Renegotiation of the 1987 Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement: 6 From Confusion to Promise

: The Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement has been the unifying principles for 13 interjurisdictional shared water management for Canada and the United States for nearly 14 40 years. Beginning in 2009, both governments agreed to renegotiate a renewed agreement 15 bringing it up to date with scientific advances and complex governance challenges. This is 16 the first substantial amendment to the agreement since 1987 and represents a watershed 17 point in the history of the Great Lakes regime. This manuscript documents for posterity the 18 process being employed in the negotiations and in public engagement through that process. 19 It contains distressing observations and highlights promising approaches to ensure the new 20 agreement is truly a vision for the 21st century


Introduction
Seen from space, the Great Lakes appear as sparkling jewels strung across the center of North America.The Great Lakes ecosystem is one of the great natural wonders of the world.Nearly one-fifth of the planet's surface fresh water is stored in and flows through the lakes.One out of every three Canadians and one of every ten United States residents takes her or his drinking water from the Great Lakes (Manno and Krantzberg 2008).
As Manno and Krantzberg (2008) explain: -The Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement was negotiated pursuant to the 1909 Boundary Waters Treaty between the United States and British Canada that had created the International Joint Commission (IJC) to help resolve problems Including pollution that was causing injury to health or property crossing the binational boarder.The IJC and the institutions added to it …were based on the principle of bi-nationalism (two countries collaborating on achieving a set of shared goals) rather than bi-lateralism (two countries negotiating with each other in an attempt to balance interests and protect each others rights).‖Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau and President Richard Nixon signed the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement (GLWQA) in 1972.This Agreement expresses the commitment of Canada and the United States to restore and maintain the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the waters of the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem (United States and Canada 1972).The GLWQA has had substantial influence on the cleanup and restoration of the region.The progress made since 1972 is evidenced by the documentation by scientists early in the 21 st century (for the first time since 1916), of the presence of spawning lake whitefish and eggs in the Detroit River, the resurgence of cormorant populations, the rediscovery of sturgeon populations, and the return of nesting and fledging bald eagles (Krantzberg 2008).
For nearly four decades the Great Lakes regime has invoked the GLWQA as the mechanism for binational cooperation on programs and policies to enhance and protect the integrity of the Great Lakes.Many advances in water quality have lead to unquestionable improvements in ecosystem quality, habitat and biodiversity, and water infrastructure.As reported at the 2009 State of the Lakes Ecosystem Conference -[r]eleases of targeted bioaccumulative toxic chemicals have declined significantly from their peak period in past decades and, for the most part, no longer limit the reproduction of fish, birds and mammals.Concentrations of contaminants in the open waters are low, and many contaminants are further declining‖ (SOLEC 2009).
Further, Hall (2009) describes how Canada and the United States have led the way in incorporating citizen participation into transboundary environmental protection and governance.-Since the 1970's, the second generation (after the Boundary Waters Treaty) of environmental agreements between the United States and Canada demonstrate a dramatic growth in the role of citizens in achieving compliance with international environmental law.‖The GLWQA relies -heavily on citizens to ensure compliance and implicitly recognize that the two federal governments may have more in common with each other than with citizens and other stakeholders on both sides of the border when it comes to environmental protection and harm.‖While acknowledging progress towards meeting the purpose of the GLWQA, Great Lakes scientists have issued compelling evidence that the ecological health of the basin ecosystem is at significant risk and could be approaching a tipping point.According to Bail et al. (2005) -[t]here is widespread agreement that the Great Lakes presently are exhibiting symptoms of extreme stress from a combination of sources that include toxic contaminants, invasive species, nutrient loading, shoreline and upland land use changes, and hydrologic modifications…Factors such as the size of the lakes, the time delay between the introduction of stress and subsequent impacts, the temporary recovery of some portions of the ecosystem, and failure to understand the ecosystem-level disruptions caused by the combination of multiple stresses have led to the false assumption that the Great Lakes ecosystem is healthy and resilient.‖

