A national environmental group says the Kansas River is one of the nation’s most endangered rivers.

“What’s happening to the Kansas River is terrible,” said Rebecca Wodders, president of American Rivers, a Washington, D.C.-based group dedicated to protecting the nation’s rivers and enforcement of the federal Clean Water Act.

The group Monday posted a list of 11 rivers it considers to be in the most danger. The Kansas River was ranked fourth behind the Missouri, Big Sunflower (Mississippi) and Klamath (Oregon and California).

Citing annual reports filed by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment, Wodders said concentrations of fecal coliform bacteria  feedlot manure, mostly  on the Kaw often reach concentrations of 10 to 50 times acceptable levels.

Lawmakers’ apathy, she said, has made matters worse.

“Even though the Kansas River is festering under a smothering load of livestock manure, the state legislature has relaxed clean water standards,” Wodders said. “If the state gets away with this, agribusiness lobbyists across the country will seek to copy this example.”

KDHE reports also cite troubling levels of fertilizer residue and soil erosion.

Farm lobby response

Last year, Kansas lawmakers passed a bill that limited the types of streams and tributaries subject to the state’s water quality standards. Before the new definitions become law, they have to be reviewed and approved by the federal Environmental Protection Agency, a process officials expect to begin this summer.

Environmentalists’ concerns that the EPA will be reluctant to challenge the agriculture-friendly definitions led to the Kansas River’s being put on the endangered list, Wodders said.

Wodders graduated from Kansas University in 1971 with bachelor’s degrees in biology and environmental studies. She later earned a master’s degree from the University of Wisconsin.

Before this year, American Rivers included the Kansas River on its list of threatened and endangered rivers in 1995, 1996 and 1998. The list began in 1986.

The state’s farm lobby scoffed at American Rivers’ putting the Kansas River’s troubles on agriculture’s doorstep.

“We see urban sprawl being every bit as large a contributor to the problem as agriculture would be,” said Steve Swaffar, director of environmental programs at Kansas Farm Bureau, the state’s largest farm lobby. “And there’s a tremendous amount of urban growth along the Kansas River in Shawnee, Douglas, Johnson and Wyandotte counties.”

Swaffar said American Rivers was reading too much into the KDHE reports.

“When you know how to manipulate the numbers, you can say pretty much whatever you want to say,” he said.

Riverkeeper’s view

Since August 2001, Dave Murphy has spent 90 days on the Kansas River, monitoring conditions. It’s not unusual, he said, to see crops planted along the shoreline.

“I can take you to places where rows of corn are growing right on the river, and as land has fallen in the river, the corn stalks are standing there with their roots exposed,” said Murphy, director of Kansas Riverkeeper, a 250-member group affiliated with the national Water Keeper Alliance.

He’s also seen where farmers have plowed through creeks and streams that feed into the river, and where cattle are confined on land bordering the river.

“When it rains, it’s just like a big flush  all that stuff goes straight into the river,” Murphy said. “There are livestock operations out there using the streams like they’re open sewers.”

Neither American Rivers nor Kansas Riverkeeper see themselves as anti-agriculture, Murphy said.

“Most farmers are trying to do good,” he said. “But there’s a segment out there that just doesn’t care, and they’ll do whatever it takes to make a profit. That’s where the problem is.”

Still, Swaffar said Murphy and American Rivers are selling the state’s farmers short.

“I wouldn’t be so bold as to say agriculture isn’t a contributor to the problem,” Swaffar said, “but there are others  many others  that are contributors in equal or greater proportion.”