Lois Wright Morton, Associate professor, Sociology
Situation
Agency personnel and technical water specialists work with individual
landowners on land use practices that reduce erosion and excessive nutrient
losses to local creeks and water bodies through a variety of state and federal
water programs.
However, these specialists often do not have skills or understanding of how
collective landowner efforts within a watershed can effectively address water
quality concerns and provide responses to sustaining farm and land use changes.
Objective
Develop local landowners’ capacities to work together to solve and prevent water quality problems within their watershed.
Activities
In 2003, an Iowa State University (ISU) Extension manual was funded by Region 7 Environmental Protection Agency for developing community leadership in building watershed communities. Renewing Local Watersheds: Community Leaders’ Guide to Building Watershed Communities was completed and distributed to all Iowa Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) county offices. Over the last two years Dr. Morton has worked with a number of Iowa water specialists in IDALS and USDA NRCS, as well as extension educators, to implement many of the practices and strategies offered in the manual.
Impacts/Outcomes
One result of the manual and one-on-one training with
a SWCD water specialist assigned to a 319 grant is the development of a group
in Camp Creek
Watershed. Camp Creek is an impaired 303d water body (impairment is fish
habitat/aquatic habitat alteration). The water specialist says, “…I
was studying the watershed…I was reading your book, trying to understand
what the heck it all meant and should I trust it, should I go with it.” He
decided to trust the manual and held a community meeting in December 2004;
35 farmers and landowners attended. As a result an advisory group of 5 farmers
volunteered to work together to develop strategies to get themselves off
the impaired water body list. The group has actively met throughout 2005
and is working at encouraging landowners along the creek to adopt a variety
of recommended practices.
2005
150 -- Environmental Stewardship
Page last updated:
July 9, 2006
Page maintained by Linda Schultz, lschultz@iastate.edu