Consensus Emerging from the Review of the GLWQA
The contrasting elements of success and peril, and the contemporary threats to ecological integrity not included in the GLWQA raise the importance of reviewing the Agreement with an eye to revisions.Imbedded within the Agreements is the provision for such a review.Article X of the GLWQA directs the Parties to conduct a comprehensive review of the operation and effectiveness of this Agreement following every third biennial report of the [International Joint] Commission (IJC).The IJC's 12 th Biennial Report, released in 2004, triggered this review which commenced May 2006 and concluded in October 2007 (Krantzberg 2008).The Review was conducted by organizing self-selected interested stakeholders into a set of binationally co-chaired Review Working Groups (RWGs).The results of that review are documented by ARC.States the ARC: -Conducted under the guiding principles of openness, transparency and inclusiveness, the Review Report, prepared by the Agreement Review Committee (ARC), draws on the work of the Reviewers… The key outcome of the public review was that, while there have been many successes; the GLWQA is outdated and unable to address current threats to Great Lakes water quality.‖-The reviewers found that…[c]ontemporary approaches to water resource regeneration such as watershed planning and implementation would strengthened the ability to achieving the purpose of the Agreement.Further the Agreement was absent language association with climate change, aquatic invasive species and urbanization.Attention was directed, as well to reforming governance in a manner that would enable active engagement of the large cross section of society that is currently and could in the future be more actively engaged in the implementation of the Agreement.More meaningful public and partner participation in the development and implementation of a renewed Agreement was recommended.‖(ARC 2007a) Previously, Krantzberg (2007) documented that the -Great Lakes community has witnessed and some have engaged in a year of teleconference discussions based on opinion by, as BEC states, experts and nonexperts alike.That no resources were made available by the Parties to conduct in person, researched and vetted discourse is disturbing.There has been no analysis of what in the Agreement works, what does not work, and why.There has been no systematic collection of empirical evidence upon which to base any specific and defensible findings.‖Nevertheless, there was enough of a consensus that the Agreement needs to be modernized to push the parties forward to that end.
There are, despite the difficult and flawed review period, highly useable observations and recommendations included in the reports of the working groups.At the time of writing, it is unclear that the Negotiators are deliberately mining these working group reports for context regarding a new or revised Agreement.
On Many other topic areas can be found in the Agreement Review Committee's reports available at http://binational.net/home_e.html.It is not clear that these findings were inspected and considered as a collective direction that could inform the renegotiation process, as revealed by the nature of the consultations held in webinars as described below.

Renegotiation Begins in 2010
In response to the strong consensus that the GLWQA is out of date, the Canadian Minister of Foreign and U.S. Secretary of State announced on June 13, 2009 that the two countries would begin negotiations to amend the Agreement.(DFAIT 2009).
It would take until January 2010 that U.S. EPA's Great Lakes National Program Office (GLNPO) and Environment Canada announced they would host a -binational webinar for Great Lakes partners, stakeholders and the public.The purpose is to inform all of the process for negotiations between the governments of the United States and Canada to amend the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.The webinar will provide opportunity for questions and answers and hopefully will be archived.‖The webinar was not archived.Nor were there any answers.Says Heckl (2010) -ENGOs were frustrated with these government webcasts because the governments provided little information on the calls, the webcasts were fraught with technical problems, and because they did not allow for a much needed dialogue between the governments and the public.The governments referred to the webcasts as ‗listening sessions'.‖Negotiations to amend the Agreement were formally initiated January 27, 2010, when senior officials from Environment Canada, Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada, the U.S. Department of State and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency concluded the first formal negotiating session for amending the GLWQA.A summary of what was entitled the First Plenary Meeting was provided online.It read: -At this first negotiating session, Canada and the U.S. reached agreement regarding the binational structure and process for negotiations.Both countries have agreed to a tentative timeline that targets December 2010 for completion of the process, while recognizing that timelines may need to be adjusted as negotiations proceed.
-The first issue to be addressed in negotiations will be governance.Governance discussions will focus on the purpose and scope of the Agreement, vision and principles, the management framework and provisions for future reviews and amendments to the Agreement.The Governments of Canada and the United States are committed to engaging the public at key stages of the negotiating process.At this stage, the public was invited to comment on governance issues…A second negotiating session is scheduled for April 2010, at which time progress on governance issues will be reviewed and the focus of negotiations will shift to specific environmental issues.‖In Canada, a Stakeholder Advisory Panel was struck, but no such consultative body was assembled in the United States.On April 8, 2010, senior officials from Environment Canada, Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada, the U.S. Department of State and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency met for the second formal negotiating session for amending the GLWQA.A summary of that meeting was posted online and read: -Since the formal launch of negotiations on January 27, 2010, a significant amount of work has been undertaken.During this time, governance discussions focused on the Agreement's purpose, scope, vision, principles, and management framework.Provisions for future reviews and amendments to the Agreement were also discussed.…Canada and the United States are committed to continued public engagement and have planned additional domestic and binational mechanisms to further engage the public and Great Lakes stakeholders at key stages in the negotiating process.These mechanisms will include a series of binational public webinars that will begin in May.During this webinar series, written comments will be solicited over a six week period.Towards the end of the negotiating process, Canada and the United States also intend to host one public forum in each country.‖The author will return to this commitment to public webinars below.
The statement concludes: -A third negotiating session is expected to take place in Summer 2010, at which time progress on all of the issues will be reviewed and the focus of negotiations will shift to the synthesis stage.This will ensure that the interrelation between governance and specific issues is reflected in the Agreement.Focus will also shift to drafting amended text for the Agreement.‖ The Governments of Canada and the United States hosted a series of binational public Webinars purportedly -on substantive issues‖ during the week of June 2010.and in addition to soliciting input during these Webinars, written comments were invited until July 2010.
The summer negotiation did not take place, and by the end of the 2010 calendar year, it became clear the negotiations would extend into 2011.The delay of the summer session to January 2011 ended up to be optimistic.That meeting was further delayed and at time of writing the meeting was tentatively rescheduled for the spring of 2011, representing a delay in completing the negotiations of at least nine months.

