For immediate release: 10/25/06

GRDA Hosts Four-State Watershed Meeting

Vinita — The Grand River Dam Authority played host to the Four-State Grand Lake Extension and Research Meeting on October 13, at GRDA headquarters in Vinita.

Charged with a mission “to identify synergies that might be tapped or developed for our watershed projects relating to Grand Lake and Grand Lake tributaries” meeting participants included university and resource agency representatives from Oklahoma, Kansas, Missouri and Arkansas.

“The goal of this first meeting was really to see how we could all work together to benefit Grand Lake and its tributaries,” said GRDA Ecosystems Management Superintendent Dr. Darrell Townsend. “Each state had the opportunity to update the others on the work they are doing and the work each feels we can do together.”

Watershed planning and assessment, pollution control, storm water issues and water monitoring were among the topics discussed by participants from Kansas State University, Oklahoma State University, the University of Arkansas, the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality, Oklahoma Conservation Commission and other partners, including county extension offices in the lake area.

“The relationships we're developing with these agencies can only benefit our efforts to be good stewards of the natural resources under our control,” said GRDA Chief Executive Officer Kevin Easley, “and we appreciate the opportunity to work with them.”

According to Townsend, the Grand River watershed consists of nearly 12,000 square miles of runoff through parts of Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma, and other tributaries from Arkansas also feed into Grand Lake. “So any time agencies from these states can sit down together and discuss common issues we think it can lead to long-term ecological benefits for the Grand Lake Watershed,” he said.

While the majority of the Grand Lake watershed lies in Kansas, Townsend added that the majority of people residing in the watershed live in Missouri. “It is easy to see why multi-state cooperation is important for Grand Lake,” he said.

This meeting comes after a similar event in June. That one was the 2006 Kansas Field Conference for the tri-state region, hosted in part by GRDA. At that gathering, Townsend served as a presenter, giving participants an overview of GRDA Ecosystems efforts. Also in late June, GRDA hosted a soil profiling workshop intended for professionals responsible for installing or inspecting waste water treatment facilities around Grand Lake. It was all part of a cooperative effort between GRDA, Oklahoma State University and the Oklahoma Conservation Commission, said Townsend, adding that Dr. Brian Carter, a professor of Soil Morphology at OSU, led the workshop.

“All these agencies involved in these multi state meetings have common goals,” said Townsend, “and they are taking the initiative to work together and bring to the table as much information and expertise as possible.”

Rock Creek Aquatic Plants: Aquatic plants like these in the cages (bulrush and water willow), are part of an ongoing cooperative effort between GRDA, the Oklahoma Water Resources Board and the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation to enhance the shoreline on Grand and Hudson lakes. The plants pictured were among those planted in the Rock Creek arm of Lake Hudson earlier this year. This aquatic plant cooperative effort is one example of how various agencies are working together to benefit the natural resources of the Grand River system.

Dr Townsend at Conservation Day: Dr. Darrell Townsend, Ecosystems Management Superintendent for the Grand River Dam Authority, answers questions about the Grand River system's ecosystem, posed by students during a recent Craig County Conservation Day. Taking part in such events, and establishing new programs like A Grand Project (tree planting initiative) are some of the ways GRDA is trying to educate the next generation about the importance of ecosystem and ecological preservation. The agency has also established beneficial, cooperative relationships with other resource agencies in the four-state region.