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Linking Water Quality to
Community Sustainability
Lincoln Creek is a nine-mile
stream which flows east through Milwaukee to its confluence
with the Milwaukee River in Lincoln Park. The Lincoln
Creek watershed covers approximately 20 square miles.
The Lincoln Creek Stewardship Project has these goals:
- Link stewardship of Lincoln
Creek to the community’s goals for sustainability.
- Expand the community’s
capacity to improve environmental quality.
- Integrate environmental management
goals with other community development activities.
- Ensure citizen access to
relevant information and its most effective use.
Currently, through the Lincoln
Creek Environmental Restoration and Flood Control
Project of the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewer District
(MMSD), Lincoln Creek is becoming a stream which, meanders
here and there, not into someone’s basement,
but into floodplain areas. While these areas comprise
a small, a very small piece, of the floodplain that
Lincoln Creek once meandered through, they illustrate
the positive role land can have in determining stream
flow and volume.
MMSD intends to heighten the
value of this ecosystem initiative through citizen
education and stewardship. MMSD contracted with the
Urban Open Space Foundation to help form and
facilitate a Lincoln Creek Stewardship Council.
The Council’s mission is to promote and facilitate
citizen action, expand citizen capacity to positively
impact water quality, and advance a community-based
stewardship agenda. Members of the Lincoln Creek
Stewardship Council include staff from environmental
non-profits, educational institutions, neighborhood
associations, MMSD, and community residents.
The Council’s has
drafted a Lincoln Creek Stewardship Plan. The
Plan outlines what has to be done, who can do it,
and what skills, knowledge and resources are needed
to get it done. There are specific opportunities for
citizen, civic group and school participation. Currently
the Council is planing a Lincoln Creek Open House
to heighten citizen awareness, provide important and
useful information and identify youth and adults who
want to increase Lincoln Creek’s benefits in
their community.
As Lincoln Creek is further enhanced through citizen
effort, watershed residents will see how an environmental
asset has economic and social value, and how it can
motivate residents to invest in their neighborhood
in multiple ways.
Contact: Geri Weinstein-Breunig:
gwbcw@chorus.net
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