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Eugene Water & Electric Board Receives Grant

Posted on: Sunday, 23 April 2006, 18:00 CDT

By The Register-Guard, Eugene, Ore.

Apr. 20--The Eugene Water & Electric Board and the East Lane Soil and Water Conservation District are among the first recipients of grants issued by the newly established Oregon Governor's Fund for the Environment.

In all, $346,000 will be doled out to nine agencies statewide to help restore streams, reduce pollution and do environmental cleanup. A total of 34 agencies applied for the grants, which range from $16,000 to $50,000. The agencies have pledged to contribute another $461,364 in cash or in-kind matches.

EWEB will receive $40,220 for a project designed to remove obsolete agricultural chemicals from the McKenzie and Middle Fork Willamette rivers.

Many landowners don't know how or don't have the resources to dispose of farm wastes. The project will include education for growers, a chemical volume survey, and collection and disposal of chemicals. Growers' participation, and the quantity and types of waste collected, will be documented.

EWEB's share of the local match will be about $24,000 in cash and in-kind assistance. The Springfield Utility Board will kick in $10,000, and Lane County Waste Management will provide in-kind services of $10,000. Other partners in the project are the OSU Extension Service, the Oregon Health Division, the state Department of Environmental Quality, McKenzie Fire & Rescue, Mohawk Valley Fire, Springfield Fire & Life Safety, the East Lane Soil and Water Conservation District and the Region 2 HazMat team.

The conservation district, meanwhile, will receive a $20,000 grant to pay for a technician to do outreach and restoration planning for the replanting of native species along a 1.8-mile stretch of the Mohawk River. The area has been treated for Japanese knotwood, an invasive plant.

The project includes a local mailing and annual workshop about riparian restoration in the Mohawk watershed. Matching funds of $36,125 will accompany the grant.

The new statewide fund was established to provide a sustainable source of money for local cleanup efforts. The governor's office, the National Fish & Wildlife Foundation and the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service administer the fund.

The fund uses the state's share of fines derived from polluters prosecuted in part by the Oregon division of the U.S. Attorney's Office.

An initial contribution of $2 million in community service payments resulted from the criminal prosecution of Evergreen International, a Panamanian shipping company that plead guilty to 25 environmental crimes and paid $25 million in fines -- the largest criminal fine ever imposed on a defendant in a vessel pollution case.

Five of the crimes occurred in Oregon.

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To see more of The Register-Guard, Eugene, Ore., or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.registerguard.com.

Copyright (c) 2006, The Register-Guard, Eugene, Ore.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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Source: The Register Guard

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