The Webinars: Scarce on Substance
The webinars to consult with regional members of the Great Lakes community entailed a number of considerations for which the Parties were seeking feedback.In most instances, the considerations were surprisingly vague and seemingly naïve.
The first topic shared was that of Governance, which the Parties defined as Agreement Scope An extract from the slide in which the Parties solicited input on governance were:  -Scope: -Currently, focused on addressing transboundary impairments.
-Fuller consideration of chemical, physical, and biological integrity?-Extend to address land-water connections at nearshore? GLWQA Management Forums: -Currently, federal, provincial and state agencies responsible for implementing programs relevant to achieving goals.-Expand membership?-Expanded membership role in priority setting and accountability?-Coordination with other environmental management forums?‖Bearing in mind the findings of the review published by the Agreement Review Committee (ARC 2007b) as cited above, that there would be a question as to fully considering physical and biological attributes, rather than the chemical focus that characterizes the current agreement is surprising, given that working groups during the Agreement Review were struck to discuss, for example, biodiversity, invasive species, habitat and climate change.
Questioning the participants on whether or not to extend the purview of the GLWQA to the nearshore suggests that there was negotiation required for the Parties to arrive at a consensus.Yet both the Review Working Groups and the IJC recommendations firmly emphasize this point.-The Agreement should establish a broad institutional watershed planning framework with goals, objectives, implementation targets, and mechanisms to coordinate land use decision makers at all levels of government.One framework objective should be establishing watershed management plans that are developed and implemented with local partners, include all the tributaries across the Great Lakes Basin, are clearly linked to larger lake-wide targets, and are contributing to the goals set out in LaMPs and RAPs;… The Agreement should clarify that its scope covers the effects of land use on the water quality of the Lakes' near-shore, coastal, and shoreline areas, and their tributaries.‖(ARC 2007b).Regarding other orders of government and the public, the ARC reports that reviewers stated: The IJC working group on the Nearshore Framework concluded that -[a] comprehensive and ecosystematic scientific assessment of condition of the nearshore waters and habitats of the Great Lakes is required.This should be developed within an adaptive-management strategy…‖ (NFAW 2009).
Hence raising the question surrounding expanded membership in Agreement implementation is baffling, as such engagement was not only articulated by hundreds of persons engaged in the review, but is also a fundamental prerequisite for actions to regenerate the health of the nearshore environment.Webinar participants were asked to comment on what they had already considered extensively in the 2006/7 review, at the IJC's Biennial meeting in 2009, and in other fora such as the Great Lakes St. Lawrence Cities Initiative, who issued Resolution 4 -2009M on the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement stating that -any final agreement recognize the critical role that local governments play in the protection and restoration of the resource.‖(GLSLCI 2009).The request for public input on matters that had already been deliberated at length engendered frustration since that those seeking input at this juncture were asking questions that had long been answered.There was nothing new of substance in this part of the webinar, in fact, the rehashing of matters resolved was unnerving and left the impression that those putting forward the questions were feigning consultation on matters for which there was overall government and stakeholder consensus.Approaches to public engagement leading to collaborative cooperation would dictate this type of consultation requires substantial modification.

