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EPA Awards Funding to University of Maine and Knox Co. Soil and Water Conservation District to Protect Boothbay's Drinking Water Supplies

Release Date: 01/29/2003
Contact Information: Peyton Fleming, EPA Press Office, 617-918-1008

BOSTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is providing $71,000 to help fund two projects aimed at protecting two local drinking water supplies in Boothbay, Maine. The money will help pay to study and install controls to prevent erosion and highway run-off contributing to pollution in Knickerbocker Lake and Adams Pond.

The Sen. George J. Mitchell Center for Environmental and Watershed Research at the University of Maine and the Knox County Soil & Water Conservation District are working with the Boothbay Water District and local lake associations to complete these projects.

These groups are working together as the Watershed Improvement Financial Assistance Partnership, led by the Knox-Lincoln Soil and Water Conservation District. Their goals are to reduce the amount of phosphorous and sediment in stormwater runoff entering Adams Pond and Knickerbocker Lake, and to initiate a continued stewardship of the watersheds by the community. To accomplish this, practices will be put into place to slow erosion and sedimentation.

"These groups working together will be able to make the kinds of changes that help protect Boothbay's public drinking water supply," said Robert W. Varney, administrator of EPA's New England office. "EPA is pleased to be providing the funds necessary to help prevent erosion and the resulting pollution caused by runoff."

Most of the erosion sites being addressed in these projects are alongside roads. The projects, part of EPA's Drinking Water Source Protection Project, will provide assessments and technical help, engineering help, administrative tasks, and road crews and landowners to install best management practices.

These Drinking Water Source Protection Projects will engage local community groups, the state drinking water program, the Maine Water Utilities Association, the Maine Rural Water Association, the Maine DEP and the Boothbay Water District to identify valuable land areas to protect and evaluate improvements in water quality of the two drinking water sources.

State and local contributions for the project total more than $47,000. Both projects are scheduled to run between now and November 2004. For more information please contact Ted Lavery, at the EPA, at (617) 918-1683.