Community Based Watershed Conservation Efforts

Community based watershed scale conservation efforts have been the focus of educational, financial and technical assistance programs for decades. Each of these programs adapts to local demographics, resource concerns, existing conservation initiatives and most importantly the cultural values associated with that community. But what have they all learned? What can we learn from decades of work? In 2010, the Environmental Protection Agency of Puget Sound awarded the Whatcom Conservation District 5 years of funding for an intensive community based, non-regulatory, social marketing campaign to improve water quality and salmon habitat in the Birch Bay watershed in northwestern Washington. The program encouraged residents to adopt stewardship practices, use low impact development and agricultural best management practices, and participate in restoration projects. In this session we will explore lessons learned, adaptive management and results of the robust program evaluation of the Birch Bay initiative. We will also examine how this case study compares to a number of peer-reviewed reports on community based watershed conservation programs from across the nation, evaluating the long-term effectiveness of outreach and educational campaigns and drawing conclusions based on decades of work