SALEM, Ohio — The end of 2024 put Ohio at a crossroads of water policy and agricultural initiatives aimed at improving Lake Erie.
Ohio has made strides in improving Lake Erie’s water quality—reducing an estimated 420,000 pounds of phosphorus load this year, according to Ohio Department of Agriculture estimates —while increasing conservation practice adoption over the past decade. However, new priorities are being set in 2025 and policymakers are evaluating the effectiveness of incentive-based conservation programs.
This past year marked the fifth anniversary of the H2Ohio plan— Gov. Mike DeWine’s prized conservation incentive program for farmers. The clock has run out on a binational plan between Ohio, Michigan and Canada to reduce phosphorus runoff into Lake Erie by 40%, while a statewide ballot initiative for water quality might be presented to Ohio voters in coming years.
There’s a wide array of funding aimed at protecting Lake Erie—some with farmers in mind, others led by environmentalists—but 2025 might give citizens a chance to vote on the future of Lake Erie protection.
Binational agreement expiration
Signed in 2015, the Western Basin of Lake Erie Collaborative Agreement expired at the start of the year. The agreement set a 40% phosphorus reduction goal between Ohio, Michigan and Ontario, Canada.
The plan also established phosphorus load reduction targets. Target loads, often assessed using tributary or in-lake sampling, represent the amount of pollutants, such as phosphorus from manure or fertilizer, allowed to enter a body of water.
In 2021, the committee concluded that “target loads were not met in any year of the 5-year evaluation,” according to a subcommittee report.
However, the success of the remaining years of the agreement will be left unaddressed by state officials.
In a statement to Farm and Dairy, the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency said “At this time, there are no plans to address the Collaborative Agreement specifically, as those efforts remain ongoing as part of existing work.”
The same 40% goal was instead extended into a new domestic action plan for water quality, DAP 2023 —the state’s latest water quality plan that coordinates between state agencies.
With overlapping timelines between the old agreement and new water quality plan, it’s clear the original reduction goal was not met and has been extended. The Ohio EPA told Farm and Dairy “We are actively working towards this target by implementing specific actions identified in the 2023 Ohio Domestic Action Plan.”
This doesn’t surprise farmer leaders following the issue. The agreement was a prelude to any major effort among Ohio’s state government, farmers and environmental groups, as it was signed just as the Toledo water crisis occurred.
The same year the agreement was signed, Ohio Farm Bureau’s 2015 policy book stated, “We insist that there is a thorough comprehensive science-based study of all point and nonpoint source discharges into Lake Erie to evaluate their full impact on nutrients transported into the lake before any widespread regulations are imposed only on the agricultural community.”
The agreement was never a form of regulation on farmers, but over the years some farm conservation leaders have described the 40% goal as premature for its time and lacking direction. They would await the flood of research that would paint a clearer picture of policy options that would create effective governance.
Though it’s clear now the agreement will not formally be evaluated, the available data reveals mixed results. For example, the Maumee River met its dissolved reactive phosphorus target but failed to meet total phosphorus goals in 2023. Similarly, the Sandusky River met only one objective. However, the Portage River successfully met both targets, according to a Tributary Water Monitoring Summary by the Lake Erie Commission.
Two issues have become clear through runoff data collection over the last decade: annual rainfall affects runoff rates, and summer heat over northern Ohio determines the severity of harmful algal blooms.
Experts acknowledge that tracking water quality progress can be difficult. The Ohio EPA noted, “Climate models are now being scaled for localized efforts,” strengthening data collected by the agency and its partners.
Protecting investments
The 2014 Toledo water crisis, when 500,000 Toledo residents lost access to water due to harmful algal blooms, became a critical pressure point for water quality coordination to surge.
H2Ohio was later established as a voluntary incentives program, implemented in 2019 across 14 counties in the Maumee River Watershed. The DeWine-backed program originated from a working group proposal from Healthy Water Ohio initiative.
