News Room
Media Contact
WaterLegacy welcomes media inquiries.
Media Contact: Paula Maccabee, Executive Director and Counsel
Phone (office): 651-646-8890
Phone (cell): 651-775-7128
Email: paula@waterlegacy.org
WaterLegacy in the News
Local View: Mining bill means more federal takeover
Opinion for Duluth News Tribune | March 16, 2026
“A federal bill to repeal a mining ban in northern Minnesota’s Superior National Forest (HJ140) isn’t just about a little mine. It’s about opening up the entire protected national forest — federal lands — to any and all private mineral exploitation, even as special interests try to strip away state regulatory control. Mining also means forest destruction. We have seen the inevitable outcome of a bare cutover region. Economic exploitation at the expense of everything that makes northern Minnesota what it is would be the worst possible trade we could make. It would be a permanent loss.”
EPA moves to curb state input on water permits, raising alarm
Minnesota Star Tribune | March 5, 2026
“For decades, a key provision of the Clean Water Act has allowed states to weigh in on, and sometimes derail, federal water permits. Now the Trump administration is poised to roll back that power. […] These powers were “written into the Clean Water Act so that states and tribes … could protect their own water quality from a reckless or inadequate federal permit,” said Paula Maccabee, executive director and counsel for the environmental group WaterLegacy. “This administration is creating chaos in what is settled law that protects all of us.””
Yet another delay in enforcing sulfate limits on wild rice waters
AGATE Magazine | January 3, 2026
“Advocates say now would be a good time to push U.S. Steel to comply with its permit, following its June sale to Nippon Steel . . . For [Mike] Maleska and others who have been following this issue, any standard will be an exercise in futility if not enforced. In that regard, the MPCA’s track record to date offers cold comfort.”
MEDIA RELEASE: Minnesotans Rally in Duluth to Tell Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to “Stay the Course” and Require U.S. Steel Keetac Sulfate Limits
WaterLegacy | December 8, 2025
“On Wednesday, December 10, Minnesotans will gather outside the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency’s (MPCA) Duluth office to support the agency’s draft decisions limiting U.S. Steel’s Keetac discharge to comply with the wild rice sulfate standard and denying U.S. Steel a variance that would delay compliance with sulfate pollution limits. They will ask MPCA to “stay the course” and protect water, wild rice, fish, and human health.
The rally will begin at 12:00 noon in the parking lot (harbor side) of the MPCA office in the Paulucci Building in Canal Park. Speakers will include State Senator Jen McEwen; retired aquatic ecologist Janet Keough; Fond du Lac Band Elder Ricky DeFoe; and retired miner and union leader Mike Maleska.”
Reflections from Minnesota’s manoomin basket
University of Minnesota Extension | November 19, 2025
“WaterLegacy, a Duluth-based nonprofit dedicated to protecting Minnesota’s waters, says environmental changes and proposed development are of great concern to communities that depend on the area’s wild rice waters. In response, the organization partnered with the University of Minnesota Extension Regional Sustainable Development Partnerships (RSDP). Connecting the regional leaders with University resources, RSDP supported WaterLegacy in developing a one-of-a-kind tribute to a landscape as vital as it is irreplaceable. “
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