United States General Accounting Office

GAO Report to the Committee on Agriculture,

Nutrition, and Forestry, U.S. Senate

June 1995 AGRICULTURE AND

THE ENVIRONMENT

Information on and

Characteristics of

Selected Watershed

Projects

GAO/RCED-95-218

GAO United States

General Accounting Office

Washington, D.C. 20548

Resources, Community, and

Economic Development Division

B-261576 

June 29, 1995

The Honorable Richard G. Lugar

Chairman

The Honorable Patrick J. Leahy

Ranking Minority Member

Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition, and Forestry

United States Senate

Recent federal, state, and local studies on water quality have identified

agriculture as the United States’ greatest source of nonpoint

pollution—that is, pollution that cannot be traced to a specific point of

origin. Agriculture contributes more than half the pollutants entering the

nation’s rivers and lakes. The threat to water quality posed by nonpoint

sources of pollution has prompted renewed interest in watershed-based

approaches to reducing such pollution.1

 With this in mind, you asked us to

(1) determine the number, purpose, location, and funding of federal

watershed projects that address pollution caused by agricultural

production and (2) provide information on the lessons learned from

selected innovative or successful watershed projects.

Results in Brief Nationwide, 618 watershed-based projects aimed at agricultural sources of

pollution were being planned or carried out through early 1995. The

projects, ranging from as little as 5 acres to over 150 million acres in size,

involved both surface water and groundwater resources and addressed a

gamut of agricultural pollutants, such as animal waste, pesticides, and soil

sediment. Through early 1995, these projects had received an estimated

$514 million in federal funds.

While the lessons learned from the 9 innovative or successful projects we

reviewed cannot be projected to the entire inventory of 618 watershed

projects,2

 participants in all 9 echoed two key lessons learned: the need for

(1) flexibility in the kinds of financial and technical assistance provided by

federal agencies and (2) local tailoring of approaches to watershed

management. Because watershed projects differ in characteristics such as

1

A watershed is generally a geographic area in which water, sediments, and other dissolved materials

drain to a common outlet.

2

From a universe of projects that were cited as innovative or successful by U.S. Department of

Agriculture, Environmental Protection Agency, or state officials, we judgmentally selected and

reviewed nine: Huichica Creek and West Stanislaus County, California; Otter Lake, Illinois; Big Spring

Basin, Iowa; Tar-Pamlico River Basin, North Carolina; Big Darby Creek, Ohio; Coos Bay-Coquille River,

Oregon; Black Earth Creek, Wisconsin; and Lake Champlain, Vermont.

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the type and source of pollutants, local agricultural practices, and the

community’s attitudes, participants believed that a prescriptive,

one-size-fits-all approach would be inappropriate. At the local level, the

projects’ participants emphasized that the keys to reducing agricultural

pollution include (1) building citizens’ cooperation through education,

(2) getting stakeholders to participate in developing the project’s goals,

and (3) tailoring the project’s strategies, water quality monitoring, and

regulatory enforcement efforts to local conditions.

Background Water pollution comes from two types of sources: (1) specific, single

locations, such as industrial waste pipes or sewage treatment plants,

known as point sources, or (2) multiple dispersed sources over large

areas, such as runoff from farms, ranches, logging operations, and urban

areas, known as nonpoint sources. Federal officials believe that significant

improvements in water quality can be achieved by reducing

nonpoint-source pollution.

The watershed-based approach to reducing nonpoint-source pollution has

been receiving increasing interest. Addressing nonpoint-source pollution

throughout a watershed allows consideration of the entire hydrological

system, including the quantity and quality of surface water and

groundwater as well as all sources of pollution. Such an approach leads to

a holistic treatment, as opposed to piecemeal efforts aimed at individual

pollutants or pollution sources.

A number of federal agencies have primary roles in watershed projects

involving agricultural sources of pollution. The U.S. Department of

Agriculture (USDA), through its various agencies and programs, provides

technical, financial, educational, and research support to a variety of

watershed projects. These projects give farmers the knowledge and

technical means they need to voluntarily improve water quality in their

watersheds. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) also provides

technical assistance and funds states’ support for watershed projects and

other efforts to reduce nonpoint-source pollution. The Department of the

Interior’s U.S. Geological Survey provides technical assistance to

individual watershed projects, primarily in the areas of research, mapping,

and water quality monitoring, while Interior’s Fish and Wildlife Service

enforces the Endangered Species Act, which provides for the protection

and restoration of fish and wildlife habitats—two common goals of

watershed projects. The Department of Commerce, through the National

Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Marine

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Fisheries Service, provides technical and financial assistance. Finally, the

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is responsible for issuing permits under the

Clean Water Act for the discharge of dredged and fill materials into U.S.

waters, including wetlands.3

Watershed Projects

Vary in Size,

Objectives, and

Funding

Nationwide, federal agencies identified 618 watershed projects that had

received federal funds through early 1995. The projects ranged in size from

as few as 5 acres to over 150 million acres; about 60 percent covered less

than 80,000 acres. Figure 1 shows the distribution of projects by size.

Figure 1: Distribution of Watershed

Projects by Size Number of Projects

0

50

100

150

200

0-39,999

40,000-79,999

80,000-119,999

120,000-199,999

200,000-499,999

Over 500,000

Size in Acres

Note: Agencies did not report the size for 84 of the 618 projects.

The projects were geared toward solving various types of problems. As

shown in figure 2, over half of the projects were aimed at surface water,

about 7 percent at groundwater, and the remainder at both surface water

3

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service makes advisory comments on applications for these permits.

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and groundwater resources. More than 85 percent of the projects

addressed multiple types of pollutants, while the rest addressed a single

pollutant. As shown in figure 3, nutrients and sediments were the pollution

problems most frequently addressed by the watershed projects.

Figure 2: Water Bodies Addressed by

Watershed Projects

• 7%

Groundwater

60% • Surface Water

•33%

Groundwater and Surface Water

Page 4 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
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Figure 3: Pollutants Addressed by

Watershed Projects Number of Projects

0

50

100

150

200

250

300

350

Nutrients

Sediments

Pesticides

Animal Waste

Salinity

Other

Type of Pollutant

Note: The total exceeds 618 because some projects addressed more than one pollutant.

As illustrated in figure 4, the watershed projects were distributed fairly

evenly across the states. Iowa had 32 projects, while Alaska and Nevada

had no ongoing projects; the rest of the states averaged 12 projects each.

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Figure 4: Watershed Projects by State



= 0 to 5

= 6 to 10

= 11 to 15

= 16 to 20

= 21 to 32

Number of Projects in Each State Page 6 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
B-261576 

The 618 projects had been operating for between 5 months and 33 years,

with an average of 4 years. Over the years, these 618 projects have

received federal watershed funding totaling $514 million as of early 1995.

The estimated funding averaged about $800,000 per project, ranging from a

low of $8,000 to a high of $75 million. In addition, some projects received

additional funds from other federal programs, such as USDA’s Conservation

Reserve Program, which also contribute to water quality goals but are

generally not considered components of watershed projects.

Federal Flexibility and

Locally Driven

Approaches Are Key

to Managing Nine

Agricultural

Watershed Projects

The common experiences of the nine projects we looked at suggest that

achieving success in watershed-based approaches depends on (1) the

flexible application of federal assistance and (2) the ability of local

officials to enlist broad support and to craft solutions customized to their

local needs. At the federal level, participants believed that financial and

technical assistance tailored to locally established goals was more

effective than prescriptive solutions. At the local level, they identified

education, stakeholders’ involvement, and a customized approach to

improving water quality as the keys to a successful project.

Participants Favor Flexible

Federal Role

Since each watershed project has unique local characteristics, participants

emphasized that federal agencies should adopt a flexible approach,

providing funding and technical assistance without prescriptive solutions.

In some cases, inflexible federal rules hampered the funding and

execution of solutions to watershed problems.

Each project we reviewed combined and addressed such characteristics as

the type and source of the pollutant, local agricultural practices, impacts,

and the community’s attitudes. For example, both the Big Spring Basin and

the Tar-Pamlico River Basin projects were initiated to reduce pollution

resulting from nutrients.4

 However, the Big Spring Basin project addresses

groundwater contamination from agricultural sources, while the

Tar-Pamlico River Basin project addresses surface water contamination

from municipal and industrial sources in addition to agricultural sources.

An approach to mitigating agricultural discharges that would improve

water quality at Big Spring Basin would likely have to be modified in the

Tar-Pamlico River Basin to mitigate municipal and industrial discharges

4

Excessive nutrients are caused by point-source dischargers, such as municipal sewage treatment

plants, and by agricultural nonpoint sources of pollution, such as the nitrogen contained in animal

manure and the chemical fertilizers applied to croplands. Excessive nutrients cause algae and plants to

grow too rapidly. When the plants die and decompose, the dissolved oxygen in the water required by

fish and other species is consumed.

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and would have to take into account that pollutants reach surface water

and groundwater in different ways. Similarly, both the Coos Bay-Coquille

River and West Stanislaus County watersheds faced problems resulting

from erosion. In the Coos Bay-Coquille River project, the erosion was

caused by a combination of timber and agricultural practices, while in

West Stanislaus the erosion was caused by the runoff of irrigation water.

As a result, the two projects need different strategies to reduce erosion. In

addition, the Coos Bay-Coquille River project addressed other problems,

such as elevated water temperatures, that were not present in West

Stanislaus.

Because of these combinations of various characteristics, the projects’

participants said that flexible program implementation is crucial to

achieving watershed goals. Watershed projects frequently depend on

multiple sources of funding and technical assistance obtained through

different state and federal programs, each with different requirements.

Federal assistance to the nine projects represented about half of the

projects’ resources. Agency staff involved in most of the projects we

reviewed demonstrated flexibility in working with other participants to

meet project goals. For example, USDA and EPA representatives involved in

the Huichica Creek project emphasized that they had to find creative ways

to work within their respective agencies’ regulations to devise effective

strategies and encourage participation by producers. Similarly,

participants in the West Stanislaus project said that a key to putting

together an effective program was the willingness of federal officials to

focus on the overall goal of the watershed project rather than their

individual programs.

However, in several of the projects we reviewed, the participants also

pointed out a need for increased levels of and greater flexibility in the

financial assistance provided to farmers. For example:

• Participants in the West Stanislaus County, Lake Champlain, and

Tar-Pamlico River Basin projects said that changes are needed to

(1) provide additional funding to farmers for adopting practices that

reduce nonpoint-source pollution and (2) separate funding for improving

water quality from funding for agricultural conservation. According to

participants, the annual $3,500-per-farmer maximum placed on

Agricultural Conservation Program funding is inadequate to support some

of the structural measures needed to reduce nonpoint-source pollution.

Furthermore, as currently structured, provisions for cost-sharing cover a

variety of agricultural conservation practices, including those, such as

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leveling land for irrigation and building irrigation canals, that may be more

related to water conservation and increased crop production than to

efforts to improve water quality. Farmers could apply the $3,500 to

practices that increase their yield rather than to practices that reduce

agricultural pollution but are of no financial benefit. Efforts to reduce

nonpoint pollution from agricultural sources can be hindered when

competing conservation goals result in applying cost-sharing funds to

practices that have little or no direct relationship to water quality.

• Participants in the Huichica Creek project pointed out that USDA’s Small

Watershed Program, which is primarily geared toward flood control,

provides funding for solutions that are unnecessarily complex. For the

problems at Huichica Creek, the solutions eligible for funding would cost

far more than the simpler solutions the participants used. For example,

USDA staff and landowners wanted to stabilize stream banks to minimize

erosion, but they believed USDA’s solution of lining stream banks with

rocks was too expensive. Instead, they found that planting young saplings

low on the exposed stream bank and interweaving their branches to create

a living reinforcement was a much cheaper approach.

