Deadline for submissions: May 1, 2012
Send submissions, questions to Celia Haven at havenc@nwf.org

Download the 2012 HOW Conference Presentation/Field Trip REQUEST FOR PROPOSALS

Download the 2012 HOW Conference Presentation APPLICATION

Download the 2012 HOW Conference Field Trip APPLICATION
Each year the Coalition’s Great Lakes Restoration Conference brings together a diverse group of more than 350 people from throughout the Great Lakes region. The conference provides a 3-day forum for participants to learn about important Great Lakes restoration issues. In 2012, the Coalition is holding its conference in collaboration with other state, federal and advocacy partners as part of Great Lakes Week.

The Coalition is looking for engaging and compelling proposals in two categories:

1. Field Trips: The Cleveland and Lake Erie Connection

The Coalition is seeking fun, educational, inspiring and creative proposals for field trips in the greater Cleveland area to highlight restoration success stories; environmental challenges; and cultural landmarks.

2. Presentations on Great Lakes Restoration Issue Areas

The HOW Coalition is seeking innovative and creative proposals for presentations at the conference under the following categories:

A) Restoration success – Chronicling Restoration Projects that Deliver Results

A discussion of restoration success stories funded through the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative or other state or federal funding sources. This category can also include projects that delve in to the economic benefit of restoration projects.

B) National Great Lakes Policy Issues – beyond the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative

An examination of critical policy issues outside of the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative that impact the Lakes. Category could include issues around Asian carp, aging infrastructure, environmental justice, agriculture conservation programs, and the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.

C) Grassroots Action that makes a Difference

A look at the compelling stories and strategies used to help win local, state, regional or national conservation victories. Groups with a focus on grassroots action specific to Lake Erie are especially encouraged to apply.

D) Science and the State of the Great Lakes

Explore cutting edge research on existing or emerging threats to the Great Lakes—and what solutions are needed. Particular attention will be given to applications with a focus on Lake Erie.

Deadline for submissions: May 1, 2012
Send submissions, questions to Celia Haven at havenc@nwf.org

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Great Lakes Restoration Initiative cleanup spot on the Rouge River in SW Detroit. | Photo by Rebecca Hammond

Great Lakes advocate, Rebecca Hammond, collected her favorite quotes heard at the Great Lakes Restoration Conference and around the Great Lakes events. Her blog is also posted on the Sierra Club Great Lakes blog.

“For Native people, caring for the water is not merely a matter of practicality.” Frank Ettawageshik, Native Leader. “We lived as human beings on this earth for thousands of years without relying on oil. We can live without gold. But we cannot live without water.”

“We know that prevention is far more cost-effective than dealing with the damage that has already been done.” Lisa P. Jackson, EPA Administrator

“You want energy to be close to where the people are. Most of the population is around the coastal areas. The wind is close to where the people are.” Victoria Pebbles, Great Lakes Commission, speaking on offshore wind potential.

“We have a lot in common with Detroit. Polluted water, high cancer rates. We can relate to you. I can go home and say, ‘I saw what happened in Detroit.’ ” Commenter from Youngstown, Ohio

“Asian Carp would cause irreparable damage to the Great Lakes. We live and breathe the Great Lakes in Michigan.” Brandon Fewins, Regional Director for Senator Debbie Stabenow

One of Detroit's now-famous urban gardens, this one right downtown. | Photo by Rebecca Hammond

“We need to engage every homeowner and get them involved. If we do that, they feel they’re part of the solution. When they read an article about [Lake Erie's] western basin, they’re more likely to get involved.” Chris Wible, Scotts Miracle Gro, who also said, “When you gather grass clippings, you’re ‘harvesting’ it. Instead, recycle it.”

“There is no greater manifestation of life than the Great Lakes.” Chris Brown, CEO, City of Detroit

“There are different levels you must find your way in. You can’t stay in your house anymore.” Maureen Taylor, Michigan Welfare Rights Commission

“The best story wins.”

“The Great Lakes are truly a winning issue, like Mom and Apple Pie.”

“If you invest in Great Lakes restoration, you’re going to get something out of it.” HOW Coalition Meeting

“Everyone needs to realize that this [online tool use] is the way people now expect to be communicated with.” Daniel Katz, Virilion

“People love the internet for fun things. Give them fun things.” and “This is just a new way of doing old business.” Jennifer Janssen, NWF, in a session she presented on Using Online Tools for Effective Organizing.

