A Grassroots Movement

In 1997, the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR) awarded a Rivers Conservation Planning Grant for Lower Chartiers Creek. In late 1998, the project stakeholders in the Lower Chartiers Watershed held public meetings to educate local citizens, municipalities, and organizations about the planning effort. The Lower Chartiers Creek Watershed Rivers Conservation Plan  was approved by DCNR, placing the lower Chartiers Creek on the Rivers Registry in December of 2001

The completion of the grant process helped to generate interest within the Washington County portion of the watershed. On April 6, 2000, then Governor Ridge announced that the grant for the Upper Chartiers Creek RCP had been funded.  The project was undertaken by the Chartiers Creek Watershed Association (ChCWA) and the Washington County Watershed Alliance (WCWA), thus ensuring the completion and holistic planning approach to the entire Chartiers Creek watershed. The Upper Chartiers Creek Watershed Rivers Conservation Plan was completed in March 2003 and DCNR placed the Upper Chartiers Creek on the Rivers Registry in May of 2003.

GOALS

The plans serve as a reference guide and an integrative tool for decision makers (municipal officials and staff, conservation organizations, businesses, planners, & governmental agencies) in the Chartiers Creek Watershed. The downstream, or lower, portion of the watershed is primarily urban while the upper portion is primarily rural agricultural farmland.  Thus, the plans incorporate critical watershed conservation information and potential implementation strategies into a reference source that focuses on the issues and opportunities unique to each portion of the watershed.  

Public input, environmental investigation, data gathering, and agency coordination went into the planning process whose project goals are to:

• improve water quality

• promote wise land use and sustainable economic development compatible with a sustainable environment 

• enhance the watershed's recreational opportunities

• protect the watershed's natural resources, historic landscape and scenic beauty

• provide an environmental education program for adults while enhancing existing school based environmental curriculum

• prepare for future growth

This website is dedicated to identifying the problems and promoting the opportunities presented in the Rivers Plans for the upper and lower Chartiers Watershed.  Specifically, it targets the formation of the Chartiers Greenway, a green and blue recreational thread along Chartiers Creek that will preserve the natural beauty of the Chartiers Valley, protect water quality and wildlife habitat and promote our recreational enjoyment of nature.