Toxic Chemicals
The webinar regarding toxic chemicals included was the topic of -Establishing Objectives:‖ which the Parties describe as currently out-of-date and difficult to update, and go on to ask:  Establish substance specific objectives independently? Establish Great Lakes wide substance specific objectives? Establish Great Lakes ecosystem objectives?
In the review of Article IV and Annex I of the Agreement, working group members reported -The inclusion of The Specific Objectives Supplement to Annex 1 section 3, Lake Ecosystem Objectives, seems out-of-place and underdeveloped concept as it currently stands.The Parties should consider transferring the concepts of Lake Ecosystem Objectives as articulated in The Specific Objectives Supplement to Annex 1 section 3, into Annex 2 or to its own annex on ecosystem objectives…‖ (ARC 2007b).
The literature on ecosystem objectives points to their importance in triggering management actions.A key challenge identified by Gislason et al. (2000) is to define -measurable indicators and costeffective monitoring programmes that relate to ecosystem objectives, as well as the reference points…There is a need to consider impacts on both the structure (biodiversity) and the function (habitat productivity)‖ of ecosystems.As Niemi et al (2007) point out, -(e)nvironmental indicators are benchmarks for the current conditions of the Great Lakes coastal region and provide measurable endpoints to assess the success of future management, conservation, protection, and restoration of this important resource.‖The webinar asked participants to consider whether to establish objectives in a wolly manner; given the advanced status of objective development and deployment for large ecosystems regionally and globally.The notion of a substance by substance approach to indicator development has long been regarded as entirely incomplete without an ecosystem-based objective that is integrative of multiple stressors.For example, Niemi et al (2004) remark that coastal resources have traditionally been monitored on a stressor-by-stressor basis.To fully measure the complexities of coastal systems, they contend, there is a need for a new set of ecologic indicators that span the realm of biological organization and are broadly applicable across geographic regions while integrating stressor types.
Implementation of the ecosystem approach, introduced into the GLWQA in 1978, necessitates, as pointed out by MacDonald et al. ( 2009) the -development of ecosystem goals, objectives, and indicators, to guide decisions on the management of aquatic resources.Ecosystem objectives are specific narratives that depict the nature and breadth of the ecosystem goals (to restore and maintain ecosystem integrity, for example).-A set of ecosystem indicators (including specific metrics and targets)‖ continue MacDonald et al. ( 2009) is necessary to evaluate programs and measures towards achieving the ecosystem goals and objectives.
The discussion of a -Management Framework‖ under this topic area invited webinar participants to comment on whether the Parties should among other things, -(c)ommit to monitoring and research to identify emerging issues‖.In light of the emerging issues extensively referenced in ARC (2007), such a question is mute, and the purpose for asking it obscure.

Nutrients
The webinar regarding nutrients was introduced in this fashion:


Establishing Targets: -Single phosphorous target for Great Lakes?-Separate phosphorous targets for each Great Lake? -Phosphorous targets specific to each Great Lake, as well as areas within each lake?-Include socio-economic factors in establishing targets?I am astonished that we were requested to considering that a future GLWQA might contemplate to set a single phosphorous target for the entire Great Lakes or even a single one for each Great Lakes.Coupled with the vague language on whether a P target is a loading limit, open water concentration, or otherwise, this consultation was particularly empty of science.It is illogical to consider such an option, given that the nature for each of the Lakes varies from oligotrophic as in Lakes Superior, Huron and Michigan to oligomesotrophic and mesotrophic for different zones in Lakes Erie and Ontario.