• Participants in the West Stanislaus project said the funds received under

USDA’s Hydrologic Unit Area program cannot be used for monitoring water

quality, and participants in the Coos Bay-Coquille River and the Otter Lake

projects noted that funds received under section 319 of the Clean Water

Act could not be used for the planning and additional demonstration

activities they needed.

The projects’ participants also stressed the need for flexibility in the role

federal agencies play in providing technical assistance to help farmers

implement pollution-reduction practices. USDA staff served on the technical

advisory committee for the Otter Lake project, although the overall

approach was set by the project’s resource planning committee. In the

West Stanislaus County project, USDA staff took a more active role, writing

the project plan that established the implementation approach as well as

identifying an innovative technical solution: using polymers in irrigation

systems to reduce sediment runoff. In addition, USDA provided a sociologist

to help develop approaches that would maximize voluntary participation.

However, inflexible federal processes were also cited by some

participants. For example, in voicing concern over rigid agency

procedures and operating methods, Coos Bay-Coquille River project and

state government officials said it took 9 months to obtain a permit from

the Army Corps of Engineers (which regulates the disposal of dredged and

fill material from wetlands) to build an off-channel pond and to spread the

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few cubic yards of earth removed in the process over a pasture. Project

officials said they could not understand why it took so long to get a permit

for such a simple project.

Participants Favor Locally

Driven Approach

The nine innovative or successful projects we reviewed were able to adopt

a locally driven approach to achieving the goals for the watersheds. Key

elements in a local approach were educating prospective participants

about how water quality improvements would benefit them; achieving

consensus among these stakeholders in selecting a project’s goals and

approaches; and tailoring the project’s strategy, water quality monitoring,

and regulatory enforcement to local conditions.

Educating Prospective

Participants

Education and public outreach played an important role in encouraging

cooperation in many of the projects we reviewed. Farm demonstration

projects and myriad educational activities were used to familiarize farmers

and the general public with the relationship between agricultural or other

activities and water quality problems and to encourage the adoption of

practices designed to reduce these problems.

The Big Spring Basin project in Iowa, for example, used an intensive

strategy of public education and farm demonstration projects to introduce

farmers to management practices that would improve their efficiency and

profitability while also reducing the impacts of agriculture on water

quality in the watershed. According to participating farmers, the

opportunity to observe—through a manure management demonstration

project on a neighbor’s farm—that nutrients could be reduced gave them

the knowledge and confidence they needed to change their own manure

management practices.

In the Lake Champlain project, a great deal of effort is being expended to

inform the public about the water quality problems affecting the lake and

to encourage the community’s involvement. Educational and outreach

activities include public meetings, the formation of grassroots

environmental groups, videos, newsletters, school presentations, and

water quality fairs. Similarly, the Coos Bay-Coquille River project,

recognizing the role of future generations, has developed a high school

curriculum to help students better understand the watershed they live in

and the potential impact their activities have on water quality.

Public education can also involve less structured efforts. For example, the

Coos Bay-Coquille River and Huichica Creek project staffs noted that they

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spent a lot of time meeting with potential participants informally,

answering questions and concerns over a cup of coffee.

Achieving Consensus Among

Stakeholders

In addition to achieving public awareness, projects need to solicit

stakeholders’ consensus on goals and approaches, according to

participants. Watershed projects typically involve a variety of

stakeholders, often having different views about a project’s appropriate

scope, approach, and management. The stakeholders may include the

government agencies responsible for environmental issues or land

management; agricultural, timber, fishery, mining, or other commercial

industries; recreational users; municipalities; and urban homeowners. For

most of the projects we reviewed, participants agreed that broad-based

participation by stakeholders is critical in breaking down barriers and

building trust among groups. We noted in several projects that respected

community leaders with strong interpersonal skills were instrumental in

bringing the stakeholders together.

One example of successful consensus building is the Coos Bay-Coquille

River project, which was managed by associations comprising

representatives of timber companies, private landowners, federal land

management agencies, state agencies with water and habitat

responsibilities, and other interested parties. According to association

members, inclusion of the agricultural community in the watershed

associations helped members of that community overcome their general

distrust of government regulation and negative attitudes about

“environmental” initiatives, emanating from federal activities to protect

the spotted owl and salmon, which local citizens blamed for harming the

local economy.

Projects that impose solutions without getting stakeholders’ buy-in have a

greater difficulty in achieving success, as illustrated by the experiences of

the Tar-Pamlico River Basin project in North Carolina. The project used a

two-phase process to address nutrient pollution. The project’s organizers

used public hearings to obtain input from those in the watershed and

negotiation and consensus to reach agreement on the implementation

strategy and water quality goals. Although this worked well for the first

phase, the process broke down during the negotiations in the second

phase. The state ultimately approved phase two of the project over the

objections of environmental and community groups, which disagreed with

(1) the goals for reducing nutrients, (2) the allocation of most of the

burden for the reduction to nonpoint sources, and (3) the revised formula

used to determine the amount of funds that point-source dischargers

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would contribute to reduce nonpoint-source pollution in an innovative

nutrient credit trading program. Under this program, point-source

dischargers agreed to contribute to a nutrient credit trading fund

whenever they exceeded the discharge limits. The fund would be used to

finance more cost-effective actions to reduce nutrient pollution from

agricultural nonpoint sources. However, environmental and community

groups felt that concessions made to point-source dischargers in the

agreement in phase two shifted too much of the financial burden of

improving water quality to the agricultural community. Unless steps are

taken to address the misgivings of these groups, a key stakeholder is

contemplating a lawsuit against the state to block this phase of the project.

Tailoring Strategies,

Monitoring, and Enforcement

to Local Conditions

The experiences of successful projects illustrate that strategies, water

quality monitoring, and regulatory enforcement efforts vary, depending on

local conditions. For instance, while all the projects generally engaged in

some form of planning to ensure that stakeholders agreed on the causes of

the problem and the corrective actions needed, they devoted different

levels of time, effort, and funding to developing such plans. For example,

the Lake Champlain project staff spent significant time identifying the

cause of that area’s water quality problem before developing a watershed

strategy. They systematically monitored the water quality in rivers and

streams feeding into the lake, which allowed them to gradually pinpoint

the sources of the problem. In contrast, for the Coos Bay-Coquille River

project, which is smaller and has less complex problems, a lengthy

planning process was not necessary. The community agreed that sediment

and riparian (riverbank) destruction in the Coquille watershed were

impeding fish spawning and that the salmon fishery was a resource they

wanted to save. They quickly established goals for improving the salmon

population and measured progress using fish counts.

Similarly, implementation strategies varied according to local conditions

and preferences. The Big Spring Basin project, for example, heavily

emphasized demonstration and educational activities, whereas the Big

Darby Creek project undertook relatively few demonstration projects,

preferring instead to provide funds to support individual farmers’

practices. The Big Darby Creek project also took advantage of a state

program that provides low-interest loans to those who implement

solutions for nonpoint-source pollution. The Tar-Pamlico River Basin

project developed the innovative nutrient credit trading program

described previously, which meets the overall goal for reducing the

discharge of nutrients by allowing the point-source dischargers to finance

the reduction of discharges from nonpoint sources.

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While all participants agreed on the importance of evaluating a project’s

performance, they tailored the rigor of their evaluations to the project’s

goals. The Coos Bay-Coquille River projects used fish counts to monitor

progress, and the West Stanislaus project used sediment assessments,

which were easily accomplished by viewing the color of the farms’

agricultural drain water. In contrast, the Big Spring Basin project had over

50 sites to monitor groundwater flow, conductivity, alkalinity,

temperature, nitrates, and pesticides.

The projects’ participants pointed out, however, that even given rigorous

monitoring, demonstrating a link between changes in land use and

diminished chemical pollution is difficult, if not impossible, especially

within a short time frame. For example, participants in the Lake

Champlain, Tar-Pamlico River Basin, and Big Darby Creek projects noted

that current science can demonstrate only a tenuous link between land use

practices and water quality, and it may take years for their projects to

produce chemical improvements in water quality. Similarly, participants in

the Big Spring Basin project said that climatic variations, such as droughts

followed by years of heavy rainfall, and other factors have made it difficult

to establish a link between changes in farming practices and groundwater

quality, despite more than 10 years of monitoring and analysis.

All nine watershed projects we reviewed are striving to promote voluntary

participation by farmers, but several felt it was also necessary to provide

for regulatory enforcement in case cooperation was lacking. Three

states—Wisconsin, North Carolina, and Illinois—and two projects have

included regulatory components in their watershed management

strategies. Wisconsin has enacted statutes that provide for state

enforcement actions, such as revoking cost-share agreements, against

uncooperative individuals. North Carolina requires the adoption of certain

best management practices. Illinois allows public water suppliers to use

watershed management strategies to comply with safe drinking water

standards, but if compliance is not accomplished within specified time

frames, contingency measures must be implemented. In the West

Stanislaus project, one water district, which is responsible for managing

irrigation canals and maintaining water quality within its jurisdiction, can

withhold irrigation water from farmers who refuse to adopt practices that

reduce sedimentary runoff from their fields. In the Huichica Creek project,

participants voluntarily developed additional restrictions on the use of

certain pesticides, which EPA approved for inclusion on the labels of

pesticides sold in the Huichica Creek area. At some projects, such

regulatory provisions were considered unnecessary and in fact

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counterproductive. For example, the environmental members of the Coos

Bay-Coquille River and the Lake Champlain projects said voluntary efforts

were the most feasible way of reducing nonpoint-source pollution, given

their communities’ resistance to regulatory enforcement.

Agency Comments We discussed the facts in this report with USDA officials, including the

Special Assistant, Strategic Natural Resources Issues Staff, Natural

Resources Conservation Service, and with EPA officials, including the

Deputy Director, Assessment and Watershed Protection Division, Office of

Water. They fully agreed with the information presented, and we have

included their comments where appropriate.

We performed our review between December 1994 and June 1995 in

accordance with generally accepted government auditing standards.

To compile an inventory of federal watershed projects, we contacted

officials at USDA, EPA, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and the Department

of the Interior headquarters and regional offices to obtain their internal

inventories of federal watershed projects addressing water quality

problems caused by agricultural production. While we reviewed and

refined these lists to eliminate duplication and clarify the descriptive

information provided, we did not verify the data provided.

To obtain information on the lessons learned at innovative or successful

watershed projects, we judgmentally selected and reviewed nine projects

from a universe of innovative or successful watershed projects identified

by USDA, EPA, and state water quality officials. These nine projects were

chosen to reflect a variety of project sizes, locations, agricultural sectors,

water quality problems, and management and technical approaches. We

cannot make generalizations based on our analysis of these projects since

they were judgmentally selected and represent only a small portion of the

more than 600 projects nationwide that receive federal funds. We visited

each site and discussed the project’s activities in detail with federal, state,

and local government officials as well as with the project’s participants.

We also reviewed project documents, such as management plans, status

reports, and the results of water quality monitoring. Appendixes I through

IX discuss each project’s location and problem, genesis and management,

planning and funding, key approaches and observations, and

accomplishments.

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We are sending copies of this report to interested congressional

committees, the Secretaries of Agriculture and the Interior, and the

Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. We will also make

copies available to others upon request.

Please call me at (202) 512-5138 if you or your staff have any questions

about this report. Major contributors to this report are listed in appendix

X.

