Mark Erickson, the Menominee River co-chair Sam Eggleston
Mark Erickson really couldn't tell you an exact date as to when he first started actively being a part of the Menominee River Area of Concern Citizens Advisory Committee. That's probably because he's been a part of it for so long.
"I've been working on this for at least 20 years," says Erickson, co-chair for the AOC's advisory committee. "From solid waste cleanups to cleaning the shoreline and the various Area of Concern sites, I've been involved since the 1980s."
Erickson, who is also the engineering manager at Lloyd Flanders in Menominee, has spent nearly his entire life around the Menominee River. His family has been in the area for generations, and Erickson grew up with his siblings right in Menominee. He graduated from Menominee High School before moving away for a short time and then moved back to his hometown.
"Back then, after I graduated, there weren't a lot of jobs to be found," Erickson says. "There was an opening here (at Lloyd Flanders) so I took it. I've been here ever since.
"This place (Menominee) has been good to me."
Erickson's role with the AOC began because of his position with Lloyd Flanders, the long-standing wicker furniture company, which has been known to have furnished the homes of former Presidents of the United States as well as other politicians, celebrities and more.
Part of the AOC includes contamination from paint sludge that was dumped on the Michigan side of the river that runs the border between it and Wisconsin. Erickson was one of the people tasked with working with the DEQ on cleanup efforts of the sludge. From there, his involvement spread to the Citizens Advisory Committee where the focus was on the broader concerns of the Menominee River region.
The Menominee River Area of Concern is a section of the waterway that includes the lower three miles of the river, from the Upper Scott Paper Company Dam to the river mouth and includes the Green Bay shoreline from the Wisconsin side's Seagull Bar to Henes Park in Michigan as well as Green Island. In addition to the paint sludge, that section of waterway and land was also once contaminated by arsenic and coal tar.
"We're cleaning up things that happened long before our time," says Erickson. "They didn't think about what could possibly happen to the environment when they were dumping this stuff. This is in the early 1900s -- in the 20s and 30s -- when this was happening all over. In areas like this where there was some industry, they didn't consider other ways to dispose of their waste."
But those concerns did grow over the decades, and Erickson says when people realized that there was work to be done in order to restore the region, they tried to get right to work.
"There are people on the committee who have been a part of it for 35 years or more," he says. "Those are the people who got me involved.
"Over the years, there have been so many people who have helped. I've met so many great people for both Michigan and Wisconsin by being a part of this. And we've all done a lot of good. It's been a lot of fun to be a part of it. It's amazing how much work can be accomplished when the groups from both states begin to work together. Not enough can be said about the partnership between the states."
Erickson said that none of it would be possible without the cooperation between the citizen's council, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources and the United States Environmental Protection Agency. The fruits of those cooperative labors over the past decades is starting to pay off, to the point that the talk of delisting the Menominee River as an Area of Concern has been steady. That achievement could happen within the next couple of years.
"Isn't that amazing?" Erickson says. "This is something to be proud of. I grew up here. I raised my own family here. Now they can go down to the river and to the shore and they can fish and swim and do anything they want and not have to worry about any of it.
"This isn't about me. This isn't about us. It's about everyone. We did this so everyone can enjoy this now and in the future and never have to deal with it again."
Sam Eggleston is a freelance writer and editor based in the Upper Peninsula.
This series about restoration in Michigan's Areas of Concern is made possible through support from the Michigan Office of Great Lakes through Great Lakes Restoration Initiative.
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