Michigan lawmakers held their first hearing on dam safety reforms on Wednesday, nearly six years after the catastrophic Edenville Dam failure that forced thousands to evacuate and caused hundreds of millions in property damage.
House Bill 5485 would tighten oversight on thousands of dams statewide, expand inspection requirements, and strengthen the state's power to order emergency drawdowns or removal of unsafe structures.
The legislation drew broad support from lawmakers, regulators, and dam safety experts, but the hearing exposed the same political difficulties that helped stall reform five years ago: concern over who pays for the upgrades and whether action will happen before the next failure instead of after it.
"We just witnessed one of, if not the largest, flooding event in Michigan's history," said Luke Trumble, dam safety chief at the Department of Environment Great Lakes and Energy. "Without some heroic efforts, we likely would have had several high and significant dam failures and the flooding would have been much worse."
The bill mirrors recommendations from a 2021 state task force and a national peer review conducted after the 2020 Edenville and Sanford dam failures.
High-hazard dams would be inspected annually and required to pass the probable maximum flood, or the worst flood that could be expected in the surrounding area. Currently, they're inspected every three years and required to pass only half as much water.
House bill sponsor Rep. Bill G. Schuette of Midland said the goal is to prevent foreseeable disasters. "The 2020 dam failures were declared foreseeable and preventable, and the regulator's calls for extensive maintenance work were ignored by the dam owner," Schuette said.
The legislation would rewrite key parts of Michigan's outdated dam safety statute to expand inspection requirements, strengthen state power to order drawdowns or emergency removal, and require dam owners to demonstrate they can afford long-term upkeep.
It would increase spillway capacity requirements, inspection frequency, strengthen emergency action planning and create a registration system requiring dam owners to show they can maintain structures.
It would also allow the state to step in sooner at federally regulated dams, which are presently exempted from state rules.
National groups such as American Rivers and the Association of State Dam Safety Officials said the legislation could position Michigan as a national leader on dam safety.
Evan Pratt, who chaired the state's post-2020 dam safety task force, said the legislation addresses nearly all of the report's major recommendations.
"This is not a handout," Pratt wrote in his testimony. "Some $10.4 billion in infrastructure loans have provided strong incentive for risk reduction in those infrastructure systems but dams are not currently eligible."
Michigan has more than 2,500 dams, according to EGLE. About 200 are owned by the Department of Natural Resources, which has struggled with funding to maintain them. Most state dams are more than 50 years old and many are approaching or exceeding 100 years.
EGLE estimated that an additional $1 billion is required to address necessary dam infrastructure upgrades across the state beyond the $44.5 million the state allocated through a dam risk reduction program set up after Edenville.
Rep. Dave Martin, Republican of Genesee County and committee chair, noted that divides to about $400,000 per dam. "You don't realize how far a billion dollars doesn't go in this situation," Martin said.
Rep. Jennifer Wortz, Republican of Quincy, questioned whether the bill amounts to an unfunded mandate, raising concern that local communities may lack the resources to meet new requirements.
Dave Kepler, president of the Four Lakes Task Force, pushed back, saying many dams can no longer support themselves financially through hydropower revenue.
"In our community, we had a national disaster because of those dams," Kepler said. "The owner would talk about having an unfunded mandate but he bought the dams and had a responsibility to manage them. It's not about protecting the owners. It's about protecting the community and the environment."
Kepler said the post-Edenville shoreline recovery and pre-construction work alone cost $60 million, while restoration of the four dams and lakes is estimated around $400 million.
In Midland and Gladwin counties, Kepler said declining hydropower revenue from the Secord, Smallwood, Sanford and Edenville dams shifted their value and ultimately their cost to the surrounding communities.
"That discussion has to happen before they fail, not after they fail," Kepler said.
Schuette framed it as a matter of public safety. "If you cannot maintain the resources to operate or own a high hazard dam, you should not be operating high hazard dam," he said.
Kepler strongly backed the bill's information-sharing provisions between the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission and the state, saying he can't overstate the importance of exchanging information between FERC and Michigan dam safety staff.
Dave Kepler, president of the Four Lakes Task Force, speaks at a Michigan House hearing in support of HB 5485 on Wednesday, April 29, 2026.