Officials, advocates push for new groundwater study in western Wisconsin

As communities continue to grapple with issues surrounding clean drinking water, advocates in three western Wisconsin counties are looking to secure funding to mount the area’s first expansive groundwater study. 

The effort, called the Driftless Area Water Study, would sample wells in Crawford, Vernon and Richland counties — a part of the state defined by its karst geology, where thin soil overlays fractured bedrock, conditions allowing pollutants to more easily enter the groundwater.