooperation and bi-partisanship for you, and also some dangerous messing around with the Great Lakes for narrow and partisan purposes.

Details here.

When you don't like an agreement, see if you can change the wording after all parties signed on, and also agreed to making no major changes.

That's what Waukesha wants to do with the eight-state Great Lakes Compact - - toss out its major decision-making standard.

That's so Waukesha can get more water, or so it thinks.

Similar thing happening in Georgia.

Legislators there want to change the boundary with Tennessee, so Tennessee water becomes Georgia water.

If these jurisdictions were talking conservation and sustainable planning and development, none of these tricks would even be open for discussion.

Details here.

Poll Indicates 80% Support For Great Lakes Compact

A poll commissioned by Wisconsin conservation groups, conducted by the UW Survey Center and released Monday, indicates 80% support statewide for adoption of the Great Lakes Compact.

That's good news for advocates of the Compact, and for backers of strong water conservation policy in Wisconsin and across the Great Lakes.

Details provided by the environmental group Clean Wisconsin to the Superior Daily Telegram indicate widespread bi-partisan support for a strong version of the Compact, with pro-Compact sentiment also measured both near the Great Lakes, and in communities far from the Great Lakes basin in Wisconsin, too.

Among the poll findings, as reported by the Daily Telegram:

"• 86 percent say it is important to provide further oversight and regulation before bottling and selling Great Lakes water.

Lobby Legislators For A Strong Great Lakes Compact Jan. 30

The annual Conservation Lobby Day - - when citizen-lobbyists swarm the State Capitol on behalf of progressive energy, environmental and conservation issues - - takes place this year on Wednesday, January 30th.

Here is a link to the best approach to take with legislators on the Great Lakes Compact, along with other information about the day and how to participate.

And another link from the Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters, with additional registration information, is here.

Historical Site Damage At Pabst Farms Echos Earlier Destruction

Call this chapter IX in our continuing series, The Road To Sprawlville:

Rare Native American effigy mounds, some in the shape of panthers, have been damaged at Pabst Farms, the Journal Sentinel reports.

Turns out it's not the first time this has happened out Waukesha way. More on that through the links above.

Wisconsin needs a statewide smoking ban, or risks being the region's ashtray, says Gov. Doyle.

He's right.