Echo

Convicted sewage dumper loses another court challenge

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By Eric FreedmanGreat Lakes EchoA federal judge in Detroit has rejected a challenge to a former landlord’s conviction for illegally dumping an estimated 107,000 gallons of raw sewage into Southeast Michigan’s Huron River. U.S. District Judge Robert Cleland rebuffed an effort by David Kircher to overturn his 2006 conviction for violating Michigan’s Natural Resources and Protection Act in a way that “substantially endangers” the public. He was sentenced to five years in state prison and fined $1 million. Earlier, the state Court of Appeals upheld the conviction and sentence. The case arose from an October 2004 incident when sewage backed up at the Eastern Highlands apartment complex that Kircher then owned in Ypsilanti Township near Ann Arbor.

Echo

Help Echo make a bucket list

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Echo is considering a redesign. I say that with some trepidation. I have found that technical and design questions regarding web projects can paralyze action. The delays frustrate getting quality content into your hands fast. And Echo works now.

Echo

Green justice: Court impact on environment often overlooked

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You may have caught this weird judicial twist in a recent Great Lakes Echo story: A Wisconsin judge ruled that manure was not a waste but a valuable commodity. That’s no surprise. Anyone with a backyard garden knows that. But providing that legal stamp produced a counter-intuitive outcome. It meant that an insurer was on the hook for damages when a farm polluted nearby wells with that valuable manure.

Echo

Twelfth day of Christmas: Quaggas clogging

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Editor’s Note: It’s an Echo tradition to revisit one of our favorite holiday stories: Tim Campbell’s The Twelve Days of Aquatic Invasive Species Christmas. Campbell rewrote the lyrics of the holiday tune for the Wisconsin Sea Grant in 2011.  We’re publishing a new verse on each of the actual twelve days of Christmas.  

 

On the twelfth day of Christmas, a freighter sent to me… Twelve quaggas clogging — Quagga mussels are now the dominant invasive mussel in Lake Michigan. A congener (a member of the same genus) of zebra mussels, the quagga mussel can tolerate colder water and colonize soft substrates.

Echo

Eleventh day of Christmas: Gobies gobbling

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Editor’s Note: It’s an Echo tradition to revisit one of our favorite holiday stories: Tim Campbell’s The Twelve Days of Aquatic Invasive Species Christmas. Campbell rewrote the lyrics of the holiday tune for the Wisconsin Sea Grant in 2011.  We’re publishing a new verse on each of the actual twelve days of Christmas.  

 

On the eleventh day of Christmas, a freighter sent to me… ‘Leven gobies gobbling — Round gobies are very effective egg predators. Their advanced lateral line system (a series of fish sensory organs) allows them to find eggs that native benthic egg predators are unable to.