On May 17, the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), along with Trinity Waters, announced a new water quality initiative to take place in the Trinity River basin. The National Water Quality Initiative is a nationwide program that will provide financial assistance to landowners who implement conservation practices on their land that will benefit water quality.For the Trinity, this initiative will provide $2 million for landowners in the Chambers Creek watershed in Navarro and Ellis counties. This is an important watershed since it flows into the Richland-Chambers Reservoir, which provides water for roughly 1.6 million people in Fort Worth and surrounding communities in Tarrant County through the Tarrant Regional Water District.
The Chambers Creek watershed is the only watershed in Texas to receive funding. Although not impaired at the present time, Chambers Creek has been impaired in the past and is still noted for undesirable levels of turbidity, siltation, dissolved oxygen, and high nutrient levels. Some examples of voluntary practices that landowners can do include but are not limited to using cover crops, riparian buffers, cross fencing for rotational grazing, filter strips and terraces.
Interested landowners should contact the NRCS Field Office in Corsicana for more information about how to sign up.
To learn more, read the news releases from NRCS and the Beaumont Enterprise.