Aquatic Invasive Species
The webinar regarding Aquatic Invasive Species was introduced in this fashion: -Address all aquatic invasive species, only those known to impact water quality, or only those known to impact biological integrity?-Consider aquatic invasive species threatening to enter the Great Lakes through canals, rivers, and waterways? Management Framework: -Binational forum to identify priorities; domestic mechanisms for action?-Binationally identify priorities and strategies in an Action Plan; domestic mechanisms for action?-New binational programs and activities to supplement domestic mechanisms for action?
It is questionable as to whether it is possible to parse biological integrity from water quality in the context of the receiving waters of the Great Lakes.In 1991 Karr (1991) discussed the matter of water being of sufficient quality and quantity as critical to all life.By way of illustration, Karr uses the -Water Pollution Control Act of 1972 (PL 92-500) and its charge to "restore and maintain" biotic integrity‖ to -illustrate that law's biological underpinning.‖Additionally, citing from the United States Environmental Protection Agency's -Assessing Biological Integrity of Surface Waters‖ (EPA 1998) -The EPA is now focusing on developing biological criteria in addition to chemical criteria to help track progress in maintaining and restoring the health of our waters.In most cases, the most direct and effective way to assess the "health" or biological condition of waterbodies is to: (1) directly measure the condition of their biological communities, and (2) support those data when necessary by measuring the physical and chemical condition of waterbodies and their watersheds.‖Water quality is central to biological integrity, by way of these illustrations.The inability and probably, undesirability to separate water quality from biological integrity not only invalidates the question of scope put forward by the negotiators of the GLWQA in the consultative process, but call into question the thought process for putting such an option forward.
The GLWQA review suggested that a revised GLWQA could serve as the organizing vehicle to deal with AIS binationally.While the GLWQA review did not deal specifically with a management framework, it did recommend there be a separate annex for AIS , and that the U.S. Great Lakes Regional Collaboration Strategy and its Aquatic Invasive Species appendix should be taken into account.Existing action plans in either or both countries could serve as models for an AIS annex in a revised Agreement.
The program elements are clearly essential if AIS are to be intercepted and risk reduced.The questions here are perfunctory, as are the nuanced language in the Management Framework that structurally look like options, but operationally are minor variants on a theme.

Climate Change
The webinar regarding Climate Change was introduced in this fashion:  Climate Change Models: -Develop or enhance models to predict changes in regional climate?-Develop or enhance models to predict the impacts of regional climate change on chemical, physical, and biological processes in the Great Lakes?-Enhance monitoring to validate model predictions? Enabling other levels of Government and NGOs: -Communicate model outputs and provide other assistance to help address climate change impacts?-Opportunities to help guide modeling efforts?
It is evident that determining how the climate system will respond to increasing atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases requires the development of future climate change scenarios.These scenarios are best described as plausible, coherent, internally consistent descriptions of a possible future state of the world, and are used to assess potential impacts and adaptation responses and acknowledge this uncertainty (Mortsch et al., 2005).The literature already contains a number of scientific techniques to develop these future climate scenarios.These include spatial and temporal analogues, application of systematic changes to observed climate data with guidance from Global Climate Models (GCMs), statistical downscaling techniques applied to coarser resolution GCM output and dynamical downscaling methodologies including Regional Climate Models (RCMs) (AMEC 2006).Higher resolution Regional Climate Models (RCMs) can improve simulations on local climate and forcing features and processes, but AMEC (2006) point out that computational demands are greater with their use and their output may not always be available for use in the climate impact assessment.Therefore, enhanced modeling efforts under the auspices of the GLWQA are a welcomed direction put forward during the renegotiation of the Agreement.The nature of such modeling was discussed in the context of detailing a variety of approaches to modeling during the webinars.This detail at this juncture is of questionable utility and more importantly deflects the discussion from the substantive matter of committing to the development and implementation of adaptation strategies, not mentioned in the documentation associated with the webinar consultations.
The types of considerations open for discussion during the consultative period in 2010 remain mute on the urgency of design and operation of adaptation programs, policies and responses.This results in an unsatisfying dialogue on the future integration of climate change into a renegotiated GLWQA and its blatant omission is troubling.

