Earth Works Institute receives State Grant for Watershed Planning in Embudo/Dixon

Starting late this fall, Earth Works Institute will ramp up its watershed planning and restoration activities in the Lower Embudo Valley when it launches a 3-year program to update a watershed plan for the Rio Embudo. While residents in the Lower Embudo Valley have been experiencing one of the driest years on record, the State Environment Department grant may be a beginning in countering the effects of extreme weather patterns and land use on surface water quality and acequias in the area. The project will help study the annual volume of dirt that chokes the river and the acequias, pinpoint the sources of this pollution, and formulate land management solutions for the future that help water soak into the soil and reduce erosion. In 2012, Earth Works will hire 24 local people to help collect water samples, while a team of students from the Arid Land Institute from Woodbury University in Burbank, CA will help map the valley and locate eroding areas. Alongside this project, EWI will train local acequia associations, youth, and residents in several pilot projects that will stabilize degraded arroyos and acequias. At the same time, they will support dialogue between Embudo Valley communities and a large forest planning project of the Forest Guild and Forest Service for future forests health improvements in upstream areas. All these projects aim to clear the waters of the Embudo Valley and boost technical skills and leadership capacity in the community for more effective water management in the future.

For more information, contact EWI's Restoration Ecologist John Busemeyer at john@earthworksinstitute.org