Earth Day is a reminder for people and policymakers to focus on the opportunities and the challenges to improve environmental health in our communities and better protect the planet. While we need to meet the moment to defend against the Trump administration’s unprecedented assault on core environmental values that most Americans share, we should seize the opportunity for Illinois to lead with better environmental protections and sustainable infrastructure.
Here are four key opportunities in 2026 to deliver safer clean water, healthier clean air, better public transit and mobility, cleaner energy, and less toxic threats for people and our communities.
1. Pass the Illinois Wetlands Protection Act. Thriving wetlands help keep water clean, control floods, support wildlife habitat and provide outdoor recreation enjoyed by all. Illinois has already lost 90% of its original wetlands. When the U.S. Supreme Court’s Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency decision weakened federal wetlands safeguards in 2023, many remaining wetlands were stripped of protection. The ideological rollbacks of federal clean water protections by President Donald Trump’s administration have made it even worse.
The Illinois General Assembly and Gov. JB Pritzker should pass the Illinois Wetlands Protection Act now to fill the gap and be national leaders in protecting our remaining wetlands. The Jan. 15 Tribune editorial had it right. Wetlands are critical infrastructure. Flooding alone cost Illinois taxpayers more than $3 billion between 2000 and 2018, and those costs are likely to grow higher because of more intense storms. Wetlands act like natural sponges, absorbing floodwater before it reaches homes, roads and farm fields so communities don’t have to pay to pump, clean or rebuild after the water destroys what’s in its path. Invest now with better protections, or we will pay more later.
2. Let’s focus on making Chicago’s regional transit system work much better. Last year, Illinois enacted the Northern Illinois Transit Authority Act to stabilize public transportation finances and invest in an improved public transit system providing necessary mobility. Now, the focus must shift to implementation: how to make our transit system work better and more efficiently. How to attract more riders back to a transit system that is safer, affordable and accessible. How to make the buses and trains run on time. Chicago cannot aspire to be a green city without public transit that works well.
3. We must deal with data centers. The gold rush to build massive data centers — some real, many speculative — imposes huge pressures on utility rates and affordability, threatens more pollution, sucks up limited freshwater supplies and stresses the electricity grid. And, quite understandably, not everyone in a residential community wants to live next door to a noisy, unsightly data center.
There are some practical solutions or, at least, mitigation actions that Illinois policymakers should require. Data center owners should pay for their own power costs and not shift them to other businesses and residential utility customers. Data center owners should bring their own clean-energy development to avoid more pollution that harms public health and externalizes risks. Data center owners should implement demand response measures to hold down peak demand and lighten the load on the stressed grid.
Moreover, not every data center developer has the unfettered right to locate their disruptive new project in any community, in any place, no matter what. The Illinois Commerce Commission has taken initial steps to require financial deposits so that data center speculators put their money where their mouth is. Illinois policymakers need to step up soon with policies that protect the public’s interests.
4. Protect Lake Michigan’s water and our shoreline. We all love the Great Lakes. Lake Michigan is where we live, work and play. We enjoy the beaches and swimming in the summer and the bike and walking paths much of the year. When we turn on the tap, we get safe, fresh water. It is our largesse that we shouldn’t take for granted. Pollution threats and crumbling built infrastructure are real as heavy waves from more intense storms due to climate change pound the shoreline. For example, the Army Corps of Engineers’ misguided plan to build a new 25-foot-high toxic dredged waste landfill along the Lake Michigan shoreline in the Southeast Side environmental justice community has been stopped. The Corps, however, is dragging its heels on cleaning up, capping and restoring the site, which the Park District plans to transform into a new 45-acre lakefront park for all Chicagoans to use and enjoy. Let’s get this cleanup done, soon.
Theodore J. Karamanski: Lake Michigan is under threat. The dangers are out of sight.
Article XI of the Illinois Constitution provides that “each person has the right to a healthful environment.” We have made major progress from the days of raw sewage being discharged into the lake and beaches covered with algae and alewives, but much more needs to be done. This Earth Day is an opportunity to focus on practical steps Illinois leaders can take to protect communities and strengthen our environmental future in this pivotal year.
This Earth Day is a time for leadership and solutions. Let’s seize the opportunities for environmental progress to advance right to a healthful environment for all in Illinois.
Howard Learner is CEO of the Environmental Law & Policy Center, a public interest environmental legal and eco-business innovation organization.
Submit a letter, of no more than 400 words, to the editor here or email letters@chicagotribune.com.
