ANDERSON - The local focus on area water quality is expected to increase after the Indiana Department of Environmental Management awarded Madison County $200,000 in state grants last week.
The Madison County Soil & Water Conservation District was among 17 organizations to submit to IDEM a proposal for consideration, and ultimately became one of eight entities to receive funding.
Among the $3 million released statewide, Madison County garnered the fewest funds while Manchester College in northeastern Indiana was granted the most at nearly $600,000.
Steve Schmidt, representative for the county soil and water conservation group, said the funds were exactly the amount submitted for approval by his office.
The distributed money will go toward reducing nonpoint source water pollution at the Little Duck and Lilly Creek watersheds in Madison County, as well as organized programs designed to educate farmers and the public on quality management practices.
Schmidt said much of the “sizable grant” will go to help share costs for farmers who are practicing best management practices in their fields particularly near larger bodies of water.
“We’re going to be looking toward the critical areas of the two watersheds,” Schmidt said. “A farmer who is right on one of the water bodies or close to it will basically be moved up to the list because that would be a critical area.”
A watershed is the region of land that drains into a body of water. Most of Madison County is in the Upper White River watershed.
IDEM spokeswoman Amber Kent Finkelstein said it was a common misconception to assume that water pollution comes from one particular source causing the contamination.
Instead, she said nonpoint source pollution is the biggest concern for IDEM, resulting in the creation of the grant program.
“It is little amounts of pollution that kind of amass together and really affect a water body, so in the case of most watersheds there’s no one person or thing you can go and tell to clean up their act,” Finkelstein said. “It’s about educating a community to make sure they’re applying things to their lawn in a responsible manner.”
Specialists within the Purdue University extension campus assist in the education process, according to program coordinator and campus faculty member John Orrick. Last year, 40 to 50 farmers attended the seminar on water quality control.
“It’s geared for ag producers, and Madison County ag producers are by and large very responsible stewards of the environment,” Orrick said. “You could say that for Indiana as a whole.”
To ensure those methods are followed through, Schmidt said, the county soil and water conservation district will continue to spend most of the grant money on testing waters and various control specialists.
“There’s no health concern or anything like that, but anything we can do to reduce sediment going into bodies of water,” Schmidt said. “Once we get all these plans implemented, we’re actually going to be monitoring (the two watersheds) for the next three years.”
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9:42 p.m.: IDEM gives county $200K in grants
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