Stakeholders involved with the Mississippi River St. Cloud Watershed Project met at Clearwater Twp. Hall to let people know about water quality in their area and get feedback from the public last Thursday. A few dozen people attended the open house and had a chance to speak with representatives from the MPCA, DNR and other members of local government about their water quality concerns. Last year, the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA) added 511 bodies of water to its Impaired Waters list, bringing the total to 3,638 in Minnesota. Under the federal Clean Water Act, states are required to monitor their waters to determine if they meet water quality standards. Waters that don’t meet their designated uses because of water quality standard violations are impaired. States are then required to develop a list of impaired waters that require Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) studies, and to submit an updated list to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency every even-numbered year for approval. Tiffany Determan, watershed coordinator at Sherburne Soil & Water Conservation District, says the open house was one of a number of meetings taking place in different watersheds. “This is happening all across the state of Minnesota,” she said. “We have public meetings about once a year to get information out and get people involved to make the watershed they live in a better place.” The Mississippi River-St. Cloud Watershed covers all or part of Sherburne, Benton, Wright, Stearns, Mille Lacs and Morrison counties and small a slice of Meeker County. The Mississippi River-St. Cloud Watershed Project is a combined effort of agencies to develop a plan to look at current water quality and work with local governments to coordinate efforts and try to identify where and how bodies of water can be protected. There were displays at the open house showing maps of the watershed, where the impaired bodies of water were, and areas that have the highest potential to contribute to nutrient loading in lakes and streams. The MPCA had samples of biological life they collected in streams to determine if it was the type of life they would expect to see in a healthy stream. Determan says most people attending the open house were worried about lake pollution in their area. “A lot of people live on lakes, and their biggest concern is ‘what’s wrong with my lake and how can we fix it,’” she says. “Runoff from land next to waters is the biggest concern.” That’s the goal of the Mississippi River St. Cloud Watershed Project - to identify existing problems, potential problems and offer solutions. The project, called the Watershed Restoration and Protection Plan, will be completed by June, 2014. Then, local agencies can use the information to apply for grants. Determan says funding is limited. But identifying specific practices that should be done will help. “Showing why you need money is a big factor in getting grants,” she says. “We’re one of the first watersheds going through this process. We’ve been active, and being first, we hope that’s going to help us.”