Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection Northcentral Region Acting Director Jared Dressler joined Columbia County Conservation District and Town of Bloomsburg leaders Tuesday to announce $245,000 in Growing Greener grant funding to improve water quality in the Kinney Run Watershed and view project sites.
Kinney Run, an impaired tributary to the Susquehanna River, is a small, urbanized watershed that frequently experiences flooding. The Growing Greener grant will fund three interconnected projects within the watershed to reduce stormwater runoff, non-point source pollution, and sediment erosion and deposition. The projects will enhance aquatic and pollinator habitats, increase ecosystem services, and establish a new public nature park with educational signage.
"The design for Kinney Run improvements is a wonderful example of creatively planning a series of interrelated projects to address multiple environmental and community goals, enhancing outdoor recreation, environmental education opportunities, and local water quality," said Dressler. "I look forward to visiting again in the future to see the established best management practices and nature park."
Portions of the Kinney Run work funded by this grant will satisfy the Town of Bloomsburg's pollution reduction requirements under the Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4) Program, achieving quantified pollution reductions and water quality improvements to benefit local waters, downstream communities, and the Chesapeake Bay.
The planned projects include:
- Sediment removal and conversion of high flow bypass channel to a bioswale;
- Installation of an infiltration basin to treat runoff from 4.44 acres by Town Park Village;
- Creation of 1,300 linear feet of in-stream fish habitat and stream stabilization structures;
- Extension of an existing 1,000 foot riparian buffer;
- Conversion of 11 acres of lawn to a pollinator meadow and creation of monarch butterfly habitat; and
- Establishment of a new public nature park with educational signs.
The Kinney Run projects will be coordinated and administered by Columbia County Conservation District staff in partnership with officials from the Town of Bloomsburg. Project partners also include the Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission Habitat Management Division, the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources, and the Keystone Ten Million Trees Partnership.
Categories: Pennsylvania, General