Locally-led watershed projects are vitally important to improving and maintaining the health of Illinois’ rivers, lakes, and streams. The groups and/or agencies working in Illinois watersheds need to be able to identify water quality concerns and solutions, and communicate them in a meaningful way to decision makers. This is an important aspect of building public support. To address this need, we held a hands-on workshop where participants pulled together data and on-line tools and customized them to their watershed. Participants received useful materials to apply to their watershed work.
TOPICS AND PRESENTERS:
In northern Illinois (Chicago), two groups participated in the workshop – those interested in technical skill-building, and those interested in outreach topics. In central Illinois (Champaign), there was only interest in the technical content, although a shortened outreach section was presented over the lunch break. U.S. EPA presented the technical modules of this workshop. Save the Dunes, from Indiana, and PRN presented the outreach components.
View AGENDA and PRESENTER BIOGRAPHIES for CHICAGO
View AGENDA and PRESENTER BIOGRAPHIES for CHAMPAIGN
View TOPICS, ATTENDANCE, OUTCOMES, AND PARTICIPANT FEEDBACK
PRESENTATIONS:
Understand Your Watershed Through Data & Maps (pdf – 864 kb)
Putting the Pieces Together (pdf – 2.29 mb)
Modifying Radio PSAs (pdf – 892 kb)
Websites Made Easy – Template for Watersheds (pdf – 739 kb)
TUTORIALS:
Mapping Your Watershed – Vermilion River (pdf – 2.0 mb)
STORET Tutorial – Des Plaines Watershed.doc (pdf – 552 kb)
STORET Tutorial – Vermilion Watershed (pdf – 453 kb)
Modifying PSAs Using Audacity (pdf – 295 kb)
Converting EXCEL Storet File to D2M Friendly Format (pdf – 100 kb)
HANDOUTS:
Watershed Worksheet – guides you to identify your watershed and its health/quality
Goals, Terms, and Ideas – defines waterbody, riparian, and upland zones; stream order diagram
Steps in the Watershed Process & Characterizing the Watershed
Table of Websites for Mapping Data & Tools (pdf – 116 kb)
List of Websites for Data in KML and Mapping Tools (pdf – 82.5 kb)
Google Earth cheat sheet (pdf – 165 kb)
WORKSHOP MANUALS:
U.S. EPA’s Data2Maps (D2M) User Manual – July 2009 (pdf – 2.37 mb)
Prairie Rivers Network’s Tools for Protecting Your River (pdf – 3.27 mb)
U.S. EPA’s Getting In Step: A Guide for Conducting Watershed Outreach Campaigns (pdf – 3.69 mb)
This workshop, hosted by Prairie Rivers Network and the Illinois Lake Management Association, was part of a series of workshops designed to increase Illinois watershed groups’ capacity to protect and improve their local water resources. Watershed Capacity Building Workshops were funded through an IEPA and U.S. EPA CWA 319 grant.
