The Board of Water and Soil Resource’s Fiscal Year 2012 Clean
Water Fund request for proposals and application process is scheduled to open
in early August 2011. For updated information on the on upcoming outreach
sessions to discuss the new application please check the BWSR website, where information will be posted later this week: http://www.bwsr.state.mn.us/training
A summary of budget and policy changes for the Board of Water and Soil Resources and partner agencies is located on the BWSR website. Total general fund appropriations for all BWSR programs in the 2012-2013 biennium will be $25,124,000, which is a 10 percent decrease from the current biennium. The Minnesota River Joint Powers Board appropriation was cut by 50 percent, to $42,000 annually. Cost-share grant funds were reduced by 31.5 percent, to $3,120,000 over the next biennium. BWSR's total Clean Water Fund appropriation is just over $55 million for the biennium.
The July 19 quarterly meeting of the Minnesota River Watershed Alliance featured presentations from 19 "river partners," a variety of organizations involved in river basin activities. The event at Gilfillan Estates, southeast of Redwood Falls, included a steak fry, and was co-sponsored by the Redwood Area Beef Producers, Revier Cattle
Company, Jackpot Junction event’s coordinator, Redwood Area Chamber, Loran
Kaardal, the Gilfillan Estate board and the Tatanka Bluffs Corridor board. The fall meeting of the Watershed Alliance normally scheduled for Oct. 18 may be rescheduled to avoid conflict with the U of M water resources conference Oct. 18-19 at the St. Paul RiverCentre. The date and location will be announced later.
Traveling from the Brandon area, west of Alexandria, to the Twin Cities
via I-94 takes less than two hours. Via the Chippewa and Minnesota
Rivers, the journey would take a lot longer. The Chippewa River begins
in northern Douglas County among the rolling, often wooded landscape,
dotted with lakes and wetlands, far different than the row-cropped
prairie of the lower part of the watershed. A June 16 bus tour with the
Chippewa River Watershed Project made 10 stops, showing practices such
as rock tile intakes, sediment basins, terraces, manure storage area
closures, and shoreline restoration. Midway, a picnic lunch was served
at the spectacular Inspiration Peak, just across the line into Otter
Tail County. |
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More than 200 people, about half farmers, attended the sediment seminar
June 24 in Mankato.The event, hosted by the Minnesota Agricultural Water
Resources Coalition,
served as a forum for experts in sediment science, agricultural drainage
and
resource protection. Presentations addressed climate, streambank
erosion, and hydrology. Presentations have been placed on YouTube, with links on the MAWRC website. News
articles are listed below.
EPA has released a significant upgrade to its Nonpoint
Source Outreach Toolbox. This new version is available online at www.epa.gov/nps/toolbox/.
This version includes two important new features, along
with other improvements:
1) A robust new search feature to help you find
the most applicable TV, radio or
print materials in the Toolbox's product catalog to meet your specific
nonpoint source/stormwater outreach needs (available directly at http://cfpub.epa.gov/npstbx/index.cfm)
2) Significant new content of outreach
material—TV, radio and print ads on
various nonpoint source and stormwater topics of concern The Nonpoint Source
(NPS) Outreach Toolbox is intended for use by state and local agencies and
other organizations interested in educating the public on nonpoint source
pollution or stormwater runoff. The Toolbox contains a variety of resources to
help develop an effective and targeted outreach campaign.
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American white oak barrels that stored some of the
country’s finest bourbon made
in Kentucky will now be collecting rain water in northern Kandiyohi
County. On June 25, 100 bourbon whiskey barrels that were modified with a
filter at
the top and a spigot at the bottom were distributed to lakeshore
residents from
Norway Lake, Games Lake and Lake Andrew as part of the Shakopee Creek
Headwaters
project to reduce rainwater runoff and improve lake water quality.
Capturing
some of the rooftop rain can help keep lakes healthier, said
Jennifer Hoffman, watershed specialist with the Chippewa River Watershed
Project
who coordinated the rain barrel program for residents who live in the
Shakopee
Creek headwaters area, which flows into the Chippewa River. The barrels
were purchased by the Chippewa River Watershed Project at a
wholesale cost of $99. A Clean Water Partnership grant that was obtained
in
connection with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency helped pay 75
percent of
the cost. - West Central Tribune, Willmar, June 27, 2011.
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The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has developed a new website about nitrogen and phosphorus
pollution to provide the public with information about this type of pollution--
where it comes from, its impacts on human health and aquatic ecosystems, and
actions that people can take to help reduce it. The website also includes updated
information on states’ progress in developing numeric water quality criteria
for nutrients as part of their water quality standards regulations. The website is available at: http://www.epa.gov/nutrientpollution/
“Sustainable Communities, Healthy Watersheds” 2010 Annual
Report Available Online The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Office
of Wetlands, Oceans and Watersheds (OWOW) has released its 2010 Annual Report
titled “Sustainable Communities, Healthy Watersheds.” Sustainable Communities
and Healthy Watersheds are two major themes for EPA's national water program.
The report contains information about EPA's work with the
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in the development of new draft guidance on
Identifying Waters Protected by the Clean Water Act (also known as the Waters
of the U.S. Draft Guidance), progress in better protection of water quality in
Appalachia from the harmful effects of surface coal mining operations, and
advancement in the work of the National Ocean Council. The report also includes information about
OWOW's response to the Deepwater Horizon/BP oil spill through data monitoring
evaluation, design monitoring plans and other efforts. Information about
efforts to address nitrogen and phosphorus pollution through the development of
a recommended Framework for states as
well as a new guidance that addresses polluted runoff from federal land
management activity in the Chesapeake Bay watershed are also included in this
publication
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