Great Lakes Restoration Conference Underway This Week

greatlakes
greatlakes

The Great Lakes Restoration Conference is underway this week in Ohio, and representatives of both the Clinton and Trump campaigns are scheduled to be on hand. Gildo Tori is with Ducks Unlimited, a group calling for the candidates to clearly express support for the Great Lakes. He says the Flint water crisis highlights the need for clean-water investments.

“And the Great Lakes are big picture,” Tori said. “There’s 30 million people who rely on them for drinking water and there’s about a million and a half jobs that are directly connected to the Great Lakes. Anybody that’s a president is going to realize, my goodness, this Great Lakes region can be really compared to its own state or country, in and of itself.”

A 2016 poll of voters in Great Lakes states found more than six-in-ten strongly support continued funding for the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative. It also revealed voters would be less likely to vote for a candidate promising cuts to federal restoration funds.