The New York Times editorial staff put it best when they wrote “like an indestructible ghoul in a low-grade horror flick, the Yazoo Pumps are rising again from the bureaucratic crypt.” First proposed in 1941, the Yazoo Pumps are nothing short of a reoccurring nightmare. This World War II era project would, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, drain 200,000 acres of wetlands. A former EPA Wetland official called the pumps the most environmentally destructive project he ever reviewed in his 24 years at the agency.If constructed the Yazoo Pumps would be the world’s largest pumping system, and the $220 million cost would be borne solely by federal taxpayers. In the 1996 Water Resources Development Act, Senator Thad Cochran successfully inserted language to get rid of the requirement that the local government share in the cost.The pumps would damage two wildlife refuges and parts of a national forest, squandering investments the public has already made by damaging existing public resources. The project will make more land available for agribusiness. With wetlands shifting into farmlands, fertilizer application will increase and natural filtering systems will be diminished. By destroying wetlands, which filter out nitrogen and phosphorus, the project would also increase pollution loads in the lower Mississippi, adding to the degradation of water health in the Gulf of Mexico.These wetlands also support critical floodplain fisheries; serve as a haven for ducks and other migratory birds; improve water quality; and help reduce flood damages by acting as natural sponges that store and slowly release floodwaters.Mississippi Senators Trent Lott and Thad Cochran are championing the project, citing the pumps as necessary for local economic development and flood protection. But their view of economic development is extremely narrow. The 200,000 acres of wetland that the project would destroy provide many benefits to the Mississippi economy in the way of wildlife habitat, flood water storage, water purification, and recreation. As the Environmental Protection Agency has pointed out, the money spent on this project could be put to better use locally by updating ailing sewage treatment plants, obtaining conservation easements, and promoting nature tourism in the region. The line needs to be drawn somewhere. Economic development does not and should not require environmental destruction.The final Environmental Impact Statement was published last now is the time to kill this project once and for all. Please take action to stop the Yazoo Pumps Project. Let the Corps, EPA, and the Department of the Interior know you oppose the project.Stephanie Powell is the Outreach Associate for the GRN’s Healthy Waters Program