John W. Harman

Director, Food and

 Agriculture Issues

Page 15 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Contents

Letter 1

Appendix I 

Huichica Creek

Watershed

20

Project’s Location and Problem 20

Project’s Genesis and Management 21

Project’s Planning and Funding 21

Key Approaches and Observations 22

Accomplishments 23

Appendix II 

West Stanislaus

County Watershed

24

Project’s Location and Problem 24

Project’s Genesis and Management 25

Project’s Planning and Funding 25

Key Approaches and Observations 26

Accomplishments 27

Appendix III 

Otter Lake Watershed

29

Project’s Location and Problem 29

Project’s Genesis and Management 30

Project’s Planning and Funding 31

Key Approaches and Observations 31

Accomplishments 32

Appendix IV 

Big Spring Basin

Watershed

33

Project’s Location and Problem 33

Project’s Genesis and Management 34

Project’s Planning and Funding 34

Key Approaches and Observations 35

Accomplishments 36

Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River

Basin Watershed

38

Project’s Location and Problem 38

Project’s Genesis and Management 39

Project’s Planning and Funding 39

Key Approaches and Observations 42

Accomplishments 43

Page 16 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Contents

Appendix VI 

Big Darby Creek

Watershed

45

Project’s Location and Problem 45

Project’s Genesis and Management 46

Project’s Planning and Funding 46

Key Approaches and Observations 47

Accomplishments 49

Appendix VII 

Coos Bay-Coquille

River Watersheds

50

Projects’ Location and Problem 50

Projects’ Genesis and Management 51

Projects’ Planning and Funding 52

Key Approaches and Observations 53

Accomplishments 54

Appendix VIII 

Lake Champlain Basin

Watershed

55

Project’s Location and Problem 55

Project’s Genesis and Management 56

Project’s Planning and Funding 57

Key Approaches and Observations 58

Accomplishments 59

Appendix IX 

Black Earth Creek

Watershed

60

Project’s Location and Problem 60

Project’s Genesis and Management 61

Project’s Planning and Funding 61

Key Approaches and Observations 62

Accomplishments 64

Appendix X 

Major Contributors to

This Report

65

Resources, Community, and Economic Development Division,

Washington, D.C.

65

San Francisco Field Office 65

Tables Table I.1: Huichica Creek Watershed Funding 22

Table II.1: West Stanislaus County Watershed Funding 26

Table III.1: Otter Lake Watershed Funding 31

Table IV.1: Big Spring Basin Watershed Funding 35

Table V.1: Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed Funding 40

Table VI.1: Big Darby Creek Watershed Funding 47

Table VII.1: Coos Bay Watershed Funding 52

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Contents

Table VII.2: Coquille River Watershed Funding 53

Table VIII.1: Lake Champlain Watershed Funding 58

Table IX.1: Black Earth Creek Watershed Funding 62

Figures Figure 1: Distribution of Watershed Projects by Size 3

Figure 2: Water Bodies Addressed by Watershed Projects 4

Figure 3: Pollutants Addressed by Watershed Projects 5

Figure 4: Watershed Projects by State 6

Figure I.1: Location of the Huichica Creek Watershed 20

Figure II.1: Location of the West Stanislaus County Watershed 24

Figure III.1: Location of the Otter Lake Watershed 29

Figure IV.1: Location of the Big Spring Basin Watershed 33

Figure V.1: Location of the Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed 38

Figure VI.1: Location of the Big Darby Creek Watershed 45

Figure VII.1: Location of the Coos Bay-Coquille River Watersheds 50

Figure VIII.1: Location of the Lake Champlain Basin Watershed 55

Figure IX.1: Location of the Black Earth Creek Watershed 60

Abbreviations

EPA Environmental Protection Agency

GAO General Accounting Office

USDA U.S. Department of Agriculture

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Appendix I 

Huichica Creek Watershed

The major lessons of the Huichica Creek watershed project were that

(1) federal program guidelines and financial assistance need to be more

flexible and (2) involving stakeholders in project planning can result in a

high level of participation and motivate landowners to voluntarily seek

tougher regulatory restrictions to head off an environmental crisis before

it occurs.

Project’s Location and

Problem

The Huichica Creek watershed represents about 4,500 acres of rolling to

steep hills in California’s Napa Valley, as shown in figure I.1. Huichica

Creek drains into the Napa River, which eventually empties into San

Francisco Bay. The watershed is primarily vineyards and dairy pasture

land.

Figure I.1: Location of the Huichica

Creek Watershed

California

Huichica Creek


Watershed

Page 20 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix I 

Huichica Creek Watershed

The Huichica Creek area, historically considered unsuitable for vineyards,

was used primarily for dairy operations and pasture lands. Vintners began

to recognize the potential for growing grapes in the Huichica Creek

watershed as a result of additional viticultural research and the increasing

use of new grape varieties.

Project’s Genesis and

Management

In 1988, staff from the Napa County Resource Conservation District5 and

the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) began to contact the

landowners in the Huichica Creek watershed to discuss the need for a

long-range resource management plan. Landowners and vineyard

managers were very receptive to this concept, and some had already

begun efforts along this line. In 1991, agency staff and landowners joined

together in a partnership called the Huichica Creek Land Stewardship.

Participants describe the stewardship as a “land use ethic” rather than an

organization. The Napa County Resource Conservation District acts as a

focal point for stakeholder communication and coordination, and the

stakeholders hold meetings when they believe it is necessary.

Project’s Planning and

Funding

The stewardship issued the Huichica Creek Watershed Natural Resource

Protection and Enhancement Plan in May 1993, about 2 years after they

began the project. The plan emphasizes (1) advice and information on

practices that landowners can use to farm in the watershed without

negatively affecting water quality and wildlife habitat and (2) low-tech

approaches, such as planting “cover crops” between the rows of grape

vines to reduce erosion. Participants are also replacing chemical

approaches to pest control with biological ones, such as installing housing

to attract insect-eating bats or roosts to attract predator birds that keep

the rodent population in check.

As shown in table I.1, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the

state were the major government funding sources. However, conservation

district staff said that landowners had contributed far more in labor,

materials, and funds than the federal and state agencies, although they

were unable to estimate the community’s total contribution.

5

Resource conservation districts are local governmental organizations that implement programs for

the conservation, use, and development of soil, water, and related resources.

Page 21 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix I 

Huichica Creek Watershed

Table I.1: Huichica Creek Watershed

Funding Funding source Amount

USDA $11,000

EPA 88,000

State 95,000

Sonoma Valley Vintners and Growers

Association

4,000

Total $198,000

Source: Napa County Resource Conservation District.

Key Approaches and

Observations

Agency staff and participating landowners said that federal watershed

program guidelines were too restrictive and inflexible. For example, they

said that programs such as USDA’s Small Watershed Program, while

beginning to move away from a strong tradition of construction and flood

control, were still using a pre-selected menu of engineered practices

instead of creative solutions developed specifically for each site. They felt

this approach was not sufficient to preserve and enhance the diversity of

plants and wildlife in a way compatible with agricultural operations.

Furthermore, they believed the solutions arrived at through that process

were overengineered for their situation. Agency staff and landowners

wanted to stabilize stream banks to minimize erosion, but they believed

USDA’s solution of lining stream banks with rocks was too complex and

expensive. They found that they could reinforce stream banks by planting

young saplings low on the exposed bank and interweaving their branches

to create a living reinforcement. This approach cost a fraction of the cost

of installing rocks.

Participants identified several reasons for the high level of participation in

the stewardship and for landowners’ quick acceptance of the Huichica

Creek implementation plan—they adopted practices suitable for their

operations even before the plan was complete. First, landowners were

heavily involved in developing the plan and were therefore disposed to

implement the recommended practices. Second, having 90 percent (63 of

70) of the Huichica Creek landowners involved in the stewardship

facilitated communication and fostered a sense of community. Third, some

vintners were also motivated by market concerns, such as potential

consumer reactions to pesticide use or the endangerment of a protected

species.

Page 22 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix I 

Huichica Creek Watershed

Stakeholders’ involvement and high participation rates were instrumental

in the stewardship’s reaching consensus to seek tougher regulations

regarding the use of certain pesticides in the Huichica Creek watershed.

These additional regulations, sought by the landowners with technical

support from county, state, and federal agencies, were approved by EPA in

1992. As a result, Huichica Creek farmers must comply with 12 additional

handling and use requirements on certain pesticides that are potentially

toxic to the California fresh-water shrimp.

Finally, although the stewardship focuses on getting commitment to

changing practices rather than achieving a particular goal, it recognizes

the need to monitor results. Therefore, the project includes a number of

quantifiable measures to monitor the condition of the watershed. These

include monitoring soil structure and quality, endangered species habitat,

use of irrigation water, water quality, and the stability of stream banks and

channels.

Accomplishments The Huichica Creek project’s accomplishments include (1) enlisting 63 of

the 70 local landowners to participate in the watershed stewardship,

(2) restoring and stabilizing 800 feet of stream banks, (3) planting at least

10,000 trees to revegetate stream banks and the upper reaches of the

watershed, (4) planting four demonstration sites to show the suitability of

different cover crops to various soil-hydrology combinations, and

(5) completing a water survey to estimate the average runoff from each

watershed section to help landowners and managers stabilize stream

flows.

Page 23 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix II 

West Stanislaus County Watershed

The major lessons of this project were that (1) involving local stakeholders

is key to getting voluntary participation, (2) financial assistance limits and

inflexible requirements hindered efforts to reduce nonpoint-source

pollution, and (3) the threat of regulation can help motivate farmers to

take action.

Project’s Location and

Problem

The West Stanislaus watershed is located about 70 miles southeast of San

Francisco, California, as shown in figure II.1. The watershed occupies

134,000 acres, of which approximately 122,000 acres are irrigated

farmland, such as row and field crops, orchards, and vineyards. The

watershed encompasses about 400 farms.

Figure II.1: Location of the West

Stanislaus County Watershed

West Stanislaus


Watershed

California

Page 24 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix II 

West Stanislaus County Watershed

Eight creeks flow across the watershed and drain into the San Joaquin

River. During the arid summer months, the water in the creeks is

composed entirely of agricultural runoff, primarily from furrow irrigation.

This irrigation method usually results in some erosion, but the highly

erodible soil in the West Stanislaus watershed exacerbates the problem.

The average level of sediment in the irrigation runoff is 1,500 milligrams of

soil per liter, although erosion in some areas reaches as high as 9,000

milligrams of soil per liter. USDA officials describe the irrigation runoff as

being chocolate brown in color.

Such high levels of sediment have a number of impacts on the San Joaquin

River. Of particular concern are organochlorine pesticide residues,

especially DDT (dichloro-diphenyl-trichloro-ethane) residues, which persist

in the soil for decades. In addition to having a negative impact on fish and

other aquatic life, the sediment increases needed maintenance for the

river, drainage ditches, and canals, which have to be periodically dredged

to remove built-up sediment.

Project’s Genesis and

Management

After almost 20 years of study, the farmers in West Stanislaus decided it

was in their best interests to solve the sediment problem voluntarily rather

than have a regulatory agency dictate a solution. The state of California is

considering a water quality strategy that includes three levels of

implementation—voluntary implementation of conservation practices;

regulatory or institutional encouragement of conservation practices, such

as waiving requirements concerning discharges if practices are

implemented; and regulation, such as issuing permits that specify the type,

amount, and concentration of pollutants that may be discharged.

The West Stanislaus Resource Conservation District sponsored the

watershed project and worked closely and cooperatively with USDA staff to

establish the overall goals and implementation strategy for reducing

erosion. An additional 25 federal, state, and local agencies provided

financial and technical support, including EPA, the California EPA

Department of Pesticide Regulation, and the Central Valley Water Quality

Control Board.

Project’s Planning and

Funding

USDA staff took the lead in developing a strategy to achieve the chosen goal

of reducing sediment to 300 milligrams of soil per liter of drain water, an

80-percent reduction in average erosion. USDA issued the West Stanislaus

Sediment Reduction Plan in February 1992, after it had been reviewed and

Page 25 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix II 

West Stanislaus County Watershed

approved by the resource conservation district. The strategy for reaching

the project’s goal is to (1) develop and conduct a comprehensive

information and education program, (2) provide cost-sharing assistance,

(3) provide technical assistance, and (4) provide for monitoring and

evaluation. The plan describes 17 conservation practices that reduce

erosion, outlines each practice’s advantages and disadvantages, and

estimates the costs and reductions in erosion. It then provides detailed

work sheets to help farmers identify the most cost-effective combination

of practices, given their soil and crops. According to USDA staff, the plan

does not include a detailed water quality monitoring strategy because the

funds received under USDA’s Hydrologic Unit Area program cannot be used

for water quality monitoring.

