Action alert from Citizens for Community Improvement:
Iowa DNR is asking for feedback on Iowa’s water quality!
They are hosting 2 virtual public hearings for a Triennial Review of water quality standards. “Under the Clean Water Act, a state shall, from time-to-time, hold public meetings for the purpose of reviewing applicable water quality standards and, as appropriate, modifying and adopting standards. This review includes, but is not necessarily limited to: designated uses, water quality criteria, and antidegradation.”
- The public hearings are Sept 18 at 9:30am and Sept 23 at 2:30pm. Zoom links to join found here. The DNR agenda is the same for both hearings with questions and public comments at the end.
- After the first hearing they will also take public comments via email through Oct 20. Stay tuned – we’ll send out an action alert when the public comments are open.
Are you able to participate on one of the public hearings? If so, please reply to this email to let me know which one.
Whether you’re able to attend the DNR hearing or not – – join us to talk about it! The water testing crew meets on the last Thursday of the month. We’ll get folks up to speed on what we heard, and we can strategize together about how to take advantage of the public comment period.
Click here to get registered for our next monthly Zoom on Thursday, September 25 at 5pm.
THEY dump it. WE drink it. WE won’t stop until THEY clean it up.
P.S. Join CCI’s Citizen Science – click here for more info and to order a Nitrate Watch test kit.
Important links for resources and opportunities:
- www.iowacci.org/watertest – order a test kit
- www.cleanwaterhub.com/nitratewatch – log your data here, make sure you connect it to the Iowa CCI organization
- Make a Plan worksheet – handy resource to make a monitoring plan – consistency is important
- IWL Resources for Monitors
- Helpful EPA map for finding waters to test
- Deltares app for recording nitrate data
Contact information:
- Kim at Iowa CCI: kim@iowacci.org
- Heather at Izaak Walton League: hwilson@iwla.org
Blog For Iowa 
I appreciate this comment and will be providing feedback to the DNR. Thank you!
However, for future reference, folks, the most effective “feedback on Iowa’s water quality” would be voting an Iowa legislator out of office specifically because of bad water votes. As a very experienced Iowa lobbyist told me years ago, the necessary effective elements would be for an incumbent Iowa legislator to be tossed out of office because of bad water votes, and for the entire Legislature to understand that voter anger caused by bad water votes is THE reason why that legislator lost the election.
It’s very hard to imagine that happening in Iowa. And that in itself is a big reason why Iowa’s water has been so awful for so long.
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