In Business for the Blackstone, developed by Massachusetts Audubon, promotes good management for stormwater at stores and offices.  A brochure describing steps such as keeping dumpster closed, washing vehicles responsibly, cleaning storm drains, and diverting run-off to landscaped areas, forms the basis for our conversation and further work with businesses. 

Recent talks with CVS and Brigido's Markets on stormwater management have been productive.  We have a new volunteer who is coordinating site visits for this project.  Recently we attended a conference presented by the Blackstone River Coalition (BRC) which demonstrated stormwater treatment for temperature and pollution control.  We installed a rain garden at Lonsdale Elementary School with volunteers from BRC and Town of Lincoln. The BRC supplied budget for 100 plants and the town supplied mulch. Purple coneflower, blazing star, ever-blooming daylilies, and Joe Pye weed now help to infiltrate stormwater from the school’s parking lot into the ground.

In early February, Supreme Mid-Atlantic, a truck-body manufacturer, agreed to participate in a landscaping project to mitigate stormwater run-off from their site.  The landscaping, with bearberry and daylilies, will mitigate run-off from that location to reduce erosion on the banks of Tarklin Brook. 

We welcome them into the Business Team to improve water quality on Tarkiln Brook, a tributary in the Blackstone watershed. 

According to the R.I. Department of Environmental Management, the Blackstone is out of compliance with copper, cadmium, and bacteria that can be deposited by stormwater.  Thus, Audubon participates to improve water quality and aquatic habitat.

Storm-water Run-off

We are also promoting "Rain Gardens " as a means for home-owners to divert roof and driveway runoff into the soil with an aesthetic effect.  We provided a tour of local rain gardens.

During the summer we conducted a survey to find out whether homeowners manage in-ground irrigation systems in their yards to reduce water consumption and stress on local rivers.  Results indicate that we need a much better informed lawn management to achieve savings in costs of water. A copy of the report is available through emarks@asri.org.

Staff participated in an EPA - sponsored webinar on "Green Roofs " as a means to mitigate stormwater run-off. Vegetation planted on layers of water-proofing and non-soil growing medium can be retrofit on existing buildings, but new design and construction provides greater flexibility in choice of plantings.

Recycling fishing line    

As a extension of our International Coastal Cleanup theme, we have started a project with RI DEM to install and promote the use of boxes where snarled fishing line can be collected at DEM fishing access sites.  So far, the pilot project in North Kingstown has shown great response by the public with a garbage bag of line collected in just one month at four locations, thanks to volunteer Alex Bruder. Both U. S. EPA Lab and URI-GSO have requested boxes for their bay-front locations.   We have another set of boxes proposed in the east bay as part of an Eagle Scout project. 

Sustainable Energy

Audubon continues its stakeholder role following reports on impacts to birds, mammals, reptiles and fish as off shore and terrestrial sites for energy generation are proposed. 

We attended the meeting of the Ocean Special Area Management Plan (SAMP) the Coastal Resources Management Council (CRMC) is developing and will suggest a location for off-shore wind energy development.  At that meeting tidal and current power were reported to be commercially infeasible due to weak energy of our tides and currents.

We continue to urge energy conservation individually and corporately, and to promote least impact projects in the public interest.

Educational Partnerships

We are currently helping Smithfield students fulfill their service requirement through International Coastal Cleanup and serving as mentor for a Barrington High School senior on her senior project to improve commercial recycling.