As shown in table II.1, most of the government funding came from USDA,

but farmers also contributed a significant amount in labor and materials.

Table II.1: West Stanislaus County

Watershed Funding Funding source Amount

USDA $1,391,000

Department of the Interior 268,000

State 407,000

Farmers 4,000,000

Total $6,066,000

Source: USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service.

Key Approaches and

Observations

Several factors were considered influential in gaining participation in a

watershed project. First, USDA staff and the project’s participants agreed

that the involvement of the members of the Conservation District’s Board

of Directors, who are well-known and respected farmers, was a key to

garnering local support. If outsiders come into the community with

solutions, local farmers are skeptical, because they believe each farm is

unique in its combination of crops, soils, and management techniques.

Second, to discover how to motivate local farmers to participate in the

project, a USDA sociologist was used to develop enlistment strategies and

estimate the farmers’ participation rates. Although participants were

initially skeptical, many felt that the sociologist was very helpful in

understanding the social and economic currents that contributed to the

project’s success. Third, participants’ ability to see reductions in erosion

with their own eyes helped increase participation. USDA staff developed a

guide that shows the color of irrigation drain water at three sediment

Page 26 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix II 

West Stanislaus County Watershed

levels: 300 milligrams of soil per liter, 1,000 milligrams of soil per liter, and

9,000 milligrams of soil per liter. Farmers can easily determine whether

they are meeting the goal of 300 milligrams, as well as observe whether

their neighbors are meeting it.

Financial assistance also helped increase participation, but cost-sharing

ceilings and inflexible requirements limited its usefulness. USDA staff noted

that farming is viewed as a financially risky occupation; thus, farmers are

reluctant to adopt new, unproven practices that could threaten their profit

margin. They said that USDA’s cost-sharing program helped mitigate the

financial impact of new practices, but farmers are limited to $3,500 per

year in cost-sharing assistance. Some farmers told us that this hindered the

effectiveness of the program because many of the practices recommended

by the USDA technical experts, such as installing irrigation piping that can

control water flow, require significant financial outlays.

After the plan was developed, USDA staff learned of a new technique that

could help reduce sediment but is not eligible for cost-sharing funding.

Adding a polymer to the irrigation water causes the sediment to settle out

much faster, reducing erosion runoff from the fields. The polymer has

been used in water treatment plants for years but has not yet been

approved for agricultural use. Participants obtained permission to test the

polymer, which costs about $10 per acre, for agricultural uses in West

Stanislaus County but had to proceed without federal cost sharing because

this treatment is not authorized in USDA’s program guidance.

Although the project’s participants were motivated in part by a desire to

avoid regulation, some felt that encouraging voluntary participation by

itself was insufficient to ensure that the project’s goals are achieved. One

of the water districts6

 in the watershed decided to require that farmers

reduce the sediment in their runoff to 1,000 milligrams per liter to receive

water for irrigation, under the threat of halting water deliveries. The water

district, which covers 25 percent of the watershed, has never had to cut off

water deliveries, and 90 percent of its farmers are in compliance.

Accomplishments Structural and managerial best practices have been adopted on about

20 percent of the watershed, or 25,000 acres. USDA estimates that the

project has reduced the sediment reaching the San Joaquin River by about

340,000 tons since the project began and thereby reduced the DDT reaching

6

Water districts are responsible for operating the irrigation and drainage canals and maintaining the

water quality in their districts.

Page 27 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix II 

West Stanislaus County Watershed

the river by about 620 pounds. Another benefit of changing irrigation

techniques is that farmers have reduced the amount of irrigation water

they use by 18 percent, saving about 11,000 acre-feet of water.

Page 28 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix III 

Otter Lake Watershed

The major lessons of the Otter Lake watershed project were that (1) a

holistic approach is important for successful watershed management and

(2) federal financial assistance can be instrumental in improving water

quality.

Project’s Location and

Problem

Otter Lake covers 765 acres in southern Illinois, as shown in figure III.1.

Built in 1968, Otter Lake is one of eight lakes contributing to the public

water supply of Macoupin County and provides drinking water and

recreational uses for about 14,000 people in seven communities. The lake’s

water supply is recharged by runoff water drained from the 12,250-acre

watershed, 87 percent of which is agricultural land.

Figure III.1: Location of the Otter Lake

Watershed

Otter Lake


Watershed

Illinois

Page 29 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix III 

Otter Lake Watershed

Excess sedimentation, caused by cropland and shoreline erosion, is a

primary cause of the declining water quality in Otter Lake. Sediment has

increased turbidity (murkiness), which has reduced aquatic vegetation. It

may also be impairing the levels of dissolved oxygen, harming fish

reproduction and overall health. All of these factors, in turn, may force a

shift in the fish species that populate the lake.

Pesticide residues and other organic materials in farm runoff are also

impairing the water quality in the lake. In 1993, Otter Lake was one of

three public water supply lakes in the county found to have atrazine levels

exceeding the standard established by EPA under the Federal Safe Drinking

Water Act. Atrazine, an herbicide commonly used on corn, is a potential

carcinogen for humans; it is water soluble and takes 15 to 20 years to

break down.

Project’s Genesis and

Management

Responding to a 1990 USDA request to identify and prioritize concerns

about water resources, the Macoupin County Soil and Water Conservation

District board selected five lakes that contribute to the public water

supply for priority attention, including Otter Lake because of its high

sediment levels.7

 After the Otter Lake Resource Planning Committee was

formed in June 1992, preliminary evidence of atrazine problems in the

Otter Lake was discovered.

Responsibilities for managing the project are shared by three

organizations representing community, state, and federal agencies—a

commission, a resource planning committee, and a technical advisory

committee. The commission, a quasimunicipal corporation that sells water

to seven communities in the watershed, has decision-making authority for

all matters related to the lake and surrounding property. The resource

planning committee, comprising members from the agricultural

community such as farmers and agribusiness leaders, provides local input

to define resource concerns and leadership during the development and

implementation of the watershed plan. The technical advisory committee,

comprising representatives from the Illinois Environmental Protection

Agency, Department of Conservation, and Department of Agriculture as

well as the U.S. Department of Agriculture, advises the planning

committee throughout the project.

7

In Illinois, Soil and Water Conservation Districts are county-level entities responsible for guiding and

implementing a local conservation program and are supported by grants from the Illinois Department

of Agriculture.

Page 30 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix III 

Otter Lake Watershed

Project’s Planning and

Funding

With guidance from the technical advisory committee, the planning

committee decided to pursue funding to implement sediment control

measures, recognizing that some of those measures could also be used for

atrazine control. However, in August 1993 the Illinois EPA placed Otter

Lake on its restricted status list for atrazine. This designation generally

prohibits further development and requires compliance within a period of

time that varies with the compliance strategy chosen. Otter Lake may

choose from among the following compliance strategies: (1) apply water

treatment technologies (e.g., activated charcoal treatment), (2) locate a

new source of drinking water, (3) blend water from the current source

with water from alternative sources, and (4) implement watershed

management measures.

The atrazine finding encouraged the planning committee to shift from

single-issue planning to broader watershed planning and, eventually, to

comprehensive “ecosystem” planning. In ecosystem planning, an inventory

of regional concerns is developed in addition to an inventory of local

community concerns. Best management practices recommended for one

resource area must be evaluated to confirm that they do not impair others.

Although a final ecosystem plan has not yet been approved, the project

aims to encourage (1) management changes on 75 to 80 percent of all

acres in the watershed and (2) widespread installation of structural

measures, such as sediment control basins and artificial wetlands.

Otter Lake has received most of its project funding to date from USDA, as

shown in table III.1.

Table III.1: Otter Lake Watershed

Funding Funding source Amount

USDA $201,000

EPA 54,000

Landowners 25,000

Local contributions 12,000

Total $292,000

Source: USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service.

Key Approaches and

Observations

Otter Lake has used federal financial and technical assistance to help

farmers design, demonstrate, and implement various structural and

management practices aimed at reducing nonpoint-source pollution in the

watershed. For example, the project funded the implementation of certain

Page 31 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix III 

Otter Lake Watershed

management practices, such as integrated crop management, a practice

designed to minimize pesticide use; the planting of pasture and hay land to

reduce erosion; and animal waste management to control nutrients.

Furthermore, with the help of state and federal staff, a demonstration

project to construct 14 water and sediment control basins and 2

permanent wetlands structures was designed to show how such

containment structures, combined with plantings, can remove atrazine and

other pollutants from the water system. According to project staff, some

farmers have expressed interest in implementing similar structures, but it

is uncertain how funding will be secured to meet this demand. According

to EPA officials, funding for the additional demonstration projects

requested by the farmers is unlikely because such structures would

duplicate those already in place in the Otter Lake project area.

In addition to financial assistance, flexibility is also important for

monitoring a project’s results. A USDA official said that some water quality

monitoring is needed if a watershed project has numerical goals (e.g., 3

parts per billion for atrazine in Otter Lake), but it does not have to be

extensive. The official said that information about water quality helps to

educate and motivate farmers. In addition, the official believes that water

quality is a good indicator of overall health of the watershed. At Otter

Lake, the Illinois EPA and a chemical manufacturer are sampling and

analyzing the lake water, and the water commission is sampling and

analyzing the tap water.

Accomplishments Monitoring results have shown acceptable atrazine levels in Otter Lake for

the last three quarterly test periods. According to a USDA official, the

behavior of atrazine in natural systems, including the reasons for

fluctuations in Otter Lake itself, are not well understood, so these results

are inconclusive. Furthermore, after obligating its fiscal year 1995 funds,

the project is expected to reach its acreage goal for implementation of

management practices.

Page 32 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IV 

Big Spring Basin Watershed

The major lessons of the Big Spring Basin watershed project are that

(1) education is key to a project’s success and (2) the relationship between

changes in land use and chemical improvements in water quality may be

difficult to demonstrate.

Project’s Location and

Problem

Big Spring Basin covers about 66,000 acres of northeastern Iowa’s Clayton

County, as shown in figure IV.1. The area is heavily agricultural, primarily

cropland planted in corn and alfalfa and livestock operations. About 220

farmers live in the watershed.

Figure IV.1: Location of the Big Spring

Basin Watershed

Iowa

Big Spring


Basin 


Watershed

In Big Spring Basin, groundwater aquifers (natural underground

reservoirs) that supply drinking water are close to the land surface and are

thus vulnerable to contamination from surface activities, particularly

agricultural operations. The primary concern about water quality is nitrate

contamination of the groundwater, which can occur through downward

percolation of nitrogen from manure or chemical fertilizers applied to

cropland or from surface runoff that enters the groundwater system

through sinkholes or other passageways. Some herbicides and insecticides

also have been detected in the Big Spring Basin’s groundwater.

Page 33 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IV 

Big Spring Basin Watershed

Project’s Genesis and

Management

In Big Spring Basin, data on water quality dating back to 1961 showed

strong correlations between the use of nitrogen fertilizers and the

concentration of nitrates in the groundwater. During the next 2 decades,

the use of nitrogen fertilizer in the watershed more than doubled, while

nitrate concentrations in Big Spring tripled. In 1981, the Iowa Geological

Survey began extensive, continuous water quality monitoring in Big

Spring; by 1983, the survey had documented a steady decline in the quality

of the groundwater in the watershed. At the same time, numerous

meetings were held, educational activities conducted, and task forces

convened to discuss the problem. In late 1983, the Northeast Iowa

Conservancy District and the Iowa Cooperative Extension Service formed

the Ad Hoc Karst Committee,8

 later renamed the Iowa Consortium on

Agriculture and Groundwater Quality, to design a multiagency, tiered

research and demonstration project for the Big Spring Basin.