Most of the current Lake Erie protections and incentive programs have stemmed from proposals from Healthy Water Ohio. Lake Erie advocates contributed to its development, including those involved in later formed Ohio Agriculture Conservation Initiative, a consortium with members ranging from The Nature Conservancy to the Ohio Soybean Council and 15 other partners.
The consensus among Ohio leadership is that the program is here to stay. However, one environmental group, the Alliance of the Great Lakes, reflecting on H2Ohio’s effectiveness, arguing that the $270 million committed so far underestimates the “scale and associated costs of implementing best management practices,” according to an organizational report.
The Alliance of the Great Lakes suggested that “semi-permanent funding structures” are needed to secure and solidify efforts, compared to the state’s biennial funding authorizations.
National conservation adoption is not as strong as it used to be anymore. Cover crop adoption increased less between 2017 and 2022 compared to 2012 and 2017, according to University of Illinois FarmDoc economists.
The call for increasing funding raises questions about whether conservation incentives offer enough money for farmers to adopt these practices. The H2Ohio program offers $35 per acre for crop rotation and manure incorporation on qualified acres, in addition to other best management practices like $25 per acre to overwinter cover crops.
FarmDoc economists estimate that subsidies may need to rise to $50 per acre to shift adoption rates, particularly given the increased costs of labor, planting equipment and seed. The estimated $50 per acre includes the $37 per acre national average implementation cost and a $13 per acre incentive.
$1 billion In the voters’ hands
What’s next for long-term funding to support agricultural incentives may lie in something called a “water bond.”
Since 2015, four resolutions have been introduced to authorize the state to issue bonds for financing clean water improvements and implementing nutrient management best practices through the H2Ohio program. The so-called water bond would issue bonds over 10 years to allocate up to $100 million annually to water quality projects.
It was first put forth by former state Sen. Joe Schiavoni, followed by former state Rep. Steve Arndt, and twice by state Sen. Theresa Gavarone—leaders who have all represented the coastlines of Lake Erie.
The water bond might come back again before Dewine leaves office. Milo Petruziello, policy director for the Ohio Ecological Food and Farming Association, said talks are underway among the same stakeholders involved in the Ohio Agriculture Conservative Initiative.
“We are in the early stages of working with partners on the water bill,” Petruziello said. These partners include farm bureau leaders, commodity groups, wildlife organizations and environmental groups.
The timeline remains uncertain, but speculation points to a possible ballot initiative in 2025. Gavarone did not respond to requests for comment on whether she plans to reintroduce this bipartisan legislation.
The Ohio Environmental Council confirmed its participation in discussions of “long-term investments in Ohio’s water quality and water infrastructure programs.” In a statement, the OEC said “The good news is that we see strong bipartisan support for water quality and water infrastructure investment from Ohio’s leaders. The Ohio legislature has generously supported Governor DeWine’s H2Ohio program to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars biannually since 2019.”
This long-term solution was first put forth as a recommendation by the Healthy Water Ohio coalition in 2015. However, momentum shifted toward the H2Ohio program, sidelining the bond initiative. Former Gov. John Kasich opposed it, but DeWine, who campaigned in favor of the bond, later discouraged the effort, wanting to spend general revenue money for water quality first.
As 2025 begins, the DeWine administration’s stance has shifted, with the water bond now under consideration with external partners and poised to become DeWine’s legacy legislation before his term ends in 2026. The resolution would require voter approval after the General Assembly votes to submit it as a ballot issue.
If not passed under DeWine, the Republican frontrunner for the 2026 governor’s race, Dave Yost, may support a water bond. While Yost has no direct experience with agriculture policy as Ohio Attorney General, he has protected Ohio’s water resources by prosecuting Clean Water Act violators and advocating for compensation for East Palestine farmers and homeowners.
The coming year will determine whether internal meetings become public discussions and if Ohio will follow through on a decade-long ballot initiative idea.
