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New watershed coordinator introduces himself to Charles City Council

By Kelly Terpstra, kterpstra@charlescitypress.com

Iowa’s soybean and corn fields produce a bountiful harvest every fall that helps feed the nation.

Those same farm plots and high-yield acres can lead to unsafe levels of nitrogen and phosphorus that pour into streams, rivers and groundwater in the state.

That’s a problem Doug Johnson is looking to alleviate.

Johnson was recently hired as a watershed coordinator to oversee the 35,000-acre Charles City watershed. A large portion of his new position will focus on helping implement best management practices to assist farmers and landowners in limiting pesticide runoff.

In addition to improving the water quality at non-point sources, Johnson will also inform the property owners within the watershed about flood reduction strategies.

Johnson introduced himself to the Charles City Council on Monday during a planning workshop. He said there are 110 farm operators and 125 non-farming landowners that reside in the Charles City watershed.

“I want to meet with at least 125 farmers and landowners and give them direct technical assistance as it relates to their operation or farm,” said Johnson.

Johnson was hired by the Floyd County Soil and Water Conservation District. The partnership also includes Charles City, the Iowa Soybean Association, the Iowa Agriculture Water Alliance, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Natural Resources Conservation Service.

The Charles City Watershed Management Plan was created in February 2018. The grants were made possible because of Charles City’s new $18 million  water resource recovery facility that is planned to be built by May 2022. The facility will replace the current 55-year-old wastewater treatment plant.

Charles City recently received $945,000 in grants to help mitigate water issues. Part of that money is through an Iowa Partners in Conservation Grant for $435,000 and is provided by the USDA and the NRCS .

A city-sponsored project program with the Iowa Soybean Association and administered under the Clean Water State Revolving Fund totals $500,000.

“The $500,000 for rural is what we leveraged to get the grant to help hire Doug. I can’t tell you how excited I am to have him on board to help with this. This is going to be great,” said City Administrator Steve Diers.

The $435,000 will be used to pay Johnson’s salary and expenses over roughly a five-year period. Johnson said the funding stream is good through September 2024. He will be housed by the Floyd County Soil and Water Conservation District.

Johnson said he would like to increase cover crop usage up to 10,000 acres. Cover crops are annual crops that are seeded to fill in a gap of live vegetation in between the times corn or soybeans are no longer growing in the fields.

“So you’ve got another few months of living crop out there to help sequester nutrients and make them less available to loss,” Johnson said.

The plan is to install 15 bioreactors or saturated buffers. Those edge-of-the-field practices can be the final network or mechanism to stop nitrogen before it reaches a stream. They are strategically placed on fields to intercept tile water, where it then runs through a biological system that denitrifies a high percentage of the runoff.

Johnson will also work with Diers, City Engineer John Fallis and other city department heads to coordinate on a permeable paving project as well as nine additional urban stormwater management practices that can be undertaken in Charles City.

Johnson said he is planning on holding field days, workshops and community outreach events to educate and inform the public in addition to the farmers and landowners he will be working with.

Also at the meeting Monday evening, Bob Ingram, an EMC insurance agent with Sisson and Associates, presented the city with a dividend check of approximately $54,000. Last year’s check of $71,000 broke a record for payout in Charles City.

“This program has been in existence for over 40-some years and has never failed to pay or provide a dividend,” said Ingram.

The dividend check is part of the Iowa Municipal Utilities Program, according to Ingram, and is designed specifically for cities that EMC insures. Factors such as the size of the city’s premiums, worker’s compensation, compensation modification and claims history can all dictate how much money is paid back to each of the cities participating in the insurance pool.

“It’s everybody that’s in the group. It’s not just the city of Charles City. It’s everybody who is a member of the Utilities Association. So there isn’t anyway that you can say, ‘OK, can we increase premiums to get more dividends.’ The dividend is set. It’s based on experience for package and worker’s compensation,” said Ingram.

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