The Consortium, with representatives from numerous federal and state

agencies, developed the Big Spring Basin watershed proposal, which

provided a broad outline for project activities. The project’s day-to-day

activities were managed by local project coordinators with the Iowa State

University Extension. Educational, technical, and financial assistance is

provided by various federal, state, and local agencies, such as USDA and

EPA, Iowa’s Departments of Natural Resources and Agriculture, and Iowa

State University.

Project’s Planning and

Funding

The planning process for Big Spring Basin was informal, and participants

did not produce a formal watershed management plan. The Consortium

targeted key problem areas and developed a nonregulatory model for the

Big Spring Basin Demonstration Project. Its objectives were to (1) reduce

the potential environmental impacts of agricultural practices and

(2) enhance the efficiency and profitability of farm management. These

objectives would be met through a 7-year, integrated education,

demonstration, research, and monitoring effort focused primarily on

nitrogen management. Technical and financial assistance would be

provided to participating farmers.

When the project officially began in 1986, participants had difficulty

securing funding because federal and state funding sources were geared

toward protecting surface water, not groundwater. Because of the limited

funding, project leaders targeted the 1,005-acre Bugenhagen Subbasin, a

Page 34 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IV 

Big Spring Basin Watershed

microcosm of the larger basin, for the project’s initial effort. Like Big

Spring Basin, the subbasin drains to a single outlet—a sinkhole—which

provided good conditions for monitoring.

Over time, the project received funding from numerous sources, as shown

in table IV.1. According to project staff, total financial support for the

demonstration project was larger than it was for many watershed projects

because of the scope and intensity of the education and monitoring

conducted.

Table IV.1: Big Spring Basin

Watershed Funding Funding source Amounta

Federal—education and technical assistance $394,000

Federal—monitoring and other studies 1,051,000

State—education and technical assistance 2,456,000

State—monitoring and other studies 2,593,000

Federal and state—special cost sharing 625,000

Total $7,119,000

aFigures include only funds specifically earmarked for the demonstration project for the fiscal

years 1982-93.

Source: University of Iowa.

Key Approaches and

Observations

Farmers and project staff alike gave enormous credit to the project’s

coordinators for its success. The coordinators selected for the project had

a long-standing involvement in the area as county staff providing technical

assistance to the agricultural community. As a result, they were regarded

as credible and trustworthy, which was a critical factor in encouraging

farmers’ participation in the project. The coordinators drew on their

familiarity with farming conditions and practices in the watershed to

identify solutions that would be compatible with the farmers’ needs and

abilities.

Demonstration projects and other educational activities were deemed

important because the project had no regulatory component and depended

on voluntary participation. In the Bugenhagen Subbasin, project staff

worked one-on-one with farmers to provide more intensive education and

technical assistance. Demonstration projects involved nitrogen

management, soil erosion, pest management, weed control, conservation

Page 35 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IV 

Big Spring Basin Watershed

tillage, and energy conservation. Project staff provided education and

technical assistance to farmers for specific practices, such as establishing

realistic yield goals, soil sampling, and soil nitrate testing. Publicity and

outreach activities, ranging from public meetings and field days to

publications in newspapers and newsletters, were used to increase the

community’s awareness about the project.

The project employed an extensive network of over 50 monitoring stations

to generate detailed information on the changes in water quality that

accompanied improved farm management (e.g., water flow, conductivity,

alkalinity, temperature, nitrates, and pesticides). Surveys of farmers’

practices were conducted both in the subbasin and throughout the basin.

Showing a link between overall declines in nitrogen use and chemical

changes in the groundwater is difficult. According to project staff, the

effects of reducing nitrogen levels over 10 years cannot be isolated from

the effects of other factors, particularly climatic variations. For example,

the resulting changes in water volume caused by drought conditions in

1988 and 1989, followed by exceptionally wet conditions in subsequent

years, affected the nitrate concentrations. Other factors complicating an

analysis of effects on water quality include changes in application rates

and in land use and cropping patterns. Project staff acknowledge that

measuring the project’s impact is generally difficult because much is still

unknown about the movement and disposition of contaminants in

groundwater systems. Recognizing the need to improve the understanding

of how changes in land management eventually affect water quality, USDA

is applying a computer modeling program called AGNPS (Agricultural

Nonpoint Source) to the extensive data collected in Big Spring Basin so

the agency can estimate how reductions in the rates of pesticide and

fertilizer application eventually affect water quality.

Accomplishments Throughout the basin, more than 200 farmers voluntarily decreased their

use of nitrogen as a result of the project. The average amount of nitrogen

fertilizer used for corn production between 1981 and 1991 decreased by 33

percent, with no loss of yields. By contrast, the county and statewide rates

of nitrogen use declined by 20 percent during the same period.

Cumulatively, Big Spring Basin farmers reduced nitrogen use by nearly

1-1/2 million pounds from 1981 to 1991, for estimated cost savings of about

$266,000.

Page 36 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IV 

Big Spring Basin Watershed

In the subbasin, 9 of 11 farmers, controlling 98 percent of the total acreage,

entered into 7-year contracts for soil and water conservation. From 1987

through 1991, annual soil savings of 64 percent were recorded for about

900 acres of cropland and permanent pasture. Some form of best

management practices for pesticides and nutrients were implemented on

all acres in the subbasin. The rates of nitrogen use in the subbasin were

reduced by about 10 percent.

Page 37 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed

The major lessons of the Tar-Pamlico River Basin watershed project are

that (1) flexible and innovative approaches—in this case, pollutant

trading—may offer more cost-effective alternatives for improving water

quality and (2) the consensus process is essential for maintaining cohesion

between stakeholder groups and keeping them committed to the project’s

goals.

Project’s Location and

Problem

North Carolina’s Tar-Pamlico River Basin watershed, comprising about

3.5 million acres, stretches 180 miles southeast from the state’s hilly north

central portion, through the coastal plain region, to empty into Pamlico

Sound, as shown in figure V.1. The watershed, which is relatively

undeveloped land, encompasses about 365,000 residents, at least nine

threatened or endangered freshwater mussel species, and all or part of

three national wildlife refuges.

Figure V.1: Location of the Tar-Pamlico

River Basin Watershed

Tar-Pamlico


Watershed

North Carolina

Water quality problems in the Tar-Pamlico River Basin watershed have

been known for a number of years. About 22 percent of the fresh-water

streams in the watershed are impaired by sediment, acidity, and high fecal

coliform bacteria counts; several lakes suffer from excessive nutrients;

and more than 50,000 acres near the mouth of the Pamlico River are

periodically stricken with algae blooms, fish kills, crab and fish diseases,

and closed shellfish waters.

Page 38 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed

Both municipal and industrial point sources, as well as nonpoint sources

that include agriculture, contribute nutrients to the Tar and Pamlico

Rivers. Point sources, such as waste treatment plants and industrial

factories, discharge waste water that contains nutrients such as nitrogen

and phosphorous. The primary sources of nutrient pollution from

agricultural nonpoint sources are animal manure and chemical fertilizers

applied to cropland.

Project’s Genesis and

Management

In response to a petition by a local citizens’ group—the Pamlico-Tar River

Foundation—and recommendations made by the state’s Division of

Environmental Management, North Carolina designated the entire

Tar-Pamlico River Basin as “nutrient sensitive waters” in September 1989.

This designation required the development of a comprehensive strategy to

reduce pollution in the watershed. In developing this strategy, the North

Carolina Division of Environmental Management worked with three

industry and community groups that represented the various

stakeholders—the Tar-Pamlico Basin Association, a point-source

dischargers group; the North Carolina Environmental Defense Fund, a

nonprofit environmental group; and the Pamlico-Tar River Foundation.

Project’s Planning and

Funding

The state initially proposed several steps to reduce the nutrients entering

the river system. To reduce the municipal and industrial contribution, the

state proposed including nutrient limits in the permits it issues to

point-source dischargers. To reduce the agricultural contribution, the state

planned to rely on North Carolina’s Agriculture Cost Share Program to

financially assist farmers in voluntarily addressing nonpoint nutrient

pollution from cropland and concentrated animal operations.

The Tar-Pamlico Basin Association estimated it would cost point-source

dischargers $50 million in plant and equipment upgrades to comply with

the state’s proposed discharge limits. Instead, the environmental, citizens’,

and point source groups proposed an alternative that had two major

phases. First, association members (i.e., point-source dischargers) would

have engineering studies performed on their facilities and would make the

operational changes and minor investments found necessary to optimize

the removal of nutrients from their discharges. In connection with this

aspect of the agreement, the members as a group would reduce the

nutrient content of their discharges by at least 25,000 kilograms each year

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Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed

to reach a group limit of 425,000 kilograms per year by the end of 1994.

Second, rather than requiring expensive plant and equipment upgrades in

order to achieve their nutrient limits, the North Carolina Environmental

Defense Fund proposed that point source association members be allowed

to instead contribute to an innovative nutrient credit “trading” fund. The

fund would be used to finance more cost-effective actions to reduce

nutrient pollution from agricultural nonpoint sources. Association

members agreed to contribute $56 to the fund for every kilogram of

nutrients discharged in excess of their group’s limits.

In December 1989, the state approved and adopted the plan, which is now

known as the Tar-Pamlico Nutrient Sensitive Waters Implementation

Strategy. The major stakeholders agreed that the details of the two-phase

plan would be spelled out in an agreement that would periodically be

reviewed and updated. Successful consensus building led to smooth

implementation of phase one, resulting in goals for reducing nutrients that

were accepted by all parties and an updated phase-one agreement that was

signed by all three participating organizations in February 1992.

The funding for phase one, which ended in December 1994, is shown in

table V.1. The Tar-Pamlico Association’s contribution includes a $750,000

grant obtained from EPA under the Clean Water Act.

Table V.1: Tar-Pamlico River Basin

Watershed Funding Funding source Amounta

EPA $1,409,000

USDA 3,711,000

State 5,590,000

Tar-Pamlico Basin Association 1,400,000

Voluntary participants (farmers) 2,047,000

Totalb $14,157,000

aAmounts shown are for funding through September 30, 1994.

bTotals are approximate and may not include the value of farmers’ in-kind labor, funds raised by

local watershed groups, or the cost of activities provided by various federal and state agencies

under other programs.

Source: The Tar-Pamlico River Basinwide Water Quality Management Plan and Implementation

Strategy and personnel from the North Carolina Division of Environmental Management.

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Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed

However, problems that emerged during the planning of phase two

portend future difficulties for the program. The consensus began to break

down during phase two, which began in January 1995 and is scheduled to

end in December 2004. A study performed in phase one indicated the need

for a goal of a 45-percent reduction in nitrogen levels in phase two.

However, because of uncertainties about the accuracy of the model used

in the study, the state decided to institute an interim reduction goal for

nitrogen of 30 percent (a reduction of 583,000 kilograms per year) and

maintain the current discharge limits for phosphorous. Most of the

30-percent reduction goal for nitrogen was allocated to nonpoint sources.

Half of the nonpoint allocation is to come from agricultural sources. Also,

under phase two, the nutrient credit trading rate that association members

would be required to pay was reduced from $56 to $29 for every kilogram

over the limit on the basis of the results of a study. The state also agreed to

credit the association for the amount of its contribution that had not been

spent in phase one. About $450,000 of the association’s contribution to the

nutrient credit trading fund had not been spent by the end of phase one, so

state officials recomputed the amount of the remaining nutrient credit this

figure represented on the basis of the new $29 rate. Thus, the association

started phase two of the project with a nitrogen credit of over 22,000

kilograms.

The major stakeholders could not reach a consensus on the overall

phase-two reduction goals and the allocation of reductions between the

point and nonpoint sources. State officials nevertheless approved phase

two because they felt it was a good compromise between the positions of

the point sources and of the environmental and citizens’ groups. In

addition, state officials said phase two had to be coordinated with the

state’s 5-year cycle for reviewing its basinwide watershed management

plans and the concurrent basinwide approval of all point-source discharge

permits.

