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City administrator heading to New Orleans water conference

By Thomas Nelson, tnelson@charlescitypress.com

Charles City has tried to set an example when it comes to water.

So much so that Charles City Administrator Steven Diers will be heading to the One Water Summit in New Orleans at the end of June.

Diers and Charles City have been on the forefront when it comes to working with watersheds and working toward the Nutrient Reduction Strategy proposed by Iowa Secretary of Agriculture Bill Northey.

“We’re fortunate enough that we’ve got one of the only watershed management authorities in the state, at least one of the first ones,” Diers said. “It’s the Upper Cedar Watershed Management Improvement Authority. That was kind of the genesis of this RCPP project that we got funded a year and a half ago.”

Charles City was a lead applicant for a Resource Conservation Partnership Program grant that gave the city $1.6 million in federal funding to implement water quality and water quantity improvement practices, Diers said.

“It was a highly competitive national grant,” Diers said. “In a large way we were funded because they saw the city as a lead applicant.

“With all these different things happening it apparently caught the attention of some people at the state,” he said. “I was kind of tapped by the Iowa Agriculture Water Alliance or IAWA.”

The IAWA is putting together a delegation to go to the One Water Summit, a conference put on by the U.S. Water Alliance, Diers said.

The groups headed to New Orleans with Diers include farmers, other city officials and scientists. They are going  to learn new ideas, share what they’re doing and learn what other places are doing, Diers said.

“The whole One Water platform is basically wastewater and drinking, it’s all one water,” Diers said. “How do you manage them all as a collective?”

The main way Diers and subsequently Charles City, with the support of Mayor James Erb, has worked to improve water quality is through volunteerism, with incentives for farmers upstream of Charles City in the watershed that lies between Osage and Floyd.

“Its not in Charles City proper, but these are things that we can do that can have a positive impact on the water coming down here and the water quality coming through here,” Diers said.

Charles City is going to have access to sponsored project dollars because the city is building a new wastewater treatment plant.

“When you borrow from the state revolving fund you pay 4 percent interest, or whatever that interest rate is, 1 percent (1 percentage point) of that rate will be dedicated to going toward another project,” Diers said. “They’ll give the money back to you if you do another project.”

The city is going to be paying that money either way, so Charles City can pay the money back to the state as interest or pay to state and they give it back to the city to do another project, Diers said.

The Iowa Soybean Association has partnered with Charles City for projects to help landowners implement best practices. It is looking to partner with Des Moines, Eagle Grove and Charles City.

 

 

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