Willamette River Anchor Habitats Virtual Story Map!
We invite you to check out a new interactive, visual story map highlighting 10 years of collaboration and Willamette River restoration success stories. The collaborating group of partners, called the Willamette Anchor Habitats Working Group, was formed as as result of two major funders – Meyer Memorial Trust and the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board (OWEB) coming together around a new funding initiative.
Meyer Memorial Trust has been facilitating strategic collaborations to increase the effectiveness of restoration throughout the Willamette Basin for over a decade, brought stakeholders together to identify opportunities for collaboration. This group of partners included conservation nonprofits, soil & water conservation districts, land trusts, and watershed councils like LTWC. These partners came together to form a steering committee to create an action plan in response to a multi-year funding opportunity created by OWEB.
The working group worked together to identify priority projects and make a detailed plan for a grant application to OWEB. The successful application committed $7 million to the group over six years, starting in 2016. Since then, these partners have been working closely together to implement projects along the Willamette River.
These grants funded floodplain restoration and side channel restoration at two Long Tom Watershed Council projects – Snag Boat Bend and Sam Daws Landing – north of Harrisburg along Peoria Road.
Our very own Amanda Reinholtz led the charge in developing the story map!
Check it out at this link!