“The very nature of academia restricts the ability to do these studies.” Jason Palagi of NIMRI, speaking of the difficulties in following up on restoration projects.

Illegal dumping continues in parts of SW Detroit. | Photo by Rebecca Hammond

“We shouldn’t be in crisis management. We spend a ton of money fixing things.”

“Follow the precautionary principle. Don’t allow restoration to become crisis management.” Various comments.

“We need to put people first. We need to have a proactive approach.” Roshani Dantas, Policy Analyst/Green Initiatives, Green Task Force

“If you don’t love people, you can’t serve people.” Heaster Wheeler, Asst. CEO, City of Detroit

“THE DAY YOU DON’T CALL IS THE DAY A CALL DIDN’T COME IN. THE DAY YOU DIDN’T SHOW UP IS THE DAY NO ONE SHOWED UP.” Millie Hall, Coalition of Labor Union Women

“I feel like I can die because the struggle will go on.” Millie Hall, speaking of the involvement of young people.

“We have to be as direct in our rhetoric as what comes at us.” Simone Lightfoot, NWF

“Clean water for the Great Lakes starts upstream.”

“We can’t keep putting BandAids on 19th century technology.”

“Maybe Great Lakes Week is not enough. Maybe we should be in Washington, DC, demanding the stopping of the tarsands pipeline.”

“The goal for everything we do should be to avoid the need for cleanup.”

“We have to clear up who is ‘we’ . These really are societal decisions.” Various commenters.

“Our connectedness has been broken in our human relations, and so has it been broken with water.” Lila Cabbil, People’s Water Board, Detroi

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ITEM I: If you weren’t able to make it to the 2011 Great Lakes Restoration Conference in Detroit you can check out much of what went down by visiting http://conference.healthylakes.org/.

On the Web site you’ll find blog posts from the conference, presentations and photos. Sadly, you won’t find are reports on the numerous extracurricular activities. Conference participants checked out some of Detroit’s fines restaurants and casinos. A few of the sports fans in our ranks attended the Detroit Tigers playoff against the Texas Rangers; others took in a Detroit Red Wings game.

Who said conferences were dull? Not in the Motor City.

The 2012 conference, in Cleveland, also promises to be a dandy.

•••

ITEM II: A new study conducted for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Foundation concluded that natural resources programs and outdoor activities generate a whopping $1.06 TRILLION annually in economic activity.

This is a terrific report with compelling data that conservation groups can use to demonstrate the value of natural resources, recreation programs and historic preservation activities.

The study found that outdoor recreation activities, natural resources conservation and historic preservation programs in the United States employ 8.4 million people, generate $100 billion annually in local, state and federal tax revenue.

It also found that outdoor recreation sales (gear and trips combined) of $325 billion per year are greater than annual returns from pharmaceutical and medicine manufacturing ($162 billion), legal services ($253 billion), and power generation and supply ($283 billion).

The report is national in scope but it has much information that is relevant to the Great Lakes region. It can be found here:http://bit.ly/vYZW2x.

•••

ITEM III: The loss of wetlands in the U.S. has slowed in recent years, according to a new Fish and Wildlife Service report.

The report, “Status and Trends of Wetlands in the Contiguous United States 2004-2009,” found that the nation had a net loss of 62,300 acres of wetlands between 2004 and 2009.

There are now just over 110 million acres in the continental United States. The report, along with the press release and science behind the report, can be found at: http://www.fws.gov/wetlands/StatusAndTrends2009/

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The report, “Water Works: Rebuilding Infrastructure, Creating Jobs and Greening the Environment,” was produced by American Rivers, Green For All and the Economic Policy Institute,

It explored the economic benefits of investing $188.4 billion in water infrastructure. That’s the how much it would cost to properly manage stormwater to preserve water quality, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

An investment of that magnitude would inject a quarter of a trillion dollars into the economy, create nearly 1.3 million direct and indirect jobs and result in 568,000 additional jobs from increased spending, according to the report.

Investing in stormwater management programs would also clean up the nation’s waters.

Every year, 860 billion gallons of raw and partially treated sewage spills into our waterways – enough to cover the entire state of Pennsylvania with an inch of sewage. Cities discharge about 40 billion gallons of raw and partially treated sewage is discharged into the Great Lakes annually. Yuck.