Although the state’s action may have been expedient, it could have a

significant impact on the project’s future. The North Carolina

Environmental Defense Fund and the Pamlico-Tar River Foundation

refused to sign the phase-two agreement. These two organizations

believed that the concessions made to the point-source dischargers

undermine the effectiveness of nutrient credit trading and shift too much

of the financial burden for reducing pollution to the nonpoint sources. An

official from the North Carolina Environmental Defense Fund said that the

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Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed

Fund may file a lawsuit against the state unless the state develops a

workable plan for achieving the large reductions in nutrients that are to

come from nonpoint sources.

Key Approaches and

Observations

The project’s participants recognized that success depended on including

local citizens and officials in the planning process. During phase one, the

state and the North Carolina League of Municipalities sponsored two

public workshops in 1994 to familiarize the public with the plan, solicit

comments, and broaden stakeholders’ education and participation.

Priorities compiled from these meetings included the need to increase

public education and stakeholders’ participation, improve the control of

nonpoint-source pollution, identify and target problem areas and

resources in the river basin, consider land use planning and property

rights, improve data on water quality, improve funding and regulatory

enforcement, and consider cost-benefit relationships.

The project’s participants said these meetings also helped break down

barriers and misperceptions between various competing groups. People

began to acknowledge that they all contributed to water quality problems

in one way or another and that protecting the watershed was in everyone’s

best interests.

Also during phase one, the state began a demonstration project in the

Chicod Creek Subbasin to reduce agricultural discharges. Farmers in that

area were encouraged to participate in a voluntary program to implement

various agricultural best management practices in order to reduce nutrient

runoff. State officials said that demonstration projects greatly increase

voluntary participation in watershed projects because farmers generally

stay with practices that are “tried and true.” They tend to wait to see what

experience their peers have with a new practice before they adopt it, even

if the practice is said to be financially beneficial.

However, some participants in the project thought that most farmers want

to be good stewards of the land and would make the needed changes if

they had the funds and expertise. Thus, the availability of financial and

technical assistance is important to the farmer. Participants noted that

supplemental funding sources, such as the state cost-sharing program, are

important to watershed projects because sufficient federal funding may be

hard to obtain. They said that USDA’s funding for improvements in water

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Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed

quality at individual farms is severely constrained because actions to

improve water quality are considered just one of several competing

practices subject to an overall annual cap of $3,500 per farmer for projects

funded under the Agricultural Conservation Program. State officials

believe that the targeted 50-percent reduction in nitrogen pollution from

agricultural sources in the watershed will cost about $8.5 million and have

recommended that funding for the state Agriculture Cost Share Program

be increased.

State officials also said that watershed projects would benefit greatly from

increased communication, coordination, and cooperation between the

states and all the federal agencies. For instance, USDA staff encourage

farmers to plant grasses at the edge of cultivated fields that serve as buffer

zones for runoff. However, better coordination between USDA and the U.S.

Fish and Wildlife Service would ensure that grasses planted also provide

good wildlife habitat.

State officials said that accomplishments have not yet been reflected in the

results of water quality monitoring for the estuary and may not be

measurable for many years. They believed that other indicators, such as a

growth in fish populations, may be better short-term indicators of success.

These officials feared that if federal agencies measure success on the basis

of short-term water quality monitoring data alone, future funding could be

in jeopardy.

Agency officials and participants both preferred voluntary programs to

control nonpoint agricultural discharges over regulation. They believed

that people would continue to take the day-to-day actions necessary to

improve water quality only if they are truly committed to them. However,

some state officials, as well as one farmer we spoke to, believed that there

must also be a regulatory enforcement component to encourage early

action and to take care of polluters who do not comply.

Accomplishments As a result of engineering studies performed early in phase one,

point-source dischargers in the Tar-Pamlico Basin Association reduced

their nutrient discharges below the state limits through relatively

inexpensive equipment upgrades and operational changes. In fact,

point-source nutrient discharge levels have been below the state’s limits

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Appendix V 

Tar-Pamlico River Basin Watershed

for nitrogen and phosphorous for every year since the phase-one

agreement was signed.

By April 1993, the end of the sign-up period for the Chicod Creek

demonstration project, 27 of the 32 confined animal operations located in

the subbasin had agreed to implement management practices to reduce

nonpoint-source pollution. Waste management plans had been written for

6 of the 12 highest-priority operations, and construction of the various

containment structures required had begun at 2 of these sites.

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Appendix VI 

Big Darby Creek Watershed

The major lessons of the Big Darby Creek watershed project are that (1) in

the absence of an immediate water quality crisis, financial incentives can

be useful in stimulating participation in a project and (2) the link between

changes in land use and improvements in water quality may be difficult to

demonstrate in a large watershed.

Project’s Location and

Problem

The Big Darby Creek watershed covers about 371,000 acres of Ohio’s

central lowlands on the eastern edge of the Corn Belt, as shown in table

VI.1. The terrain is generally flat land and gently rolling hills. About 1,170

farms are located in the watershed, with the steeper upper portion

containing small farms of about 60 acres and the flatter lower portion

containing larger farms of about 300 acres. More than 80 percent of the

land in the watershed is devoted to crops, and there is some livestock

pasturing.

Figure VI.1: Location of the Big Darby

Creek Watershed

Big Darby


Watershed

Ohio

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Appendix VI 

Big Darby Creek Watershed

The two major threats to water quality in the Big Darby Creek watershed

are agricultural and urban nonpoint-source pollution. The major

agricultural pollutant is sedimentation, caused by the widespread use of

conventional tilling practices and stream bank erosion. Increased

sediment has impaired stream habitat and the feeding and spawning

activities of fish and other aquatic life. Agriculture also has created limited

nutrient and pesticide problems in the creek. Experts estimate that

although the watershed is now one of the healthiest in the Midwest, up to

25 percent of Big Darby’s aquatic species may be lost in the near future if

land management practices are not changed.

Project’s Genesis and

Management

The Big Darby project was conceived jointly by the Ohio chapter of the

Nature Conservancy and USDA.

9

 Before the project began, the Conservancy

spearheaded the creation of the Darby Partners, an association designed

to facilitate closer communication and coordination among all the

stakeholders in the watershed. The Partners now comprise more than 40

public and private organizations committed to working together to protect

the creek. The Darby Partners review and assist in the implementation of

the Big Darby project. For example, the Partners identify practices and

funding sources appropriate for farmers, serve as a clearinghouse for

funding applications, and use committees and subcommittees to

coordinate individual farmers’ projects.

Project’s Planning and

Funding

In 1990, USDA approved a proposal to include Big Darby Creek in its

Hydrologic Unit Area program, which targets areas facing significant

threats to water quality from agricultural nonpoint sources. The program

provides technical and financial assistance to encourage landowners to

voluntarily adopt best management practices.

Under this program, the objective is to maintain or improve the unique,

high-quality stream and its watershed by using innovative approaches to

reduce sedimentation and levels of nutrients and pesticides while

maintaining a viable agricultural economy. The specific goals of the

project are to (1) reduce sediment in the creek by 40 percent, (2) protect

3,200 acres of riparian corridor, (3) reduce nutrient and pesticide levels,

and (4) protect 21 miles of stream banks. Following Big Darby’s selection

as a hydrologic unit area, the Nature Conservancy designated Big Darby as

9

The Nature Conservancy is an international nonprofit membership organization committed to the

preservation of biological diversity.

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Appendix VI 

Big Darby Creek Watershed

one of its 12 “Last Great Places,” which enabled it to begin funding,

conducting, and coordinating environmental conservation programs there.

The Partners did not create a formal watershed management plan but

relied instead on three basic documents to guide their work: (1) the

original hydrologic unit area project proposal, (2) a Forest Service

watershed inventory, and (3) the Nature Conservancy’s watershed plan,

which focused more on urban issues. Project staff we met with

acknowledged the importance of planning but stressed that it must lead to

action, not to documents that sit on a shelf.

Collectively, the Soil and Water Conservation Districts in the six counties

in the watershed identified the following problem areas: (1) soil erosion

and sedimentation from croplands, (2) the widespread lack of

management of nutrients and pesticides, (3) poor management of animal

wastes, and (4) livestock’s access to streams. USDA identified a general list

of best management practices to be implemented by the project and

estimated the level of funding needed for these practices—about

$9 million over 3 years. Almost half of Big Darby’s funding has come from

USDA, as shown in table VI.1.

Table VI.1: Big Darby Creek Watershed

Funding Funding source Amount

USDA $2,367,000

EPA 650,000

Department of the Interior 349,000

State 387,000

State-local matching funds 313,000

Local government 85,000

Ohio Nature Conservancy 716,000

Kellogg Corporation (grant to

Operation: Future Association) 278,000

Total $5,145,000

Source: Ohio Nature Conservancy.

Key Approaches and

Observations

The Big Darby project provides financial and technical assistance and

educational opportunities to encourage and facilitate farmers’

implementation of best management practices in all six counties in the

watershed. Since Big Darby is not facing an immediate crisis in water

quality, the project’s leaders recognized that some farmers need incentives

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Appendix VI 

Big Darby Creek Watershed

to participate in the watershed project. According to project staff,

financial assistance has helped make nonpoint-source pollution more of a

priority for some people.

One approach to providing financial assistance is Ohio’s recently

established low-interest loan program for qualifying individuals and

private organizations that want to implement projects to control

nonpoint-source pollution. Under this program, an applicant who has

received a certification of qualification from a conservation district can

take the certification to a participating bank. If the bank approves the

loan, the interest rate will be discounted, usually by 3 percent, from the

normal lending rate.

Regarding technical assistance, project staff noted that it is important to

understand farmers’ needs and find practices that are compatible with

those needs. Different programs have different purposes and

requirements, and farmers need flexibility to choose among a program’s

tools or even expand the toolbox.

An assortment of educational and outreach activities, such as farm tours,

workshops, canoe trips, expositions, videos, the use of mass media, and

school events, are being directed to the general public and to landowners

to increase their awareness of water quality and encourage interest in the

Big Darby watershed. Although some farm demonstration projects have

been conducted, project staff prefer to use funding for farmers’ specific

projects, estimating that the cost of 1 demonstration could pay for about

10 farmers’ projects.

Assessments of the biological, physical, and chemical aspects of water

quality are being conducted in Big Darby Creek. According to state

officials, biological monitoring may be the best method for assessing

problems with nonpoint-source pollution. They stressed that such

monitoring should be a separate element and in place before individual

watershed projects are begun. However, a project’s performance can be

validly assessed using other indicators, such as fish counts, best

management practices adopted, and farmers’ attitudes, according to

project staff.

Water quality monitoring in Big Darby is not tied directly to farmers’

implementation activities. According to project staff, farmers are

sometimes frustrated by data limitations and the project’s inability to show

results. They acknowledged that a better link between monitoring and

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Appendix VI 

Big Darby Creek Watershed

day-to-day project activities could help show participants that their

activities are having a positive effect. They cautioned, however, that

current science can demonstrate only a tenuous link between land use

practices and the chemical aspects of water quality.

Some sociological data also has been collected. Focus groups showed that

farmers were generally enthusiastic about collaborating with agencies to

achieve a greater goal and that their primary concerns were the protection

of stream corridors and control of suburban encroachment.

Accomplishments During the last 3 years, the biological integrity of the watershed’s streams

has remained constant, while sediment, pesticide, and nutrient levels have

fluctuated. The Big Darby project has reached 57 percent of its goal of

reducing sediment by 50,000 tons per year, and 98 producers have installed

one or more structural enhancements or implemented management

practices in 1994 to reduce nonpoint-source pollution.

