“I say water is better than money,” — Mike Delp, “Mad Angler Speaks Truth to Power,” from Lying in the River’s Dark Bed: The Confluence of the Deadman and the Mad Angler. (Wayne State University Press, 2016). Mike Delp, the water poet, has shared his poems at readings and on the electronic pages of… Read more »
We had a great evening and thanks to much generous support, we raised over $10,000 with around 250 people in attendance! Thank you to all who supported our work, especially Betsie Bay Furniture, Northway Orthodontics and The Garden Theater and all of our amazing donors.
Ask any ship captain or sailor along the shores of the Great Lakes, and they will tell you how important it is to follow the rules of navigation, including honoring those lighthouse beacons and green and red channel buoys. In short, boat captains must exercise utmost caution at all times. The same is true for… Read more »
Aquaculture –often in the form of networks of enclosed pens that exclusively occupy a large area of surface water and underlying bottomlands—raises substantial legal, environmental, aquatic resource, and water use impact issues. Specifically, the use of public waters and bottomlands for the occupancy and operation of concentrated fish production raises a number of grave concerns,… Read more »
On Monday May 2, 2016, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that state laws regulating the oil and gas industry trump local bans and moratoriums on fracking. Colorado has become a leader in oil and gas production with more than 50,000 actives wells and more than 45,000 inactive wells. The high court overturned Longmont’s 2012 ban on fracking… Read more »
The launch of FLOW’s new website comes at the same time FLOW’s work (beginning back in 2009 when Terry Swier, President of Michigan Citizens for Water Conservation, my brother Eric Olson, Ted Curran, and a few others, saw the need to educate leaders and the public on the overarching principle known as the public trust… Read more »
Recent PostsThe last frontier? Great Lakes lakebed needs mapped to modern standardsMay 14, 2025We are all enamored of the 38,000 square miles of Great Lakes water within the boundaries of Michigan, but few think of the 38,000 square miles of land at the bottom of the Great Lakes. This area, which the State of Michigan… Read more »
IJC Report Released Today on Great Lakes Diversions, Consumptive Uses, and Climate Change Adopts Policy Prescription from FLOW, Great Lakes Water Law and Policy Center TRAVERSE CITY, MI — The International Joint Commission issued a much anticipated report today on the success of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Sustainable Water Resources Agreementand Compact ban on diversions and excessive consumptive… Read more »
By Jim Olson, President FLOW (For Love of Water) We can be thankful that nations of the world have opened the door to the foyer to address climate change. Most encouraging is the senses of cooperation to protect this home we call earth. The other end of the promise and hope of the Paris… Read more »
A new animated video by the University of Michigan and the National Wildlife Federation shows how devastating an oil spill beneath the Straits of Mackinac would be for the Great Lakes, wildlife, and communities. The animation shows that if an oil spill occurs, oil could reach popular tourist destinations like Mackinac Island, blanket 50 miles… Read more »