The report is further proof that investing in green infrastructure would create much-needed jobs, stimulate the economy and improve water quality.

American Rivers, Green For All, and the Economic Policy Institute have set up a petition where individuals can show their support for improving the nation’s water infrastructure.

If the groups get 25,000 signatures, White House staff will review the report, ensure it is sent to the appropriate policy experts and issue an official response.

You can read the report here.

You can also sign the petition.

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ITEM I: If you weren’t able to make it to the 2011 Great Lakes Restoration Conference in Detroit you can check out much of what went down by visiting http://conference.healthylakes.org/.

On the Web site you’ll find blog posts from the conference, presentations and photos. Sadly, you won’t find are reports on the numerous extracurricular activities. Conference participants checked out some of Detroit’s fines restaurants and casinos. A few of the sports fans in our ranks attended the Detroit Tigers playoff against the Texas Rangers; others took in a Detroit Red Wings game.

Who said conferences were dull? Not in the Motor City.

The 2012 conference, in Cleveland, also promises to be a dandy.

•••

ITEM II: A new study conducted for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Foundation concluded that natural resources programs and outdoor activities generate a whopping $1.06 TRILLION annually in economic activity.

This is a terrific report with compelling data that conservation groups can use to demonstrate the value of natural resources, recreation programs and historic preservation activities.

The study found that outdoor recreation activities, natural resources conservation and historic preservation programs in the United States employ 8.4 million people, generate $100 billion annually in local, state and federal tax revenue.

It also found that outdoor recreation sales (gear and trips combined) of $325 billion per year are greater than annual returns from pharmaceutical and medicine manufacturing ($162 billion), legal services ($253 billion), and power generation and supply ($283 billion).

The report is national in scope but it has much information that is relevant to the Great Lakes region. It can be found here: http://bit.ly/vYZW2x.

•••

ITEM III: The loss of wetlands in the U.S. has slowed in recent years, according to a new Fish and Wildlife Service report.

The report, “Status and Trends of Wetlands in the Contiguous United States 2004-2009,” found that the nation had a net loss of 62,300 acres of wetlands between 2004 and 2009.

There are now just over 110 million acres in the continental United States. The report, along with the press release and science behind the report, can be found here:http://www.fws.gov/wetlands/StatusAndTrends2009/
 

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Many people feel strong connections to Great Lakes beaches – and why wouldn’t they? That’s where most interact with the lakes – they swim, hike, and relax on beaches – and there’s nothing like a sunset or sunrise viewed from a the edge of a Great Lake.

Despite the majesty of the Great Lakes, some communities don’t have these positive experiences with Great Lakes beaches. Many beaches are polluted by sewage overflows, nuisance species, waterfowl droppings, and litter. Luckily, there are groups throughout the region that are working to clean up these beaches and give safe beach access back to the communities who deserve them.

Alliance for the Great Lakes

The Alliance for the Great Lakes Adopt-a-Beach Program creates a year-round opportunity for families, businesses, schools, and other groups (and of course individuals as well) to conduct beach health and litter monitoring on Great Lakes beaches. As part of the beach cleanup process, volunteers catalog the litter they find in an attempt to learn the sources of pollution. All information is entered into a robust online system to monitor the data.

Under the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, the Adopt-a-Beach Program is focusing on three areas: Wisconsin’s Milwaukee Estuary, Ohio’s Cuyahoga River area, and Michigan’s Saginaw Bay.

The Watershed Center of Grand Traverse Bay

The Watershed Center of Grand Traverse Bay has implemented a few innovative programs to improve the quality of the Bay’s Lake Michigan beaches. The Center produced a series of public service announcements encouraging people to take action to improve local beach conditions – for example, to reduce E. coli levels by feeding waterfowl less. The Center performed a detailed sanitary survey in order to find leaks that were letting untreated sewage into the lakes – they even brought in dogs that could detect whether there was a sanitary sewer leak upstream from a given point!

City of Kenosha, Wisconsin

The City of Kenosha is taking steps to improve beach quality for its residents. Stormwater is a big problem at Pennoyer Beach in Kenosha, so the city is planning to create a stormwater infiltration basin, filled with native plants and grasses, that will hold stormwater in one place and allow it to infiltrate slowly, preventing erosion and reducing pollution on the beach and in Lake Michigan. The city hopes that this infiltration basin will also alter the landscape enough to discourage seagulls from swarming the beach, eliminating a major source of bacterial pollution for residents. Furthermore, the city is working on stormwater management through green infrastructure in order to reduce stress on the city’s beaches.

