Citizen Collaboration in Minnesota’s Olmsted, Wabasha & Winona Counties

The Whitewater River Watershed Project works for better water quality, less erosion and flooding, habitat for diverse plants and animals, and a land stewardship ethic among citizens who live, work, and play in the watershed. Work is directed by the Whitewater Joint Powers Board, a group of elected commissioners and Soil and Water Conservation District directors from the three counties. Citizens may join them for regular meetings on the third Thursday every other month at Whitewater State Park Visitor Center, 8:30 a.m. Current projects build on citizen work begun in 1938, when the Whitewater River flooded 28 times, burying farms and the town of Beaver in silt. Farmers responded then by voluntarily adopting new tillage and management practices, which reduced erosion and flooding and improved farms. Minnesota’s first Soil & Water Conservation District was established here then, to lead and assist. Concern about massing sediment at the confluence of the Whitewater and Mississippi Rivers brought landowners and local, state, and federal conservation staff together in 1987 to look at upstream sources. A successful erosion reduction project on the Middle Whitewater River led to more opportunities, so the Joint Powers Board formed in 1989 to facilitate shared work.