Fighting tower with … pigs?

Unsuccessful for two years in his battle to keep Island Lake from building a water tower across the street from his property, Bob Wargaski is pulling out the big guns.

Or, to be more accurate, the pig guns.

The Wauconda Township man, who says the proposal for a well and water tower would be a nightmare for him and nearby residents, plans to build a pig farm he'll stock with 50 to 100 hogs.

"As a child, I grew up on a farm with cows and pigs," Wargaski said, adding he already raises 40 bison in Wisconsin. "I have agriculturally zoned property."

But he's also acutely aware his new piggy plans might torpedo the water tower.

It's no secret that pig feces and public water are two things that should rarely be in the same sentence, much less the same vicinity.

"They are only going down 110 feet (for the well)," Wargaski said. "If fecal matter gets into the groundwater, you could have an outbreak of cryptosporidium."

According to fact sheets from the Centers For Disease Control Web site, cryptosporidium live in infected animal intestines and are commonly spread through water.

The young, pregnant women and those with compromised immune systems are most at risk for serious complications from cryptosporidium, the CDC says.

Illinois Environmental Protection Agency regulations require a pig feces containment facility be 400 feet from a water source. Wargaski says the test well would be 260 feet from his manure lagoon.

"The groundwater section of the (Environmental Protection Act) says it has no business even being in the vicinity, much less 400 feet," Wargaski said.

Wargaski has a letter from Lake County dated Nov. 1 stating a pig farm would comply with county regulations.

"I am making sure that the way I design my containment facility, I am following all Illinois guidelines," he said.

He hopes to start building the manure containment lagoon this spring. Then, in come the pigs.

Island Lake Mayor Tom Hyde said Wargaski has the right to do anything legal he wants with his unincorporated property.

"He can do whatever he gets permits to do," Hyde said, adding he doesn't know how a pig farm might affect the village's well project. "(Wargaski is) not in our village."

But Hyde said Wargaski's neighbors likely would oppose a hog farm next door.

"I'm sure that they'll love to have a lagoon for manure," he said. "That sounds like something I wouldn't want to live next to."

Hyde noted Wargaski also has sued the village to try to stop the tower project.

"(Wargaski) obviously doesn't seem to get along with the developments that are next to him," Hyde said. "There isn't much we can say."

The injunction request Wargaski filed in Lake County court in November says the village doesn't have the special-use permit it needs to build the water tower. It also says the property hasn't been dedicated to the village.

The village has yet to respond to the lawsuit in court.

But Island Lake already has an IEPA permit to build the water tower, and Hyde expects to be able to move forward with the project.

"I can't imagine they're going to take the permit and take it away from us," Hyde said. "I would think we would be able to build it. I guess we'll have to see."

Wargaski, who says he thinks the IEPA will withdraw the village's permit now that it knows of his pig farm plan, has a slew of problems with the water tower.

He has complained it would lower his property values, limit what he can do on his five acres and affect the draw-down on his own well. He says the village could put the tower elsewhere.

"There are cheaper places and more cost-effective places," Wargaski said.

He admits putting in a pig farm is a lot of work to go through, but says he's out of options.

"They have left me no choice," he said.