The Red Cedar Basin: The Movement Redefining Water Management as Guardianship

Granting the Red Cedar Watershed legal rights.

Just as human beings are 60% water, our local communities are inextricably linked to the waterways that sustain them. But what if our laws recognized this dependency by treating rivers themselves as living entities? By granting the Red Cedar Watershed legal rights, we can empower guardians to protect its waters from rampant phosphorus pollution. It is a bold leap in environmental law, but could recognizing the ‘Rights of Nature’ be the key to saving our rivers? And this push to grant river rights of nature could be key to stopping any data center development in the Red Cedar River Basin. Our river sustains us! Big Tech’s data centers release Forever Chemicals (PFAS) into water systems that we need to survive.

According to Yale Alumni Academy, “The push to recognize river basins as legal persons rather than property is a growing global movement that redefines how water is managed.” Source: https://alumniacademy.yale.edu/can-river-have-rights-global-legal-movement-youve-probably-never-heard

Sustainability is key. The river gives us life, and we must sustain it. The Rights of Nature are taking hold in many communities.

Rights of Nature

“Rights of Nature is a legal and philosophical framework that recognizes ecosystems and species as having inherent legal rights to exist, thrive, and regenerate, much like human beings. It challenges traditional laws that treat nature merely as property or an exploitable resource, granting nature “legal personhood” so it can be defended in court.” Source: Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund, https://celdf.org/rights-of-nature/

Communities in Wisconsin and Minnesota have granted Rights of Nature. According to Eco Jurisprudence Monitor, “the White Earth Band of Ojibwe granted legal ‘Rights of Nature’ to wild rice (Manoomin) in 2018, the first law of its kind in the U.S. While the State of Minnesota has not officially recognized these rights statewide, legislative efforts are actively underway to formalize protections for the sacred grain.” White Earth Nation (USA) Tribal Resolution: Rights of Manoomin, https://ecojurisprudence.org/initiatives/resolution-establishing-rights-of-manoomin/

Granting legal Rights of Nature is just the first step. It will be a test of how those rights hold up in a court of law. It’s a start for Mother Nature to begin to hold people accountable.

One county in Wisconsin seems to think it can hold people accountable for the damage they cause to nature. Milwaukee County passed a symbolic, non-binding Rights of Nature resolution in 2023. And Democratic state legislators led an unsuccessful push to grant Rights of Nature. Some two years prior, the Menomonee Tribe gave the Right of Nature to the river that bears their name.

“In January 2020, the Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin passed a historic resolution declaring that the Menominee River possesses inherent, legal rights to exist, flourish, and naturally regenerate. This “Rights of Nature” action was driven by the Tribe’s desire to protect their sacred birthplace from the proposed Back Forty mining project.” Source: Menominee Tribe of Wisconsin (USA) Resolution: Rights of the Menominee River, https://ecojurisprudence.org/initiatives/recognition-of-the-rights-of-the-menominee-river/

The Menomonee Tribe’s action to grant the Right of Nature to their sacred ancestral river was born out of the need to protect it from a mine. That’s not so far-fetched as the same need to protect the Red Cedar Watershed from hyperscale or modular data centers being proposed in the area. Big Tech wants the water at all costs, no matter the risks to our rivers and their rights to exist. They need it to cool thier machines. Machines created by men that will take away our jobs. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is the new wave of the future, so they say. Every drop of Forever Chemicals (PFAS) thier machines put out will kill our historic Red Cedar Watershed. And there is no restoring the river from PFAS!

These chemicals are released through data center cooling systems into local sewer and water treatment centers. It is a struggle to remove them according to Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, “The chemicals are needed in the centers’ operations – such as its cooling equipment – which almost certainly leads to some on-site pollution. Meanwhile, PFAS used in the equipment housed in the centers must be disposed of, which is difficult because the chemicals cannot be fully destroyed. Meanwhile, a large quantity of PFAS is used to produce the semiconductors housed in datacenters, which will increase pollution around supporting manufacturing plants.” Source: https://www.uphe.org/2025/10/21/the-connection-between-pfas-and-data-centers/

No municipal water treatment plant can completely get rid of PFAS. It can only filter it and separate it. But it is still there, and it could end up in our Red Cedar Watershed. There is a reason PFAS is called a forever chemical. Once made, it never goes away. It wreaks havoc on a body.

“Current filtration technology like granular activated carbon, reverse osmosis, or ion exchange removes Pfas which must then be stored in hazardous waste facilities or destroyed. Destruction of the chemicals typically involves a thermal process that subjects them to high heat, but that leaves toxic byproducts, or essentially breaks larger PFAS into smaller PFAS. No technology fully destroys PFAS on an industrial scale.” Source: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2026/jan/23/pfas-forever-chemicals-filtration

Seems like a big bad monster, all these toxins being released into our waterways that never go away. They get into humans and animals, causing all sorts of damage to immune systems, hormonal systems, cardiovascular and liver systems, developmental issues, and cancer.

Granting the Right of Nature to the Red Cedar River Watershed is the very means to saving the water that sustains us. The Red Cedar River watershed spans approximately 1,893 square miles across nine counties in northwest Wisconsin (with Barron and Dunn counties containing the largest portions). Because watershed boundaries don’t align with exact municipal limits, the resident population is estimated at roughly 75,000 people. Can we exist without the river? I do not think so. What is important is how healthy the river is now, and whether we keep the damage minimal. We are dependent on the Red Cedar Basin.

But what if our laws recognized this dependency by treating rivers themselves as living entities? By granting the Red Cedar Watershed legal rights, we can empower guardians to protect its waters from rampant phosphorus pollution. It is a bold leap in environmental law, but could recognizing the ‘Rights of Nature’ be the key to saving our rivers? And this push to grant river rights of nature could be key to stopping any data center development in the Red Cedar River Basin. There is hope!

Granting a river the “rights of nature” means recognizing it as a legal person with inherent rights to exist, flow, and be free from pollution. This process typically requires local or national legislation, treaties, or court rulings that appoint human guardians to represent the river’s best interests in legal proceedings. for more information:

Environmental personhood: what is it and why should nature be given legal status? Link: https://www.weforum.org/stories/2025/02/environmental-personhood/

“The natural world on the planet Earth gets its rights from the same source that humans get their rights: from the universe that brought them into being.” — Thomas Berry, Eco-theologian and originator of Earth Jurisprudence

Rachel Tilseth is a Menomonie, Wisconsin-based environmental writer, filmmaker, and owner of Wolves of Douglas County WI Films & Media. Lead writer at The Red Cedar Watershed Ledger. Her work explores the intricate relationships between humans, wildlife, and local ecosystems.

Jan O’Neill-editor at large. Jan edits the blog for grammatical accuracy and contributes story ideas.

Given Jan’s extensive 45-year nursing background, protecting the health and well-being of the Menomonie area has been her life’s work. With deep local roots in the Red Cedar River Watershed, she views environmental conservation as a natural extension of public health. Jan is dedicated to halting the proposed mega data center to preserve the community’s natural resources, advocating instead for sustainable, community-driven economic development that protects the long-term quality of our watershed.

The Red Cedar Watershed Ledger is based in Menomonie, Wisconsin, in the historic Red Cedar Basin.

Discover how our local economy can thrive without leaving the planet behind. We cover news and stories on sustainable economic development, highlighting initiatives that boost community prosperity, foster equity, and protect our local ecosystems.

We are producing a series of educational articles and interviews featuring city leaders, scientists, and residents to explore sustainable economic development in the region. What began as a grassroots effort by Menomonie residents to successfully pause a controversial data center has evolved into a broader mission championing environmentally conscious, community-driven economic growth.”

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