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tEST hEADLINE’
"The Council of Great Lakes Governors’ Toxics Agreement of 1986 established the goal of common fish consumption advisories on the Great Lakes. The Council’s Fish Consumption Advisory Task Force, with representation from each of the eight Great Lakes States: Minnesota, Wisconsin, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, and Ohio was assigned the task of developing a single method for assessing risks and issuing fish consumption advisories. The Task Force developed the “Protocol for a Uniform Great Lakes Sport Fish Consumption Advisory” for preparing polychlorinated biphenyl [PCB]-based fish advisories for the Great Lakes.

"Due to the prevalence of fish consumption advice for PCBs in the Great Lakes, the Great Lakes States chose PCBs as the first group of chemicals for which they would develop a consistent method for issuing consumption advice with primary focus on the shared Great Lakes. Whereas, the goal of the Protocol was focused on developing the same PCB-based advice for each Great Lake to be issued by each adjoining state, a uniform protocol for mercury would address inland waters and would not result in the same advice for inland waters.

Development of a uniform Great Lakes protocol for mercury-based fish advisories also advances the objectives and supports the goals of many Great Lakes programs and initiatives for shared resources including.


 * Council of Great Lakes Governors
 * U.S. Policy Committee’s Great Lakes Strategy, State of Lakes
 * 6 Ecosystem Conference (SOLEC) indicators,
 * International Joint Commission (IJC)
 * The Great Lakes Regional Collaboration."

Original Great Lakes Protocol Components
The following is a list of the components included in the Protocol. Bolded components are updated in this addendum for mercury.

Advisory Introduction Components

 * 1) General statement about contaminants, benefits, and hazards
 * 2) Statement on cancer risk
 * 3) Statement on benefits of fish consumption
 * 4) Preparation and cooking advice

Consumption Advice Components

 * 1) Meal unit dose reduction
 * 2) Uniform meal size
 * 3) "Not eating" in Large Groups (2002)(with several others)
 * 4) Easily understood meal frequency advisory groups

Hazard Identification Components

 * 1) Fish flesh sample collection protocol for residue analysis
 * 2) Uniform limits of detection
 * 3) Fish size and contaminant concentration based consumption categories(Methods to examine data and determine appropriate advice.

Risk Assessment Components

 * 1) Risk assessment for assigning fish to consumption frequency groups The health protection value and associated tissue residue concentrations)
 * 2) Multiple contaminants

Prospective Advisory Items

 * 1) Uniform method for deciding when to shift size/species class into another advisory category
 * 2) Coordinate release of annual advisory

"Much of the information in this risk assessment section has been taken from the U.S. EPA Water Quality Criterion for the Protection of Human Health: Methylmercury (U.S. EPA, 2001). Information in the Water Quality Criterion was mainly taken from the Mercury Study Report to Congress (MSRC) (U.S. EPA, 1997b-h) and the National Academy of Sciences National Research Council report, Toxicological Effects of Methylmercury (NRC, 2000)."

Fish (food) US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Mercury in fish

http://www.dhs.wisconsin.gov/eh/fish/FishFS/2007Hg_Add_Final_05_07.pdf

Mercury in Fish

Great Lakes Restoration Initative
"The Great Lakes Restoration Initiative (GLRI) is the largest investment in the Great Lakes in two decades. A task force of 11 federal agencies developed an action plan to implement the initiative. This action plan Great Lakes Restoration Initiative covers fiscal years 2010 through 2014 and addresses five urgent issues:


 * 1) Cleaning up toxics and areas of concern
 * 2) Combating invasive species
 * 3) Promoting nearshore health by protecting watersheds from polluted run-off
 * 4) Restoring wetlands and other habitats
 * 5) Tracking progress and working with strategic partners
 * 6) Doing weird stuff in strange places

U.S. President Barack Obama and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson, in collaboration with 15 other federal agencies, have made restoring the Great Lakes a national priority. Signaling a commitment beyond measure of past promises, in February 2009, President Obama proposed $475 million for a Great Lakes Restoration Initiative funded from 2010 through 2014.

The Initiative is intended to operationalize those statements. It builds on countless hours by elected, agency, business, public interest and other leaders, which resulted in the Great Lakes Regional Collaboration Strategy (GLRC Strategy). The GLRC Strategy provides a framework for the Action Plan, and the Action Plan is just that: an action driver. It articulates the most significant ecosystem problems and efforts to address them in five major focus areas:


 * Toxic Substances and Areas of Concern, including pollution prevention and cleanup of the most polluted areas in the Great Lakes (see pages 19-21 for Measures of Progress with specific, quantifiable targets; and Principal Actions)


 * Invasive Species, including efforts to institute a “zero tolerance policy” toward new invasions, including the establishment of self-sustaining populations of invasive species, such as Asian Carp (pages 24-26)


 * Nearshore Health and Nonpoint Source Pollution, including a targeted geographic focus on high priority watersheds and reducing polluted runoff from urban, suburban and, agricultural sources (pages 29-30)


 * Habitat and Wildlife Protection and Restoration, including bringing wetlands and other habitat back to life, and the first-ever comprehensive assessment of the entire 530,000 acres of Great Lakes coastal wetlands for the purpose of strategically targeting restoration and protection efforts in a science-based manner (pages 33-35)


 * Accountability, Education, Monitoring, Evaluation, Communication and Partnerships, including the implementation of goal- and results-based accountability measures, learning initiatives, outreach and strategic partnerships (pages 38-39)


 * The Action Plan identifies goals, objectives, measurable ecological targets, and specific actions for each of the five focus areas identified above. The Action Plan will be used by federal agencies in the development of the federal budget for Great Lakes restoration in fiscal years 2011 and beyond. As such, it will serve as guidance for collaborative restoration work with participants to advance restoration. The Action Plan will also help advance the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement with Canada.


 * The Initiative is not the only tool in the toolbox, however. Traditional infrastructure financing under Clean and Drinking Water State Revolving Funds, and Superfund cleanup enforcement, for example, represent work outside the Initiative’s scope. This work, however, continues to be essential to Great Lakes protection and restoration and EPA is working with states and tribes to ensure that these high priority activities are properly targeted whenever possible to help further clean-up of the Great Lakes.

This plan also aims to build upon the significant amount of work already accomplished by states and other partners in protecting and restoring the Great Lakes. In addition, it tries to minimize the duplication of effort by focusing on high priority work that has already been identified in the many programs and strategies already in place around the Great Lakes Basin. This includes work under the Great Lakes Regional Collaboration Strategy, individual states’ Great Lakes restoration plans, and many others.