Habitat and Species
The webinar regarding Habitat and Species was introduced in this fashion: -Rely on jurisdictions around the Great Lakes as opposed to addressing this issue through the Agreement?-Commit to maintain and restore habitats, species and ecosystem services supporting the chemical, physical, biological integrity of the waters of the Great Lakes? Monitoring and Reporting: -To include all species, habitats and ecosystem services which contribute to, or are key indicators of water quality?-To include only those species, habitats and ecosystem services that are relevant to address lake-specific impairments The 2006/7 review of the Agreement included a working group on Biodiversity Threats and Responses.The working group called for the Agreement to explicitly address the need for the protection, conservation, and recovery of aquatic and related terrestrial biodiversity as a factor in maintaining or improving water quality and explicitly note biodiversity as key measure and driver of ecosystem processes related to maintenance of water quality (ARC 2007b).From the first pair of considerations regarding scope, it is apparent the findings of the working group are not being accepted as a consensus from the region.Why this is the case is unknown.Further the monitoring and reporting options seem not to make sense.Key indicators of water quality would be relevant to lake-specific impairments, and indicators that were limited to current lake-specific impairments would not have the flexibility to respond to future threats to water quality and ecosystem health.
Overall, the consideration of including species and habitats in a revised agreement is a welcome advance.The matters presented for discussion, however, provided little by the way of substance.

Next Steps
The Parties indicated at the conclusion of the webinars that "Possible elements and approaches under consideration will be presented for feedback.Advice received on different approaches will inform subsequent negotiations… Two in-person meetings planned [are planned] for Fall 2010 (one each in U.S. and Canada) to present likely amendments to Agreement.‖These did not take place.
In November 2010, the IJC was informed that the Parties have nothing to report since their last meeting with Commissioners at the October Semi-Annual Meeting and that the next negotiating plenary scheduled for the week of January 24 , 2011 was further delayed until at least April 2011.
In response to the nature of the consultation to date, thirty-six citizens' groups submitted a joint set of comments on the Canadian and U.S. Federal Governments as they renegotiated the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.In their document of July 9 2010 the collaboration states: -To improve the rest of the consultation process, we urge you to carry out each of the following: 1. Provide detailed draft language of the proposed new Agreement to the public for their comment and ensure that the consultation stage after the release of draft language is long enough to allow people to conduct full assessments and provide detailed comments back to the governments.2. Conduct dialogue sessionsnot just listening sessionsso we can have a thorough discussion with the negotiators of issues and options under consideration.3. Set up an expert table that includes both government and non-government people for each issue area to develop the draft Agreement language.4. Hold more than just the two public meetings that have been promised for late September and provide adequate advance notice of these meetings, including making materials available, so people can reserve the dates and adequately prepare for the meetings.‖

Some Promising Potential
At the request of a coalition of several dozen environmental nongovernmental oganiations, seven conference calls were held in September to discuss governance, toxic substances, nutrients, climate change, habitat and species protection, aquatic invasive species, and the coordination of science and research in the Great Lakes region.Heckl (2010) recounts that -[o]n each call, the government issueleads gave a brief overview of their thinking on solutions to their respective issues and then the ENGOs briefly summarized their main recommendations on how the issue should be addressed in a new GLWQA.This was then followed by a productive back-and-forth discussion on each of the issues between the ENGOs and the governments.It resulted in a true dialogue and mutual exploration for the first time during the renegotiation process…This more reciprocal, substantive tone of these calls was in stark contrast to the previous webinars held in January and June.It more closely approached the type of engagement that all parties say they think is essential for a successful new Agreement.‖ Citizen engagement has been central in the Great Lakes regime, and relying exclusively on national governments for compliance ignores the potentially powerful role that citizens can and do play in environmental law and policy (Hall 2007).
In fact, the role of citizens with proven credentials to be engaged in the renegotiation process was clear recognized at the time of the last revisions to the Agreement.In 1987, John Jackson, then vicepresident of Great Lakes United received an invitation from Joe Clark, then Canada's Secretary of State for External Affairs to be an observer on the renegotiation of the 1978 GLWQA (Manno 1994).Whether such engagement will be repeated in the 2011 renegotiation period the Parties have not revealed notwithstanding numerous requests both on the webinars and at the Canadian Stakeholder Advisory Panel (Krantzberg, per.obs.).
Effective sustainable management of a transboundary watershed system requires coordinated actions among governments.Chen (2008) states that this inter-state approach is important yet inadequate.-Policies and management plans developed by formal inter-state processes eventually rely on the implementation at local sites; hence community-based actions are critical to the effectiveness of policies.‖Chen advocates integrating community-based actions in watershed management, which will be complicated if citizen engagement and contributions to the renegotiation of the Agreement are superficial and limited.While a consensus and willingness to cooperate among the Parties to the Agreement is central to management of the Great Lakes watersheds, implementation of programs and plans must take place at the local level by enabling community engagement.Chen (2008) contends that it is impractical and inefficient for all interventions to be made centrally to protect ecosystem integrity.