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Appendix VII 

Coos Bay-Coquille River Watersheds

The major lesson of the Coos Bay and Coquille River watershed projects is

that involving local stakeholders in planning and implementing a project

can help overcome a community’s suspicion of government-sponsored

initiatives and result in a cooperative partnership of community interests

and government agencies.

Projects’ Location and

Problem

Coos Bay and the Coquille River are adjacent watersheds covering about

2,000 acres along the southern Oregon coast, as shown in figure VII.1. The

terrain is composed of steep, heavily timbered hills interspersed with

pasture land leading to pastures on drained wetlands along various rivers

and creeks. The local economy depends heavily on timber, commercial

fishing, and agriculture.

Figure VII.1: Location of the Coos

Bay-Coquille River Watersheds

Coos Bay-Coquille


River Watersheds

Oregon

The Coos Bay-Coquille River area is an important spawning and winter

rearing habitat for salmon and other anadromous fish.10 The fish spawn in

the gravel-covered stream beds near the headwaters of the creeks, and the

10Anadromous fish hatch in fresh water, journey downstream to the ocean to mature, and return to

their place of birth to spawn. Anadromous species in the Coos Bay-Coquille River watersheds include

coho salmon, fall and spring chinook salmon, winter steelhead trout, and sea-run cutthroat trout.

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Appendix VII 

Coos Bay-Coquille River Watersheds

juvenile fish linger in the cool, heavily shaded areas downstream until they

are mature enough to head out to sea.

The salmon population has severely declined for several reasons,

including the impact that timber and agricultural activities have had on the

spawning and rearing habitat. Sediment from timber runoff and eroding

banks in pasture land has silted over the gravel spawning grounds and

decreased the amount of dissolved oxygen available to the fish.

Destruction of habitat—by, for example, straightening streams—causes

juvenile fish to be swept out to sea before they are mature enough to

survive ocean conditions. Finally, temperatures in parts of the Coquille

River reach 80 degrees, much warmer than the 50 to 60 degree

temperature suitable for fish.

Projects’ Genesis and

Management

The initial effort was a 1991 demonstration project on Larson and Palouse

Creeks, tributaries of Coos Bay, that was funded through EPA’s Near

Coastal Waters Program. The effort was prompted by a complaint from

owners of one of the Coos Bay oyster beds, which had been closed

because of fecal contamination. In addition, the state identified these

creeks as dangerous for recreation because of the high fecal coliform

count. The project’s goal was to reduce the coliform count from 16,000 per

100 milliliters to 200 per 100 milliliters.

The government agencies involved in the project called a community

meeting to elicit citizens’ concerns about water quality. The potential

listing of the coho salmon as an endangered species was a major concern

for landowners along the creeks. Attendees also identified drinking water

quality, access to creeks in order to water livestock, land loss due to

erosion, and suitability for recreational use as their primary concerns.

The community organized two watershed associations, one focusing on

the Coos Bay watershed and the other on the adjacent Coquille River

watershed. Each association has an executive council that sets the overall

policy and direction for the project. Watershed members include timber

companies; private landowners; federal land management agencies, such

as the Bureau of Land Management and the Forest Service; state agencies

with water and habitat responsibilities, such as the Oregon Department of

Environmental Quality; and other interested parties, such as local seaport

operators and environmental groups.

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Appendix VII 

Coos Bay-Coquille River Watersheds

Projects’ Planning and

Funding

Both associations issued an action plan in 1994 after spending less than a

year planning and developing their overall approach. The plans include

quantifiable goals and a monitoring strategy. For example, the Coquille

River watershed plan identified three goals: (1) meeting the Clean Water

Act’s standards, (2) enhancing fish survival and production, and

(3) creating understanding and acceptance in the community of the need

for sustainable economic activities that are compatible with long-term

resource conservation. The evaluation strategy includes monitoring a

variety of parameters, such as stream temperature, stream flow, and fish

spawning and juvenile populations. Both plans emphasize voluntary

participation and community education, and both advocate simple,

low-technology approaches like (1) installing fencing to minimize damage

to streambanks caused by livestock and thus reduce erosion, (2) planting

shade trees along the creeks to reduce the water temperature, and

(3) building small pools, called off-channel ponds, alongside the creek to

provide a rearing habitat for juvenile fish.

EPA staff told us that they could not help fund the planning activities for

the Coos Bay-Coquille River projects because, at that time, funds received

under section 319 of the Clean Water Act could only be used for

implementation, not planning.

The Coos Bay project is funded almost equally by federal and state

agencies, whereas the Coquille River project is funded primarily by federal

agencies, as shown in tables VII.1 and VII.2.

Table VII.1: Coos Bay Watershed

Funding Funding source Amount

Department of Commerce $250,000

Department of the Interior 33,000

State 300,000

Total $583,000

Source: Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.

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Coos Bay-Coquille River Watersheds

Table VII.2: Coquille River Watershed

Funding Funding source Amount

Department of the Interior $1,300,000

Department of Commerce 250,000

EPA 150,000

State 619,000

Landowners’ contributions (estimated) 100,000

Total $2,419,000

Source: Oregon Department of Environmental Quality.

Key Approaches and

Observations

The projects’ participants emphasized that getting the local community to

agree that a water quality problem existed and needed to be addressed

was critical in making the project viable. The local community is

suspicious of government regulation and very protective of private

property rights. The community is particularly resistant to projects with an

environmental slant, because many blame federal and state efforts to

protect the spotted owl and salmon population for high unemployment in

the timber and fishing industries. Participants believed that public

education and outreach was a major factor in overcoming this resistance.

Because many in the community were suspicious of the projects,

participants spent a great deal of time making formal and informal contact

with members of the community to explain the scope and approach of the

projects and reassure the public about the projects’ intent. Members of the

Coquille River Watershed Association are also developing a high school

curriculum to improve students’ understanding of the watershed they live

in and how their activities affect water quality.

Emphasizing stakeholders’ involvement capitalized on the fact that many

landowners really wanted to help their neighbors by improving water

quality and revitalizing the salmon population. Participants said involving

stakeholders helped ensure that all economic interests were represented

and considered when defining the problem and developing a solution.

Representatives of the timber, fishery, and agricultural sectors explained

their operations and needs, and these were taken into consideration in

developing the projects’ strategy. Participants emphasized that the

projects could not progress until stakeholders move beyond blaming each

other for the current problem and begin concentrating on the solution.

Involving stakeholders also helped the government agencies to move

beyond focusing on their own missions to focusing on the overall

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Appendix VII 

Coos Bay-Coquille River Watersheds

condition of the watershed. Historically, government personnel had

seldom communicated with each other. For example, one agency official

noted that the state was doing studies and building in-stream structures,

such as inserting logs, old trees, and other woody debris to slow the

stream flow; the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was dredging canals and

sloughs to improve drainage; the Bureau of Land Management was

undertaking projects on federal land, such as reengineering access roads

to minimize erosion; and USDA was working with private landowners to

reduce erosion and runoff from animal wastes. However, the agencies

were not looking at how these efforts related to each other. The watershed

associations have given the agencies a forum for sharing information, and

coordination among them has greatly improved.

Coos Bay and Coquille River project staff, participants, and state

government officials voiced concerns about inflexible federal processes.

For example, project staff and state government officials said it took 9

months to obtain a permit to build an off-channel pond and spread the few

cubic yards of earth removed across a pasture. A permit had to be

obtained from the Army Corps of Engineers because it has authority over

disposal of dredge and fill materials into U.S. waters and wetlands.

Participants in the project said they could not understand why it would

take 9 months to issue a permit for such a simple project.

Accomplishments The Coos Bay project on Larson Creek has reached its goal of lowering the

fecal coliform count to 200 bacteria per 100 milliliters, allowing the oyster

beds that had been closed for 13 years because of fecal contamination to

be reopened. In addition, the number of adult fish returning to spawn in

the tributaries of Coos Bay has doubled over the previous year. However,

project staff noted that factors other than the project, such as overall

ocean conditions, can also affect the number of fish returning to spawn.

About 20 of the 2,500 landowners along the Coquille River are

participating in the program. Participants estimate that the Coquille River

project has fenced and replanted about 45 miles of streambanks and built

five off-channel ponds.

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Appendix VIII 

Lake Champlain Basin Watershed

The major lessons of the Lake Champlain Basin Watershed Project are that

(1) project management must be flexible enough to span multiple

jurisdictions, (2) watershed efforts must be driven by stakeholders’

concerns and supported by local participation, and (3) diversified funding

sources and good communication with state and provincial legislatures are

essential to sustained success.

Project’s Location and

Problem

The Lake Champlain basin spans about 5.3 million acres of mostly rural

land, of which about 56 percent is located in Vermont, 37 percent in New

York, and 7 percent in Québec, Canada, as shown in figure VIII.1. The

watershed is home to a population of over 600,000 people. Lake Champlain

and its basin abound with historic and Native American cultural artifacts

and was designated part of a biosphere reserve by the United Nations in

1989.

Figure VIII.1: Location of the Lake

Champlain Basin Watershed

Lake Champlain 


and Surrounding 


Watershed

New York

Vermont

Canada

U.S./Canada


Border

Overall, Lake Champlain is considered healthy from the standpoint of

water quality. However, various sections of the lake are experiencing

problems caused by excessive nutrients, particularly phosphorous.

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Appendix VIII 

Lake Champlain Basin Watershed

Phosphorous acts as a fertilizer, causing algae and plants to grow more

rapidly. When excessive weeds and algae die and decompose, they use up

the dissolved oxygen in the water required by fish and other species. Data

indicate that the phosphorous levels in the lake need to be reduced by 200

metric tons per year to address the problems associated with accelerated

plant growth and that 68 percent of this reduction should come from

nonpoint sources of pollution, such as agricultural land. Other problems

include (1) annual beach closings in both New York and Vermont because

of high counts of fecal coliform bacteria and the presence of pathogens;

(2) the presence of toxins, such as mercury and PCBs (polychlorinated

biphenyls); (3) nuisance aquatic plants, such as water chestnuts, that

discourage recreational use; and (4) nonnative species, such as zebra

mussels and sea lamprey, that threaten native mussel and fish species.

Project’s Genesis and

Management

Water quality problems in Lake Champlain were recognized as far back as

1905 by the U.S. Geological Survey. However, attempts to establish a

long-lived institution for the management of Lake Champlain and its

watershed have been unsuccessful. The most recent effort, the Lake

Champlain Special Designation Act of 1990, elevated Lake Champlain to a

protection category shared by only a few national lakes and estuaries.

Under the act, EPA was required to establish a management conference

tasked to develop, within 5 years, a comprehensive pollution prevention

and control and restoration plan for Lake Champlain and its watershed.

The Lake Champlain Basin Program was established to coordinate the

activities envisioned under the Lake Champlain Special Designation Act.

The Basin Program, jointly administered by EPA, the states of New York

and Vermont, and the New England Interstate Water Pollution Control

Commission, serves as an umbrella for the numerous cooperating

agencies, organizations, and individuals working to develop the plan.

Altogether, some 227 regional, state, provincial, or federal entities are

involved in the planning effort for Lake Champlain and its watershed.

The Lake Champlain Management Conference is the Basin Program’s

primary decision-making body. It is a 31-member board representing a

broad spectrum of stakeholders’ interests within the watershed from both

New York and Vermont, including local residents; environmentalists;

farmers; marina owners; fishery specialists; scientists; industry and

business representatives; and local, state, and federal government officials.

Although it has an independent function, the Joint New

York-Vermont-Québec Lake Champlain Steering Committee also

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Appendix VIII 

Lake Champlain Basin Watershed

participates in the planning process, which involves both regional policies

and cooperation with Québec.

