Stream in a Ditch
Stream in a Ditch Seminar and Tour
Wednesday December 6, 2006, 8:30am-4:00pm.
Dorothy Buell Memorial Visitor Center, Porter, IN
Can ditches be constructed and maintained and water quality protected simultaneously? At Save the Dunes Conservation Fund (SDCF)’s Stream in a Ditch Seminar and Tour over 70 participants from Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan learned about channel design, passive restoration, monitoring, and ditch maintenance techniques that protect water quality. The Stream in a Ditch Seminar and Tour: An Innovative Approach to Drainage Management was held on Wednesday, December 6, 2006 at the Dorothy Buell Memorial Visitor Center in Porter, Indiana. The seminar and tour educated land and drainage managers, surveyors, planners, soil and water conservation districts, watershed practitioners and others on two-stage ditch design properties, engineering, management, maintenance, and water quality benefits.
John Mathews, Program Leader for the Streams and Stormwater Section at the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, Division of Soil and Water Conservation was the primary speaker. Kent Wamsley, Field Representative with The Nature Conservancy presented a case study on the Tippecanoe River two-stage ditch project. The seminar concluded with a tour of local projects, led by Joe Exl, Coastal Nonpoint Coordinator with the Indiana Department of Natural Resources, Lake Michigan Coastal Program.
The Stream in a Ditch Seminar and Tour was brought to Porter County by SDCF with funding from Conservation Technology Information Center (CTIC) and EPA Region 5. Lunch was generously provided by Williams Creek Consulting, DLZ, Incorporated, and Global Land Surveying, Incorporated. Other partners included Indiana Department of Environmental Management, Natural Resources Conservation Service, Indiana Department of Natural Resources – Lake Michigan Coastal Program, Indiana Society of Professional Land Surveyors, Porter County Soil and Water Conservation District, the Town of Porter, and the Porter County Surveyor’s Office.
