could include the loss of Gableman's law license.

In environmental news, Wisconsin is home to more than 4000 dams and most of them are very old and at risk of failing.

It's left communities across the state in a position to decide their future before the dams burst and wreak havoc on the communities downstream, “Here& Now” reporter Nathan Denzin visited communities in western Wisconsin which are grappling with what to do with their old dams.

>> In the summer of 2018, Wisconsin's Driftless Area was hit by massive and destructive storms.

>> They were good ones.

They were really dandy.

>> If you were standing on top of the dam, which is about 39ft above the valley floor, your boots would have been in water.

The cleanup took well over six months.

fail in the Creek and West Fork.

Kickapoo watersheds near Viroqua.

structures in the United States, five structures breached in one event in 2018 that never happened before.

>> Bob Macheel is the Monroe County Land Conservation director, which is in charge of the dams in the Creek watershed.

Somehow, no human lives were lost in 2018, but roads were washed away and debris spread for miles.

>> If you have a structure that fails, it's like a giant bulldozer racing down the valley floor, destroying everything in its path.

>> There are 23 earthen dams between the two watersheds, and to the untrained eye, they just look like big dirt hills.

They're all past their 50 year expected lifespan and climate change has supercharged storms.

The dams were never designed to hold back.

>> We have 11 more structures that are still standing.

That potential of happening again is still there.

>> The county commissioned a study along with state and federal officials, to figure out what the future of the dams might look like.

The study considered nine options, including rebuilding or removal was the only viable solution.

If they are taken out, it would be the largest dam removal project in U.S. History.

>> I was actually dumbfounded that there would even be a discussion about about taking these dams out.

They've saved this community and this valley from flash flooding now for nearly 60 years.

>> Dave Eggen is a retired farmer and representative on the Vernon County Board, who has lived most of his life within a mile of at least six of the dams.

Despite the aging dams, residents still say that they play a critical role in reducing flood events.

They worry that removing the dams would mean multiple floods a year, hurting farming operations.

>> There is no protection from flash flooding, like a 30 foot high earthen dam.

>> His neighbors agree.

>> I have a concern over what will happen to our farming operation.

you know, how are we going to have to react when the dam is gone?

what the benefit really is.

>> Eggen recalled a story from his grandfather who had farmed the valley before the dams were built.

>> After five years of farming out here on these fields, he realized that he wasn't going to make a living farming in this valley because of the constant flash flooding.

replace these dams is steep.

Estimated at about $61 million.

Removing them would only cost about 4 million.

the financial resources to operate, maintain and repair dams.

County resource conservationist who has been overseeing one dam that's already in the process of being removed.

>> But where that clay meets these sandstone abutments or hillsides, that's proven to be the weak point.

>> All of the old dams in this area were connected to sandstone underneath hillsides, but over and the dam could breach.

>> We've seen one structure.

You've seen them all because they breached the same way.

>> And if they breach a violent burst of water would be released downstream with huge destructive power.

Monroe, La Crosse and Vernon counties have all approved a plan to remove the dams, but it will take additional studies, consultation and grant applications before any Earth is actually moved.

That leaves about 18 months for Eggen and his allies to stress the importance of the dams and provide viable alternatives to removal.

towards these dams being taken out with with hardly any options.

material and a friendly contractor repairing the dams might not be as expensive as initially thought.

>> I personally talked with a general contractor in the county to give me a ballpark to dig down and put in new age plumbing.

He said 200 to $250,000.

>> But his frustration runs deeper than the ballpark figures noted in the study.

Cost benefit ratios were calculated to determine if federal funding would be justified to repair the dams.

That ratio concluded that not enough people and structures are downstream for those dollars to be released.

>> Our country can spend $111 million on a missile, and they're shooting them off every day over in in the middle East.

But you can't come up with a handful of millions of dollars to help restore life saving dams like we're standing on.

>> The one dam that did qualify for federal funding to be reconstructed only did so because it holds back a standing lake.

Though that lake has been contaminated multiple times by manure runoff, if the plans go forward and the dams are removed, the community knows it will have to change to survive future floods.

a reckoning about how we live on this land.

>> Biggest concern really is what are the next steps?

>> Sidney Widell and Nancy Wedwick are members of the Creek Community Watershed Council.

Wedwick serves as the president and Widell is watershed coordinator.

out that there are indeed many things that you can do just as people or as landowners, to mitigate flooding, to slow water, to make running water walk.

stranger to first of its kind interventions.

In the 1930s, the federal government used this land to demonstrate the effectiveness of sustainable >> Here we are again.

What are we going to do next?

>> The likely answer returned to many of the practices implemented in the 30 seconds building the terraces, returning to the contour strips, and doing whatever we can to infiltrate good quality water.

Terrace farms are higher on ridges and build berms between strips of crops to slow water.

She also mentioned the effectiveness of planting perennials, oats, or even building more mini dams.

Anything to build the quality of the soil and slow water down.

>> There's some levers that we have more control over than others, and it's a matter of using the levers we have as effectively as possible.

>> But, they added, we should not think that, yes, by implementing a few practices, we're going to solve problems.

Flooding problems.

No, we are not.

We can slow water and we can start a process.

>> A healthy ecosystem, they argue, will somewhat reduce the danger of smaller floods.

>> These smaller events the two, five, ten, 25 year storm events, we can manage those.

We can do that.

But when we get these 100 year storm events every year, those are the ones we have to respect and stay out of harm's way.

people will have to relocate from the valley floor, there are ever more concerns.

Will sediment from recently downstream?

How will it affect the famous trout streams around Creek?

How will farms be impacted?

There aren't easy answers for any of those questions, but these communities will have to grapple with them over the coming months.

For the people that are living and using those buildings, that's their livelihood.

work I've ever done or will ever, ever do for "Here& Now".