Location: Lake Carmi in Franklin County, Vermont
Problem: Dangerously high phosphorus concentration
Solution: septic maintenance and outreach, shoreline management and repair, stream and lakeside bank erosion, agricultural phosphorus reduction and management
RCAP Solutions, Inc. has been working with the Franklin community and others in the region to protect and enhance Vermont’s natural water quality. This award-winning project stands out as a model toinspire allVermonters to find innovative approaches to conserve natural resources, safeguard human and environmental health, and pro-actively prevent pollution.
Franklin is a very small agrarian community in the north end of Franklin County on the Canadian border with an estimated population of 1,268. Lake Carmi has experienced high phosphorus concentrations, causing water quality troubles for several decades. Late summer algae, reduced water clarity, and heavy aquatic plant growth persist, which has resulted in the State of Vermont Agency of Natural Resources, Water Quality Division issuing a Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) for the lake. This total amount identifies the phosphorus which can enter the lake without causing water quality problems as part of section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act. In this case, it is the result of considering a very delicate balance between plant growth and water quality, and the State has provided guidelines as to how much the load needs to be reduced.
In this community, concerned residents mobilized to form the Franklin Watershed Committee to work to reduce the phosphorus and improve their lake. RCAP Solutions has provided technical assistance to the committee, assisting them in resolving their watershed management needs system. One of RCAP’s major contributions to the effort has been the design of a door-to-door sanitary, interest and attitude survey of lakeside residents. This ongoing survey is will serve as an educational tool to provide further information about onsite wastewater disposal and shoreline erosion in an effort to prepare the community to take further steps in protecting their lake.
RCAP Solutions staff also began the process of working with a very capable committee in an effort to create a watershed management plan for Lake Carmi. Since this body of water is the headwater for some of Missisquoi Bay in Lake Champlain, the plan will also serve the greater watershed. Community members are in the process of surveying the residents and collecting data about the community while learning more about the potential solutions which may be employed in the future.
In May of 2010, the Governor of Vermont informed the Franklin Watershed Committee that a panel of judges selected its Lake Carmi Phosphorus Reduction Project for recognition in this year's Governor's Award for EnvironmentalExcellence & Pollution Prevention. The project was chosen for demonstrating progress towards protecting this troubled watershed with increased education and training, community consensus building, and buy in from the community to sustain the watershed.
