Tips and tales about keeping water clean
$505,000 will be used to help Forest Lake Area Schools, the Rice Creek Watershed District and the City of Forest Lake retrofit stormwater ponds and construct new irrigation systems to reduce groundwater use by more than 4 million gallons per year.
Read More
Washington County is reaching out to area businesses with an offer they can’t refuse – cut costs while protecting local water supplies. The outreach effort, conducted in partnership with the Minnesota Technical Assistance Program (MnTap) at the University of Minnesota includes two components: 1) Free, in-depth water efficiency consultations, conducted by MnTAP engineering staff; and…
Read More
There are many places where groundwater is already contaminated due to industry and agriculture, leaving even less of an already precious resource available to us.
Read More
In Washington County, Eurasian watermilfoil has taken hold in 21 lakes, zebra mussels are in Forest Lake, White Bear Lake, and the St. Croix south of Stillwater, and flowering rush has become a problem along the shoreline of Forest Lake.
Read More
Plastic bottles, bags, cigarette butts and other garbage in streets and roadside ditches are eventually washed into lakes and rivers when the snow melts or it rains. The Mississippi river gathers runoff (and trash) from 1,245,000 square miles and carries it to the Gulf of Mexico.
Read More
This year, BWSR awarded 64 new grants totaling $11.7 million. Seven of the projects are in areas draining directly or indirectly to the St. Croix River.
Locally, watershed management organizations – Brown’s Creek, Carnelian-Marine-St. Croix, Middle St. Croix, South Washington, and Valley Branch – are all in the process of updating their 10-year management plans.
Read MoreRecently, our office began looking at data collected from inspections during the first half of the summer, the results were astounding.
Read MorePublic service announcements are being targeted to mobile devices near popular water bodies in Washington County to catch the attention of visitors, as well as local residents.
Read MoreOne solution in Washington County is a new web-based mapping tool that tracks small-scale habitat and water improvement projects that reduce non-point source water pollution.
Read MoreThere are eight species of fish in Washington County that are considered threatened or special concern species by the State of Minnesota.
Read More
East Metro Water 