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John Goss said crews working on the Chicago Waterway System have beat back the invasive fish, which were imported to commercial fish farms in Arkansas in the 1960s and have since spread into the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers and the Chicago Waterway System.

“The carp front is still 80-100 miles below the barrier and has not advanced in the past year,” Goss said.

He said electric barriers in the Chicago Waterway System, about 30 miles south of Chicago, are now pumping enough voltage into the water to prevent any fish from swimming through.

“The barrier is effective,” Goss said.

Conservation groups and some scientists have said the discovery of Asian carp DNA in waters connected to Lake Michigan suggests Asian carp may have already breached the electric barrier.

Goss said the fact that no live Asian carp were been found beyond the barrier in 2011 is cause for optimism. “It gives us increasing confidence that we have more time to work on the long-term solution,” Goss said.

Asian carp — which hog fish food, breed like mosquitoes and leap out of the water when disturbed by boats — could decimate the $7 billion Great Lakes fishery and pose potentially lethal threats to boaters.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is studying how best to keep Asian carp in the Mississippi River basin from invading the Great Lakes. Although the Corps study won’t be completed until at least 2015, Goss said the federal government is committed to creating an ecological separation between the  two basins.

In January 2012, the Great Lakes Commission will release the results of a privately funded study exploring how to create an ecological separation between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi River basin.

Tim Eder, executive director of the Great Lakes Commission, said the coalition of Great Lakes governors wants more Asian carp barriers installed in the Chicago Waterway System by 2017. He said quick action is needed to keep the invasive fish from colonizing Lake Michigan and spreading to the other Great Lakes.

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Karen Chapman, Great lakes Regional Director of the Environmental Defense Fund and Carrie Vollmer-Sanders, Western Lake Erie Basin Project Director at the Nature Conservancy led a session entitled “It’s the Hydrology, Stupid.”

The focus of the session was agricultural impacts to Lake Erie, challenges faced by farmers, and how to work together with multiple partners and using multiple conservation practices to develop large-scale solutions.

The importance of farming is only rising as the population grows and more countries gain wealth and choose to eat meat, which requires more land to grow the feed. There is also a cultural value to farming, as Vollmer-Sanders described. Her family farms in the western Lake Erie watershed, in Ohio.

Yet, the challenges faced by farmers are only increasing.  Vollmer-Sanders described talking to a farmer, who said he does not remember seeing this much rain in the past. Not only is he witnessing the change, he is having to deal with it. You just cannot farm the crops during heavy rains and floods.

As they explained, we have think about multiple practices for the multiple problems effecting Lake Erie. It is not just about reducing nitrogen applications, but looking at how the fertilizers are applied, at the soil, and at the waterways. System wide problem need system wide solutions.

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Over the past decade, those counties have reduce the amount of untreated sewage flowing into lakes and streams by 599 million gallons annually, according to Annette DeMaria, an environmental consultant for Clinton Township, in suburban Detroit.

“That’s pretty cool,” DeMaria said.

Illicit sewer connections are those where sanitary sewage from homes or businesses is discharged into a stormwater pipe, which transports the untreated sewage into lakes and rivers when following rain showers. The situation can cause bacterial pollution in surface waters and on beaches.

Five counties in metropolitan Detroit inspected 24,000 storm sewer outlets. Officials disconnected 4,500 illicit sewer connections, and connected those homes to a sanitary sewer.

DeMaria said the work will reduce bacterial pollution at beaches, a problem that has plagued Detroit area beaches.

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“We’re excited about returning to Cleveland,” said Jeff Skelding, director of the Healing Our Waters-Great Lakes Coalition. “Cleveland has been at the center of iconic triumphs and challenges in the effort to restore the Great Lakes—from the comeback of the Cuyahoga River and resurrection of Lake Erie to the proliferation of new threats including invasive species and excessive nutrients. The city offers powerful examples of how restoration programs produce results—and the ongoing work that needs to be done to restore the Lakes before the problems get worse and more costly.”

The 2012 event will mark the second time the coalition has held its annual conference in Cleveland. The event attracts hundreds of conservationists, scientists, elected officials and community leaders. The conference was last held in Cleveland in 2006.

