Protecting Rivers & Your Clean Water
Portland, Oregon’s Flood Protection Success Story: Reducing Flood Risk and Restoring Floodplains along Johnson Creek.
March 15, 2012 | Water Pollution, Floods & FloodplainsLocated on the southeast side of Portland and on the eastern side of the Willamette River basin, Johnson Creek flows 26 miles west through six different jurisdictions and finally into the Willamette River. Although just a small portion (6 %) of Portland’s “100 year” floodplain is in the Johnson Creek watershed, it accounts for the majority (78%) of Portland’s repetitive flood loss claims.
Read more »Celebrate the International Day of Action for Rivers
Amy Souers Kober, Senior Director of Communications
March 14, 2012 | Water Pollution, Water Supply
Today, March 14, marks the 15th year of celebration of the International Day of Action for Rivers. It’s a day to celebrate victories like the removal of obsolete dams, and the restoration of our rivers. Find out how can you celebrate your rivers.
Read more »Wake Up!
Fay Augustyn, Intermountain West Blue Trails Manager
March 14, 2012 | Water Pollution, Floods & Floodplains, Climate Change, Water Supply
In the last month there has been an outcry by members of Congress, states and the insurance industry to wake up and begin preparing for more large scale and extreme weather events. Illinois Senator Dick Durban commented early last week that it’s time we acknowledge the obvious fact that our climate is changing, and it’s time we do something about it.
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Finding Water Supplies and Lost Revenue in the Southeast
March 13, 2012 | Water Pollution, Water SupplyMarch 12-18 is EPA’s WaterSense Fix a Leak Week. This week will push more people to improve their home’s water efficiency. While many discussions involve not wasting water at home, American Rivers is also working at the community level. Where can we find our hidden reservoirs of water supply? A good place to start is reducing the waste in water systems themselves.
Read more »Putting People to Work, the Green Infrastructure Way
Jeffrey Odefey, Director, Stormwater Program
March 9, 2012 | Water Pollution, Stormwater & Sewage
As river advocates, we tend to talk a lot about polluted stormwater runoff, and the need to reduce pollution from our streets, parking lots and roofs that ends up in our rivers every time it rains. Building more green infrastructure, such as green roofs and rain gardens, is becoming a very promising approach to reducing runoff into our storm sewers and creeks and rivers, so we talk about that a lot too.
Read more »Horse Creek Dam: Six Years After it was Blown to Bits.
March 7, 2012 | Water Pollution, Dams & Dam RemovalThrough the joint efforts of American Rivers and several partner agencies and organizations, the defunct Horse Creek Dam in the San Rafael Wilderness near Santa Barbara, CA, was demolished in October 2006 by a blasting crew. This momentous occasion set the precedent as the first successful dam removal project in Southern California that used explosives instead of heavy machinery.
Read more »Huge Step Forward for Yuba Salmon Restoration!
March 5, 2012 | Dams & Dam Removal, Most Endangered Rivers, Water PollutionOn February 29, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) issued a much anticipated plan for how the Corps of Engineers must change its Englebright Dam and Daguerre Point Dam on the Yuba River to eliminate the dams’ contribution to the risk of extinction of Yuba salmon, steelhead and green sturgeon.
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