You might be surprised that Ogunquit has another grant that will help us identify bacterial problems in the Ogunquit River watershed. This grant has actually been percolating for a number of months, and while it may be easy for any of us to confuse this grant with the others we have had through the help of FP Environmental Associates, this one is a bit different.

This grant, entitled the Coastal Community Grant, is bringing together all of the towns that are part of the Ogunquit River Watershed: York, South Berwick, Wells and of course, Ogunquit for a number of purposes. The problem with watershed water testing has had so far, is that it has only taken place in Ogunquit, while a major percentage of the watershed is actually in Wells, with parts in York and South Berwick.

This Coastal Community Grant will strengthen collaboration among the watershed towns of Wells, South Berwick, York and Ogunquit; expand the existing water quality monitoring program to identify and bracket potential sources of bacteria in ‘hotspot’ areas and across the seasons; address bacteria contamination from existing development and identify areas at high risk from bacteria contamination.

You can see that the goals of this project are many and should bring our area towns in the Ogunquit watershed closer together so that we can work with one another to make sure the waters that feed the Ogunquit River are free from bacterial problems, especially if they are caused by humans.

Our Coastal Community Grant then is undertaking a multiple prong attack on bacterial problems within our watershed that can affect our beach waters.

More about this next week  – this is another part of our conservation work in conjunction with our town and surrounding towns, and with the help of FP Environmental Associates to assure clean water for all.