Project’s Planning and

Funding

The Management Conference allotted considerable funding to priority

research for the first 2 years. Other funds were spent on data management

efforts, demonstration projects, education and outreach efforts, and

administration of the Lake Champlain Basin Program. Projects were also

funded in four major areas: water quality; living natural resources, such as

threatened and endangered fish and wildlife; human activities, such as

recreation and cultural, economic, and health concerns; and support

studies, such as data gathering and monitoring. All projects require a

25-percent minimum in matching funds from anyone undertaking the

work. The Lake Champlain Management Conference is scheduled to

“sunset” (i.e., terminate under its authorizing legislation) in March 1996,

upon completion of the final management plan, which must be approved

by the governors of New York and Vermont and the Administrator of EPA.

Under the Lake Champlain Special Designation Act of 1990, the Congress

tied financial support for Lake Champlain to a clear timetable—up to

$5 million per year for 5 years. As shown in table VIII.1, funding for Lake

Champlain has come from several sources.

Page 57 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix VIII 

Lake Champlain Basin Watershed

Table VIII.1: Lake Champlain

Watershed Funding Funding source Amounta

USDAa $9,936,000

EPAa 8,000,000

Department of the Interiora 2,834,000

Department of Commercea 980,000

Voluntary participants (farmers)a 3,279,000

Contractors and othersb 750,000

New Yorkc 903,000

Vermontb 275,000

Totald $26,957,000

aAmounts shown are for funding through September 30, 1994.

bAmounts shown are through March 31, 1995.

cAmount shown is through June 30, 1994.

dTotals are approximate and may not include the value of farmers’ in-kind labor, funds raised by

local watershed groups, or the cost of activities provided by various federal and state agencies

under other programs.

Source: Lake Champlain Basin Program Annual Reports for 1991-1994; the Lake Champlain

Basin Program draft plan entitled Opportunities for Action, October 1994; personnel from the Lake

Champlain Basin Program; and personnel from the New England Interstate Water Pollution

Control Commission.

Key Approaches and

Observations

Recognizing that a regulatory program would likely polarize stakeholder

groups, the project’s participants agreed that the project should adopt a

voluntary approach. Lake Champlain Basin Program officials believe that

public education, support, and participation are crucial to getting

voluntary action. In this regard, public meetings and other forums were

used to break down the barriers between stakeholder groups so that

constructive dialogue could take place. Basin program officials also

believe that building on existing community organizations results in more

effective, less costly, more creative solutions than would result from an

inflexible, prescriptive approach.

Because many of the farms in New York and Vermont are marginal,

family-owned dairy operations, the farmers and USDA officials we spoke to

said that financial assistance is essential to the project’s success. The

financial assistance available to farmers has often been insufficient, and

many farmers could not afford the cost share required of them.

Furthermore, the $3,500 annual cap placed on all farm practices that fall

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Appendix VIII 

Lake Champlain Basin Watershed

under the Agricultural Conservation Program serves to deter farmers from

implementing pollution-mitigating structures and practices.

While more research is still needed, studies and monitoring efforts

undertaken throughout the watershed have provided valuable information

about water quality issues, such as phosphorous pollution in the lake, that

helped set the framework for the management plan. Data from monitoring

have not shown a noticeable water quality improvement, however, and

additional information needs to be developed on how pollutants such as

phosphorous are introduced into, travel through, and dissipate from the

lake.

Accomplishments From the agriculture/water quality standpoint, a few of the most

significant accomplishments include the following:

• The states of New York and Vermont and the province of Québec signed a

water quality agreement in 1993, which endorsed uniform interim goals for

phosphorous management for Lake Champlain.

• A Lake Champlain Agricultural Advisory Council was established to help

address agricultural issues relating to water quality throughout the

watershed and ensure that farmers’ needs for information are met.

• Two demonstration projects dealing with manure management were

undertaken, and 70 farmers participated in manure management

workshops designed to reduce the nutrient runoff entering Lake

Champlain and its tributaries.

• Finally, more than 500 farmers in the watershed have agreed to participate

in water quality projects sponsored by USDA.

Page 59 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IX 

Black Earth Creek Watershed

The major lessons of the Black Earth Creek watershed project are that

(1) broad involvement by stakeholders is critical to a project’s success and

(2) education is needed to promote long-term stewardship of a watershed.

Project’s Location and

Problem

The Black Earth Creek watershed covers about 64,000 acres, primarily in

Dane County, Wisconsin, as shown in figure IX.1. Black Earth Creek and

its tributaries support one of the state’s top recreational trout fisheries.

Approximately 56 percent of the watershed is agricultural land, most of

whose approximately 380 farmers operate dairy farms. Other agricultural

businesses in the watershed include hog and beef cattle operations and

farms devoted to cash crops such as soybeans.

Figure IX.1: Location of the Black

Earth Creek Watershed

Black Earth


Creek Watershed

Wisconsin

In response to anecdotal evidence of deteriorating stream conditions, the

U.S. Geological Survey began a study of Black Earth Creek in 1984 to

Page 60 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IX 

Black Earth Creek Watershed

assess the hydrology, aquatic life, and water quality of the creek and its

tributaries. The Survey collected data from sites along two of the creek’s

tributaries and found problems with animal waste runoff, high sediment

levels, and low dissolved oxygen levels. The extent of these problems was

greater than originally anticipated.

Project’s Genesis and

Management

On the basis of local support and interest from Dane County and the local

chapter of Trout Unlimited, a national sportsmen’s organization, the

Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources designated Black Earth Creek

a priority watershed in 1985. The Black Earth Creek project formally

began in 1986. The project is being implemented under the Wisconsin

Nonpoint Source Water Pollution Abatement Program, also known as the

Priority Watershed Program. The program provides state matching funds

to encourage farmers to implement best management practices to reduce

nonpoint-source pollution. The program targets critical landowners in

each watershed, and participation is voluntary, although the state retains

some enforcement authority.

The project staff is drawn from a number of agencies and organizations,

including Wisconsin’s Department of Natural Resources, the University of

Wisconsin Extension, the Dane County Land Conservation Department,

and USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service. Another active

participant in the project has been the Black Earth Creek Watershed

Association, a citizens’ group formed when the project began to provide a

mechanism for local input. The watershed association’s charter is to

“advocate the stewardship and sound management of land and water

resources in the watershed and to serve as an information clearinghouse”

for interested parties.

Project’s Planning and

Funding

The watershed plan for Black Earth Creek was prepared jointly by the

Department of Natural Resources; the county conservation department;

and representatives from other federal, state, and local community

organizations. The project focuses on surface water issues and covers

both rural and urban sources of nonpoint pollution. On the rural side, the

plan’s goals include (1) a 50-percent reduction in sediment and manure

runoff and (2) habitat restoration in selected stream segments. To

accomplish these goals, cropland management practices are needed on

about 11,500 critical acres, barnyard runoff controls at 65 of the livestock

operations, and intensive stream bank work on two segments of Black

Page 61 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IX 

Black Earth Creek Watershed

Earth Creek. On the urban side, the plan requires that a management plan

for storm water be developed for one portion of the watershed.

The Black Earth Creek watershed project has received funding from a

variety of state, local, and other sources, as shown in table IX.1, but no

direct federal funding.11 Farmers have also used other state and federal

funds (i.e., funds not tied specifically to the project) to implement

conservation and other environmental practices in the watershed.

Table IX.1: Black Earth Creek

Watershed Funding Funding source Amounta

State $2,536,000

County 404,000

Nonprofit organizations and others 305,000

Total $3,245,000

aAmounts shown are as of January 1, 1995.

Source: Dane County Land Conservation Department.

Key Approaches and

Observations

According to the project’s participants, early involvement by all watershed

stakeholders was very important in facilitating understanding and

consensus. To this end, the watershed association played a critical role.

The association provided a forum for discussion, and its perceived

neutrality was key to cutting through intransigence and bureaucracy and

achieving consensus on issues to be addressed and actions to be taken.

The watershed association also helped to alleviate farmers’ concerns that

they were the only ones being “targeted” in the watershed. County staff

also emphasized the importance of starting simple and building trust with

the local community. Despite prior experience working with county staff

on conservation planning, the farmers did not feel comfortable with the

project until after repeated visits from county staff and word-of-mouth

communication.

The Black Earth Creek project provides financial and technical assistance

to participating farmers who sign long-term agreements to install and

maintain certain practices. In general, project staff have emphasized

management solutions over structural ones. Where structural solutions are

necessary, the staff have encouraged simple, less expensive structures.

11The state receives $2.5 million per year from EPA under section 319 of the Clean Water Act, which is

used to support state agency staff, not individual watershed projects. Black Earth Creek is one of 65

watershed projects in Wisconsin.

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Appendix IX 

Black Earth Creek Watershed

For example, a $10,000 to $40,000 barnyard structure that catches solid

waste runoff and drains liquids into a grassy filter strip is preferable to a

100-percent containment structure that would require more planning and

cost tens of thousands of dollars more.

Project staff said that education is also an important component of the

Black Earth Creek project and will be critical to its long-term success. An

early challenge faced by the watershed association and project staff was to

boost community interest in the creek. A variety of mechanisms, including

audiovisual programs, printed materials, exhibits, media events, tours,

demonstration activities, signs, workshops, meetings, youth education,

recreational clinics, and fund raisers, have been used to boost the public’s

awareness and provide information about the watershed.

Two farm demonstration projects have been implemented in Black Earth

Creek. Dane County project staff said that while it takes 2 or 3 years

before farmers will implement demonstrated practices in their own

operations, such projects can be good vehicles for generating cooperation,

especially if they are relatively simple and successful. One such

demonstration project combined techniques to simultaneously protect fish

habitat and stabilize a stream bank. The project used a USDA-approved

practice, called rip-rap (the positioning of rocks to stabilize and shape the

stream bank), to reduce erosion. However, since rip-rap alone would have

destroyed the cave-like spaces in which certain fish hide and spawn,

wooden boxes called “lunkers” were built into the stream bank to imitate

the natural habitat. According to county staff, this demonstration project

catalyzed partnerships among agencies and between agencies and farmers.

They attributed all the stream bank work undertaken so far in the

watershed to the success of this one demonstration project.

Although water quality monitoring in Black Earth Creek has been more

intensive than it has in other watershed projects in the state because of the

state’s priorities, Black Earth Creek staff said that extensive monitoring is

not always necessary. Project staff said that decisionmakers should adjust

their expectations and look to indicators of success other than chemical

changes in water quality when evaluating watershed projects. Other

measures, such as the level of farmers’ participation, level of community

support, and monitoring of plants and aquatic life forms, are also valid

indicators of a project’s success.

Project staff favor a voluntary approach to watershed management, but

acknowledged that regulation to establish minimum standards for farm

Page 63 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix IX 

Black Earth Creek Watershed

management may be needed to deal with egregious behavior. The

Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources retains certain enforcement

authorities that it can use against participants who violate their

cost-sharing agreements, or other uncooperative individuals. For example,

if landowners violate the terms of their cost-sharing arrangement, the state

may revoke its offer of cost sharing and substitute a low-interest loan. For

critical sites in a watershed project, the state can issue compliance orders.

Accomplishments Preliminary monitoring data (collected up to 1992) show significant

decreases in nitrates and sediment in one subwatershed of Black Earth

Creek. In addition, the fish population has increased at the stream bank

restoration demonstration site, but Department of Natural Resources

officials could not attribute this improvement solely to the project’s

activities. Thus far, 103 Black Earth Creek landowners have signed county

cost-sharing agreements to implement environmentally friendly

management practices. County staff said that only about two dozen

farmers have taken no action, and of those, only a few have serious

problems.

Page 64 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
Appendix X 

Major Contributors to This Report

Resources,

Community, and

Economic

Development

Division, Washington,

D.C.

Michael J. Rahl, Staff Evaluator

San Francisco Field

Office

Keith W. Oleson, Assistant Director

Jonda R. Van Pelt, Project Leader

Linda Chu, Staff Evaluator

Jonathan M. Silverman, Communications Analyst

William D. Prentiss, Graphics Adviser

(150538) Page 65 GAO/RCED-95-218 Selected Watershed Projects
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