19. OUTREACH PROGRAM
Overview
Communities should develop a comprehensive outreach program to educate residents and businesses about the full range of water wise behaviors. These include a wide range of practices that affect watershed health in the community, such as residential and commercial water conservation and reuse, LID and stormwater management on private property, septic system maintenance, environmentally friendly lawn care, and proper disposal of household hazardous waste. Communities should use social marketing techniques to identify the barriers and motivations for behavior change and target their outreach programs to these points of leverage.
One crucial way that communities can inform residents is via up-to-date and well-designed websites. Websites should provide links to relevant bylaws and regulations, and should highlight drought conditions that trigger more stringent water conservation requirements in a timely manner. Cities and towns should regularly publicize relevant bylaws through local news media, postings at schools and other prominent locations, and mailings to residents. Communities should also ensure that all LID demonstration projects and habitat restoration projects are well-publicized and include adequate signage, as appropriate, to explain their environmental benefits. One way to raise public awareness of vital natural resource areas is to place signs in key locations. For example, rivers and streams can be labeled at road crossings and storm drains can be stenciled (“this drain leads to the Ipswich River”) to discourage dumping that pollutes rivers and streams. Finally, communities can offer targeted outreach and extension programs to help property owners undertake environmentally friendly lawn care and landscaping, water audits, and other water wise actions.
Local Examples
Communities in the Ipswich River watershed have undertaken a variety of outreach and education efforts, but no community has a comprehensive outreach strategy at present. Several towns, such as Reading and Danvers provide links to residents seeking water audits and rebates, and others, such as Ipswich and Middleton, have made efforts to publicize water emergencies through press releases and web links. Many communities, including Wilmington, North Reading, Reading, Topsfield, and Ipswich, are involved in LID and water conservation demonstration projects under an EPA Targeted Watershed Grant. These project provide a unique opportunity to educate residents about a variety of techniques, ranging from rainwater harvesting to green roofs.
Given the impact of outdoor irrigation on summer streamflows, outreach programs focused on water wise landscaping are particularly important. Greenscapes North Shore is a collaborative outreach program sponsored by the Eight Towns and the Bay Committee, Ipswich River Watershed Association, Massachusetts Bays Estuary Association, and Salem Sound Coastwatch, and nineteen cities and towns on the North Shore. The program provides comprehensive outreach and technical assistance on environmentally friendly lawn care, including workshops, demonstration projects, reference guides and newsletters, educational mailings, discounts, and private consultations. Greenscapes program materials highlight the money-saving and time-saving benefits of green landscaping, as well as the environmental benefits.
Local groups can assist municipal governments in public outreach and education. For example, the Reading/North Reading Stream Team has partnered with the town of Reading to offer rebates on rain barrels. The Middleton Stream Team has placed signs on bridges identifying the Ipswich River and several tributary brooks. Elsewhere in Massachusetts, the SuAsCo Community Watershed Council has created a Stormwater Community Assistance Program (SWCAP) to provide outreach materials to municipalities to address two of the six minimum control measures under the Stormwater Phase II Regulations, Public Education & Outreach and Public Participation & Involvement.
Resources
Aceti and Associates, Barrier/Motivation Inventories (html)
Greenscapes Program (html)
SuAsCo Community Watershed Council, Stormwater Community Assistance Program (html)
Water Wise Communities: Index
- Introduction & Using the Handbook
- How Development Affects Water (link to IRWA site)
- Checklist: Is Your Community Water Wise?
- Water Wise Tools:
