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Watershed group gets state grant

BUCKHANNON — The West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources, West Virginia Conservation Agency, and the West Virginia Division of Forestry recently awarded $98,360 in grant funding for 21 groups as part of the Stream Partners Program.

The Buckhannon River Watershed Association was one of the groups making the list, claiming $5,000 in funding.

G. Paul Richter, WCAP administrator with the BRWA, said the intent of the association is to preserve and protect the watershed of the Buckhannon River.

“And to keep the water quality as good as it is now or to help improve it where it’s not as good as it could be,” he added.

Richter noted grants received help the association meet the goals of the watershed.

“It would be difficult to do some of these things without that grant money,” he said.

To further the progression of those goals, officials have specific projects in mind for the grant funds.

A portion of the funds, $3,700, will go toward the association’s water monitoring on the Buckhannon River.

“More specifically, identifying particular tributaries or projects that we’ve already formed, but we have to continue to monitor them,” Richter noted.

Another $550 of the funds are designated for more outreach projects – the Strawberry Festival canoe race, a booth at Pickens’ Maple Festival and advertising for Earth Day and the Strawberry Festival.

Richter said the remaining funds will go toward the organization receiving a intern from the environmental science program for the spring semester.

“(The intern) will probably be collecting data or collating data … The board hasn’t specified in detail what that intern would be doing,” he said.

According to a press release issued by the WVDEP, the West Virginia Stream Partners program was established by the Legislature in Code Section 20-1, to “encourage citizens to work in partnership with appropriate state agencies so that the state’s rivers and streams are safe for swimming, fishing and other forms of recreation, can support appropriate public and commercial purposes, and can provide habitat for plant and animal life.”

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