Projects

To support the measurement of methyl mercury contamination in the Quinnipiac River and the Oysters in New Haven Harbor. The study will evaluate the extent of methylmercury pollution and  help to identify sources and hotspots.

To support the work of the Freedom Lawn Campaign to educate users of 'traditional'  chemical lawn care about the harmful environmental and health effects of pesticides and fertilizers, and encourage a switch to organic lawn care methods that are safe for the natural environment and people.

To support the grassroots organization identified in the Quinnipac Watershed Action Plan and continue to organize volunteers toward implementaing the plan's actions.  To harness the combined efforts of a large pool of citizen volunteers, clubs, civic roups, shcools and businesses, which hav eparticipated at least one year in a QRWA river activity.  To use our conservation, recreation and education events and programs to increase our volunteer ranks.  To continue to train and guide these volunteers toward reducing the point source and nonpoint source pollution that enters our waterways.  These volunteers will educate landowners and builders whose activities have a direct impact on water quality and habitat health in tributaries and main rivers.

To measure contamination along the Quinnipiac River and in oysters of the New Haven Harbor and evaluate the extent of mercury pollution and  identify sources and hotspots.

To support the annual monitoring, education, advocacy, public access and restoration activities as well as expanding grassroots organizing to continue with clean up activities in the Quinnipiac Rive Watershed Action Plan.

To fund the protection of the Heminway Creek, a tributary of the Quinnipiac River through the purchase of wetlands.

To continue monitoring vegetation change and mudflat development in the Quinnipiac River brackish marshes, and begin to test hypothesized causes for the observed wetland loss.  To complete a nitrogen and trace metal analyses and begin to assess how marsh loss has affected the load of pollutants to the river.

To offer a short course in river processes to local environmental activist and municipal officials.  The course will cover the basic hydrologic, geomorphic, chemical and biological processes that govern stream ecosystems and how they are perturbed by human activities. Participants will receive the scientific tools that they need in order to understand and critically evaluate environmental data on the Quinnipiac River.

To educate New Haven's youth about the natural and social systems that affect the Quinnipiac River.  To design and execute a community service action project that addresses an issue for youth to identify and teach what they have learned and accomplished to others; thereby building a constituency of urban advocates for the Quinnipiac River.  This project is called Kids Explore!, Kids Do!, Kids Teach!

To educate the community about the effects of pollution, to increase access to the Quinnipiac River, to empower the residents to right environmental wrongs and to enhance appreciation for parkland and its preservation.