Mike Naig and Chris Jones Clash Over Iowa Water Quality Improvement
Naig: Conservation efforts are working. Jones: Regulations are needed.
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Mike Naig, Chris Jones clash over how best to improve Iowa water
Donnelle Eller
Des Moines Register
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MARSHALLTOWN — At a central Iowa farm, Agriculture Secretary Mike Naig says growers are being unfairly blamed for complex problems the state faces, most recently agriculture’s role in elevated nitrate levels in the water that some research links to the state’s high cancer rates.
"Clean water is non-negotiable," Naig tells about 20 farmers in early September. "It’s not a question of whether we need to improve water quality. That's not up for debate..."
"But there’s very much a debate about how best to do that," says the Republican, who since 2018 has led the state’s approach to cutting ag’s nitrate and phosphorus losses that are befouling Iowa’s lakes, rivers and streams.
That, indeed, is the crux of the race between Naig and Democrat Chris Jones. The retired University of Iowa research scientist seeks to upend Iowa’s approach to improving water quality, backing "common sense regulations" such as bans on fall tillage, taxes on fall nitrogen sales and grass buffers on Iowa waterways to stem farm runoff.
Jones said the state's incentive-based approach encouraging Iowa farmers to voluntarily adopt conservation practices to cut farm fertilizer losses — “spending a million dollars here, a million dollars there” — only puts BandAids on a large hemorrhaging agricultural system.
"The proof is in the pudding. The water is as bad as it’s ever been," said Jones, who paddled down the Des Moines River’s western fork for six days last month to highlight its poor conditions — water covered with a layer of algae, little aquatic life and brown foam, caused in part by livestock manure. "We need to demand better."
Naig said the state’s approach is working. "We’ve set records five years in a row" for conservation gains, he said at the Iowa State Fair Soapbox, including going "from a few thousand acres of cover crops … to over 4 million acres."
"But that’s not good enough. We need to do more," Naig said, pointing to increased state funding that’s helping accelerate conservation adoption.
Farming is important to Iowa, Naig said, with ag driving about 25% of the state's $277.1 billion economy through manufacturing, finance and insurance.
"Every Iowan benefits from a strong agriculture," he said. Let's "quit the blame game, saying it’s all a rural issue, it’s all an urban issue. It’s an ‘us’ issue."
Chris Jones: Farmers squeezed by same system that’s 'failing the rest of us'
This summer, for the second consecutive year, Central Iowa Water Works banned lawn watering as demand outstripped its capacity to treat rising nitrate levels and meet basic drinking water needs.
High nitrate levels in the Des Moines and Raccoon rivers, the source of drinking water for 600,000 residents, forced the regional drinking water authority to run its massive nitrate removal facility for a record 193 days.
Attention on farming's impact on Iowa health grew following a report in March, which linked environmental factors such as pesticide use, high nitrate levels in Iowa waters and elevated radon exposure to the state's high cancer rates.
Iowa's cancer rate ranks second highest nationally, and the state is only one of three with where rates are rising.