The coalition has not set the dates to the 8th Annual Great Lakes Conference.

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Lead Organization/Person: Alliance for the Great Lakes

Presenters:

• Jamie Cross, Adopt-a-Beach Manager, Alliance for the Great Lakes
• Jill Lis (tentative), Supervisor in the Environmental Public Health Service Area Cuyahoga County Board of Health
• Andy Knott, Executive Director, Watershed Center of Grand Traverse Bay
• Shelley Billingsley, Assistant Engineer, Stormwater Unit and Parks City of Kenosha

• Session Summary: Restoration Successes: Healthy Beaches, Healthy Perceptions

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Lead Organization/Person: Ducks Unlimited

Presenters:

• Moderator:  Marc Smith, National Wildlife Federation
• Gildo Tori, Director of Public Policy, Ducks Unlimited
• Terry Cosby, State Conservationist, Natural Resources Conservation Service
• Vicki Anderson, Great Lakes Coordinator, Natural Resources Conservation Service

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Lead Organization/Person:

Presenters:

• Peter Alexander, Director, Northeast Great Waters Coalition
• Steering Committee Member, America’s Great Waters Coalition
• Josh Saks, Senior Legislative Representative for Water Resources Campaigns, National Wildlife Federation
• Doug Siglin, Executive Director of Chesapeake Bay Foundation

• Session Summary: Partnering with America’s Other Great Waters

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Lead Organization/Person: ECT, Inc

Presenters:

• Annette DeMaria, Senior Engineer, Environmental Consulting Technology, Inc.

• Detroit area communities cracking down on illicit sewer connections
• Session Summary: Reducing Sewage Contamination in Stormwater

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Green Chemistry is the design of chemical products and processes that reduce or eliminate the use and generation of hazardous substances. Dr. Lin Kaatz Charry gave a great presentation on “Green Chemistry 101” and encouraged participants to get involved in the Great Lakes Green Chemistry Network, which holds monthly webinars and is planning a 2012 Great Lakes Green Chemistry Conference in Chicago, IL.

Darrel Gerber from Clean Water Action let us know about some successful efforts on the green chemistry at the state-level in his home state of Minnesota. Notably, 2009 was a big year for advocates in that state, with advocates successfully convincing the legislature there to pass a BPA ban in baby bottles and sippy cups. Additionally, Minnesota passed the Toxic Free Kids Act.

At the federal level, Alexis Bilzman from the Ecology Center and the Michigan Network for Children’s Environmental Health discussed current efforts to update the Toxic Substances Control Act. Senator Lautenberg has introduced the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011 (S. 847) to do just that. He has garnered a number of co-signers on the bill, but so far Senators Stabenow and Levin have not signed-on.

Want to do more to support these Green Chemistry efforts? Contact your U.S. Senators and encourage them to co-sign S. 847, the Safe Chemicals Act of 2011.

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Consider the case of Salaberry-de-Valleyfield, a small Quebec city located on an island in the St. Lawrence River, near Montreal.

The city has turned the discharge from a sewage treatment facility into a whitewater kayak course on the St. Charles River. The river for years was too polluted for public use, but cleaning up the discharge from the city’s sewage treatment facility helped restore the river.

The Charles River now hosts whitewater kayak tournaments that attract paddlers from around the world. Check it out here.

The kayak course is just one of the ways Salaberry-de-Valleyfield has rebuilt its flagging industrial economy by investing in water-based projects, Mayor Denis Lapointe told attendees at the Great Lakes Restoration Conference in Detroit.

Salaberry-de-Valleyfield also invested $6.5 million to re-open an abandoned canal that once flowed into the St. Lawrence River. Reopening the canal has unleashed a prosperous recreational economy; 5,000 boats traverse the canal annually, Lapointe said.

“Over the past 15 years, things have changed, people are smiling and the city has grown up,” Lapointe said.

The canal generates $65 million annually in recreation-related revenue, Lapointe said. The city built on the success of the canal reopening by hosting a series of concerts in which moving images are projected onto giant water screens.

The images from these concerts are amazing. Check it out here, or visit http://www.ohneka.com/.

Salaberry-de-Valleyfield is just one of many Great Lakes cities that are capitalizing on the lakes and rivers in their midst.

The city of Grand Rapids, Michigan, has spent  $320 million to reduce sewer overflows, which plagued the Grand River for more than 50 years.

