Trump’s cutbacks to Great Lakes laboratory cause havoc: “This has massive impacts on coastal communities”
Cutbacks to NOAA funding by the Trump administration risk leaving coastal communities on the Great Lakes in the dark about toxic algal blooms.
There had been hopes that with JD Vance, an advocate for the Great Lakes who has called them “an invaluable asset,” by Trump’s side that the new administration would work to protect the largest body of freshwater in the world.
However, those have been dashed as the White House has cut funding for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, including a lab dedicated to monitoring toxic algal blooms.
The Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory has seen roughly 35% of its 52 employees fired or take payouts to leave since February, and new spending limits have presented challenges to purchasing the necessary basic equipment. ProPublica spoke with several people who have worked with the lab and are raising alarm bells about the impact the cuts and restrictions will have.
“This has massive impacts on coastal communities”
As the Great Lakes warm up, the algal blooms are becoming more frequent and larger in size. These can kill animals and sicken people, either through drinking water or coming into contact with it.
The five lakes, representing over a fifth of the world’s freshwater, provide potable water to over 30 Million in Canada and the US. The real-time forecasts from the lab and other NOAA-funded projects are “critically important in making water treatment decisions.”
Typically, the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory begins placing large data-collecting buoys in the water in April. However, that didn’t start until the second week of May this year.
Millions of people depend on the Great Lakes for drinking water. But scientists like @Greg_Dick are concerned that cuts mean they’ve lost the ability to protect the public from toxic algal blooms, which can kill animals and sicken people. https://t.co/KelZ6SaxyX
— U-M SEAS (@UMSEAS) May 6, 2025
ProPublica was told that there are now “serious gaps in this year’s monitoring of algal blooms,” and some like Gregory Dick, director of the NOAA cooperative institute at the University of Michigan that partners with the lab, are worried about the lab’s remaining workforce being able to operate the buoys.
“This has massive impacts on coastal communities,” Dick told the outlet.
Bret Collier, who has 24 years of professional experience but whose job was slashed by DOGE cuts because he was still probationary, joining the lab last year, said that “stakeholders will be very unhappy,” as these streams of information cease to flow.
In recent years, the tools and resources the lab has provided to local drinking water managers have reduced the likelihood of another crisis like in 2014 in Toledo, Ohio “to almost nothing by additional vigilance.” That year, half a million people were issued a ‘don’t drink the water’ advisory, they were warned not even to touch it.
Staffers from Toledo’s water system told ProPublica that that “has saved the system significant costs,” as well as “helped it avoid feeding excess chemicals into the water.”
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