Nearly 700 miles of open water flow through Faribault County's borders. Over one-third of these miles are artificial drainage systems. Artificial drainage systems are necessary to remove excess precipitation and improve the productivity of agricultural land, however they also have a direct effect on the water quality and quantity of receiving waterbodies. With limited resources available to manage these systems, innovative and efficient management tools will play a critical role in targeting improvements for water quality.
This project will support a civic engagement cohort that will be offered in southwest Minnesota to foster partnering and build capacity of local government, organizations, and residents for effective civic engagement in water protection and restoration. This project will also build networks and the skill set of local resource professionals to do effective civic engagement work for water restoration and protection. The cohort will be administered through the Minnesota River Board (MRB), established in 1995 with a goal of focusing water management efforts on the local level.
This project will develop an understanding for how sediment sources change over timescales of individual storm events as well as over the past two centuries. The results will be used by the larger Collaborative for Sediment Source Reduction (CISSR)-Blue Earth research group to establish a sediment budget for the Greater Blue Earth River Basin and understand the effectiveness of various potential mitigation strategies. In addition, these results can be used by MPCA and others to calibrate watershed sediment models.
This project will build network and the skill set of local resource professionals to do effective civic engagement work for water restoration and protection in Southeast Minnesota. The cohort will be administered through the Southeast Minnesota Water Resources Board (SE MN WRB) which is an area wide Joint Powers Board (JPB) established to help improve and protect the water resources of the area through coordinating local water planning efforts. This JPB has successfully administered water quality grants in the past that have positively impacted the water resources of this region.
The East Branch Blue Earth River is currently negatively impacted and has been shown to contribute disproportionately high sediment loads to the Minnesota River. With limited funds available for implementing conservation practices, targeting tools to pinpoint locations where conservation practices have the highest effectiveness are increasingly important. Innovative use of technology can help streamline these targeting procedures.
BWSR will administer funding to eligible County projects that provide funds and other assistance to low income property owners to upgrade or replace Noncompliant Septic Systems. BWSR will also manage annual reporting completed by each County.