Requisites for Change
A number of recent and significant voices agree that governance reform in the Great Lakes is critical to future ecosystemic recovery and well-being in the Basin and that any renegotiation of a GLWQA should produce substantive changes in the governance structure in the Basin (e.g.Krantzberg and Manno 2010, Jackson and Kraft Sloan 2008).
Botts and Muldoon (2005) called for -significant and rapid changes, the Great Lakes Agreement‖ or it will be -at the brink of irrelevancy.‖Further, they contend that -the Great Lakes themselves [are] subject to an onslaught of existing and new threats without a binational regime in place to deal with them.‖,consistent with the findings of Krantzberg and Manno (2010).
Although there is still a need for governance at the ecosystem scale, many policy makers recognize that some threats, such as persistent organic pollutants are a global problem that required a global response.The appropriate scale for the hands-on work of restoring the Great Lakes ecosystem, however, is at the local level where thousands of ‗Friends of‖ organizations, local conservancies, beach stewards, and so on, represent a substantial and knowledgeable constituency actively engaged in clean-up and maintenance (Manno and Krantzberg 2008) Several analyses undertaken by scholars, activists, and the IJC have recommended changes in the Great Lakes governance system.(IJC 2006, Botts and Muldoon 2005, ARC 2007b) Although they differ in a number of details, they converge on a number of features that would help build a governance framework around a set of clear responsibilities with means for concerned citizens to hold governments accountable.These include:  Regular reporting on progress in achieving the objectives of the Agreement with indicators directly related to specific commitments;  Independent third-party review of science to evaluate progress in meeting the purpose of the Agreement;  Direct reporting by the IJC to Congress and Parliament, in addition to the current practices of reporting the U.S. State Department and the Canadian Departments of Foreign Affairs and International Trade;  Methods for sub-national governments to share responsibility for the implementation of the Agreement.
More than two decades ago, Weiss (1989) contended that despite the lofty goals of the GLWQA, its implementation has been undermined by its sub-treaty status, as it was never subject to approval in the United States Senate, along with the absence of enforcement provisions.However, Markell (2005) points out that while the GLWQA lacks legally enforceable domestic status, it has given citizens an increased role in shaping policy to address transboundary pollution in the Great Lakes (also Hall 2007).A renegotiated GLWQA could increase the opportunity for public participation in decisionmaking, compensating to some extent, for the GLWQA's current failure to contain specific enforcement provisions.It is unlikely that a new agreement would be given treaty status, hence, as noted by Hall (2007), increased public participation would help to insure increased accountability on the part of both federal governments to comply with their joint responsibilities under the GLWQA.The current GLWQA has helped create an informed and engaged citizenry on both sides of the border, which could result in an increased role for citizen enforcement.
The degree of engagement in a future Agreement, from scope, issues of significant importance, governance and collabortation will hinge on a thorough analytical process, so far seemingly absent, coupled with real consultation, so far marginally evident.Previously, Krantzberg (2009) outlined steps that scholars have revealed lead to successful interjurisdicitonal negotiations, stating: -[A ]prescription for renegotiating the Agreement to generate a revitalized and sustainable future mandates that science inform contemporary public policy, third Party Mediation presses for and coordinates a deliberate negotiation, and inclusive discourse and public engagement be integral through the process.‖Many of these steps are still absent, and the analysis presented here strongly suggests that the constituents of the Great Lakes regime voice their views critically, emphatically, and often.If the negotiators listen, we can collectively make the Lakes Great.

1 .
-The Agreement should recognize the critical role and essential participation of other orders of government, including: (1) Tribes and First Nations, (2) states and province and (3) local governments and authorities.These entities should be included in the revision and implementation of the Agreement.2. The Agreement should recognize the critical role and essential participation of the public in the successful implementation of the Agreement by the Parties and other orders of government.The public should be consulted in any revision of the Agreement.3. The Agreement should recognize the importance of accessible information for decision making to foster greater involvement of other orders of government, non-government organizations and the public.‖(ARC 2007a)