While some charities use collection bins for receiving clothing and used goods, they may also face opposition from local governments that cite public-nuisance concerns as justification for banning them. A federal appeals court has ruled in favor of one mid-Michigan charity that opposed a ban, but it could be some time before Michigan cities back down on such restrictions.

“They may find another way to make it difficult, like a permit fee of $300,000 or something like that. We hope that’s not the case and we can work with them so that it is a win-win for everyone,” says Dan Dalton, the attorney representing the charity Planet Aid.

Planet Aid sought a temporary restraining order on a collection bin ban in the city of St. Johns. The charity prevailed in federal district court and a federal appeals court upheld the ruling. The attorney for St. Johns says no decision has been made to appeal. It could ask the appellate court to reconsider the matter, ask all judges in the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review the case or submit a writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court to consider the matter.

“The effect of the (appellate) ruling was to suspend enforcement of St. Johns' donation bin ban while the court case is being litigated. … At some point the case will be remanded to the district court for further proceedings at the trial court level,” said St. Johns City Attorney, John Salemi.

Planet Aid alleged the ordinance violated its First Amendment right to free speech. Cities throughout Michigan have banned outdoor collection bins, claiming they have become a public nuisance. But charities say the bans are there to protect big recyclers like Goodwill and Salvation Army, which have expanded their retail operations into big box stores. Goodwill is opening higher-end “boutique” shops in some parts of the country.

Goodwill did not respond to a specific questions in an email, nor did the leader of the Association of Goodwills in Michigan return a call for comment in time for publication.

Planet Aid spokesman Brian Hinterleiter says his organization’s experience in St. Johns was a bit unusual. The city had no ban but removed the charity’s bins off authorized private property without notification. Planet Aid did get its bins back and later the city passed a bin ban. Charities whose bins were not removed by the city were grandfathered in, which allowed their bins to stay in operation.

A state bill to restrict bans failed to make it out of committee in the last legislative session. Dalton says he and others are looking for a new lawmaker to champion the cause. He says the Michigan Municipal League and Michigan Counties Association agreed to remain neutral on the matter. Until then, Dalton says Planet Aid will work with cities. He is encouraged by the recent appellate decision upholding the charity’s First Amendment right.

“We’d like cities to pass an ordinance similar to the one that has been operating successfully in the city of Portage. Basically, set up a system that fits within the character of a community but doesn’t ban them outright,” said Dalton.

Portage uses a licensing system that calls for periodic review and seeks to eliminate unscrupulous or negligent operators.

Salemi said discussion of any changes to the city’s bin ban is premature at this point.

“I do know that the city commission is very concerned about the potential of unattended donation boxes creating public nuisance and blight situations based on what has happened in other communities both state and nationwide,” said Salemi.

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A video on bin bans:

Michigan legislators once tried restricting the sale of bottled water for fear of running out. Today, water levels are once again high and rising.

Last spring, Great Lakes water levels rose above what’s considered average, based on the brief 97-year period that they have been continuously measured. Since then, the lakes have risen enough to cause the sort of concerns associated with high-water periods of the Great Lakes cycle. Those concerns include disappearing beaches, flooding near waterfront dwellings, menacing waves, and even trouble for rescue teams.

Great Lakes water levels rose so quickly compared to other periods that numerous claims – posted on various websites during the most recent trough of the cycle – that low-water levels were evidence of man-made global warming still reside on the Internet. Other residue from the low water level period includes echoes of the political clamor it caused in the mid-2000s.

The 2000 to 2013 low-water level period of the Great Lakes cycle lasted a few years longer than the declines that began in 1926 and 1964. It also became politicized. Former Gov. Jennifer Granholm seized the issue and made it her own.

Legislative hearings were held in the Michigan Capitol, at which testimony attesting to the severity of the alleged crisis was taken. A bevy of laws — some quite draconian – were passed, supposedly to address the situation. A coalition led by the group Clean Water Action demanded that Michigan bottled water companies be required to sell at least 95 percent of their water within the Great Lakes basin.

The Granholm administration imposed a moratorium on bottling plants and restricted the sale of water out of state from Nestle Inc. It eventually backed down.

Geologists, such as those at the United States Geological Survey say that fluctuations of Great Lakes water levels were far more extreme in the past than in modern times. However, these geologists and other experts who have spent their careers studying the sedimentary evidence (going back centuries) of changing water levels were not invited to speak at any legislative hearings.

“It became pretty clear that they weren’t interested in anybody who might disagree with their preconceived position on this and the outcome they were aiming at,” said Sen. David Robertson, R-Grand Blanc, who was a House member when the issue of a possible water shortage in the Great Lakes basin was in the legislative limelight. “It always seemed to me that things like the weather are influenced by forces far beyond what the Legislature can do anything about. Making hasty decisions based on what was happening short-term, when longer-term natural fluctuations were involved, such as occur with Great Lakes water levels, made absolutely no sense, and I said so at the time.”

Throughout the early and mid-2000s, Todd Thompson, then an associate scientist with the Indiana Geological Survey, an institute of Indiana University, was interviewed several times by MIRS newsletter in Lansing. In those interviews Thompson asserted that the variation the Great Lakes were showing was not atypical and that the fall in lake levels from the high levels of 1986 were the same as in the recent previous cycles.

“In the media and politics a lot gets said and written, but the actual data rarely gets shown,” Thompson said in one interview. “I try to give as many talks to groups as possible. I tell them I want to give them a perspective that goes beyond their lifetimes.”

“I'm beginning to think the problem is that we have engineers who don't believe any measurements unless they've taken it themselves in the last six minutes,” Thompson also told MIRS. Conveying his importance of taking the long view, he said, "is an uphill battle.”

In September 2005, the Granholm administration was trying to restrict the ability of the Nestle Ice Mountain water plant in Mecosta County to export its product outside of the Great Lakes basin. Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives, stopped over in Michigan and criticized what was going on.

“You're surrounded by the largest collection of water in the world,” Gingrich said. “Do you know how ideologically out of touch with reality you are if you've concluded that Michigan could run out of water?”

Geologists say about 4,500 years ago Lake Michigan-Lake Huron had two outlets, one where Port Huron is today and the other close to where Chicago is now located. Between 4,500 and 3,400 years ago, the lake level fell nearly 15 feet and the outlet at what is now Port Huron began handling the entire discharge of the Great Lakes. This marked the beginning of the modern phase of the Great Lakes.

Thompson has written that Lake Michigan-Lake Huron is subject to regular water level cycles that vary between 28 and 37 years. His data shows that from 3,400 years ago to the present, the upper limit of Lake Michigan-Lake Huron reached an elevation of 1.5 to 3.5 feet above the historical average and about 1.5 feet below. Two prominent highs occurred from 2,300 to 3,100 years ago and then from 1,100 to 1,900 years ago. The lowest lake levels of the modern lake phase occurred about 1,000 years ago, corresponding with the medieval warming period, which took place approximately between the years 800 and 1200.

Clean Water Action of Michigan was contacted and asked: In light of the rebound of the Great Lakes water levels, could it now be said that your call to limit bottled water sales outside of the Great Lakes basin was shortsighted?

So far there has been no response.