Eliminating sewer overflows improved water quality in the river and bolstered a salmon and steelhead fishery in the city’s downtown.

Grand Rapids was recently named one of America’s best urban fisheries, thanks in part to investments in cleaning up the city’s sewer system, Mayor George Heartwell said.

The city is now in the process of developing a whitewater kayak course on the Grand River, in the shadows of towering office buildings.

“We’re going to restore the Grand Rapids to the Grand River,” Heartwell said.

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The Refuge has taken a tangle of invasive species and the hardened shoreline of a former industrial site and restored over 454 acres of coastal wetland and riparian habitat. The project would not have gone anywhere without the public and private partnerships that helped create a master plan that both supported community needs and created valuable new habitat. So far, the Refuge has created hundreds of acres of coastal habitat – habitat that would not exist otherwise. Steps to create the Refuge included daylighting a stream (taking it out of an underground culvert and thus allowing access), creating man-made wetlands, and softening shoreline. The Refuge also worked to create a place that the community could enjoy – including a “greenway” and “blueway”: hiking and biking trails on land and boat launches and kayak access on the water. These efforts are enormously significant as the Refuge is located on the last undeveloped mile of shoreline along the Detroit River.

The Refuge has already seen exceptional results from their efforts. After the construction of the Fighting Island Sturgeon Reef, Lake Sturgeon were found in the Detroit River after 40 years of absence. A few years later, researchers found that the Sturgeon were successfully reproducing along the reef, a massive triumph considering the legacy of habitat degradation in and along the river.

The Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge is the only international wildlife refuge in North America. It brought two countries together over a shared resource and fostered partnerships among numerous public and private entities to restore shoreline, create habitat, and improve the community. More information on the Refuge can be found on the Fish and Wildlife Service’s Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge page.

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Here’s a sampling:

“Simply put, the Great Lakes give our region a competitive edge and, to secure a vibrant economy for future generations, we must invest in keeping them clean and healthy.”

He continues:

“In a time of high unemployment, restoration projects like these create well paying jobs ranging from engineers and biologists to carpenters, electricians, and truck drivers.”

It’s great to see a member of the Great Lakes congressional delegation to voice support for results-oriented restoration programs. I’d like to see more do the same.

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The agency also has an extensive monitoring program that collects information and results from its restoration projects on things like water quality, vegetation, wildlife, and the human/social aspects (things like volunteering, new jobs, and personal stories).

These kinds of monitoring programs are critical to show the results of restoration projects. Without continued monitoring, it’s difficult to know if project approaches are working, and it’s hard to learn what aspects we can improve in the future. Furthermore, monitoring efforts show tangible results that demonstrate the effectiveness of current projects and the need for future funding in the Great Lakes. Being able to show local and federal decision-makers what we’re doing in the Great Lakes and how much needs to be done is crucial in supporting funding initiatives like the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative.

Find out more about NOAA in the Great Lakes at the Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory Homepage!

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The Buffalo River is also making a dramatic comeback, thanks to the Buffalo Niagara Riverkeeper, community groups, government agencies and local corporations.

The Buffalo River, like the Cuyahoga River in Ohio and the Rouge River in Detroit, was once so polluted it caught fire.

Today, the Buffalo River is the centerpiece of the city’s downtown revitalization effort. Thirty species of fish now live in parts of the river that were once too contaminated to support any fish and an area of the river referred to in the past as a “repulsive holding pond” is now home to marinas.

The Buffalo River is far cleaner today than it was in the 1960s, but river advocates aren’t stopping there. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will spend $50 million to dredge 1.1 million cubic yards of contaminated sediments from the lower river.

That work is expected to further improve the river’s health and advance efforts to restore some of the luster to the “Queen City.”

Jill Spisiak Jedlicka, Director of Ecological Programs & Buffalo River Remedial Action Plan Coordinator for the Buffalo Niagara RiverKeeper, said the community is rediscovering the river because people are thinking about it differently.

Instead of dismissing the river as a polluted mess, the community has rallied around efforts to restore it. Celebrating the improvements has helped generate more public support and interest in the river, Spisiak Jedlicka said.

That’s good for the river and the city of Buffalo. “The health of a waterway is absolutely linked to the health of a community,” Spisiak Jedlicka said.

The Bills aren’t the only thing making a comeback in Buffalo — the long-maligned Buffalo River is also

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