(Ankeny)– 16 projects to clean up Iowa’s lakes, rivers and streams have won tentative approval for funding from the Iowa Watershed Improvement Review Board.
For the second year in a row, the Iowa Legislature appropriated five billion dollars for watershed improvements that are locally driven, include matching funds and are designed to improve the quality of impaired waters.
The board’s members represent a wide range of interests, from environmental organizations to farm commodity groups. The Department of Natural Resources and the Iowa Department of Agriculture and Land Stewardship are also represented. The board met Wednesday in Ankeny.
38 applications were received for funding requests totaling more than 12 million dollars.
Last year’s projects approved for funding included 486-thousand dollars for the Low Impact Development initiative in Dickinson county. This year’s approved projects include two in northwest Iowa: 73-thousand dollars to help fund additional improvements in the Storm Lake watershed; and 267,800-dollars for a cost-share program to reduce runoff from smaller cattle feedlots in the Big Sioux River watershed in western Lyon county.
