Training neighbors to restore their watersheds

Ballinger Creek photo by Londa Jacques

Applications are now being accepted for a program that empowers community members with a passion for their local streams, clean water, and local wildlife. 

Community Action Training School (CATS) provides a free series of lectures – presented in a hybrid in-person and virtual format this year – and field trips. In exchange, participants volunteer on a local watershed improvement project of their choosing.

“We are thrilled to once again work with enthusiastic community members who are dedicated to being changemakers,” says Sarah Heerhartz, Executive Director of Mid Sound Fisheries Enhancement Group. 

“Protecting and restoring our rivers and natural areas requires many partners – from national governments to local ones, from nonprofit organizations to responsible businesses – and including people from all walks of life. 

"I have seen how passionate individuals play a critical role in watershed health and salmon recovery – from restoring their local parks to holding elected officials accountable. 

"Community Action Training School helps people focus their passions and interests and knits them into closer connection with likeminded people in their communities, creating projects that make a lasting difference and watershed advocates that have the support to sustain long-term work in their local communities.”

Tracy Banaszynski, Project Manager for Mid Sound Fisheries Enhancement Group. agrees.

“Participants have created a positive impact on their watersheds through a huge variety of project types. Projects from past sessions of Community Action Training School cohorts include the creation of Students Saving Salmon at Edmonds Woodway High School, community-led restoration events, and translation of interpretive signs in one participant’s local park to the languages most often spoken in her neighborhood. 

"In our last cohort, one participant worked with her local Trout Unlimited chapter to create a trapping program to eradicate an invasive frog species that threatens Kokanee restoration efforts. Another adopted a natural area in his childhood neighborhood that had become overrun with invasive Himalayan blackberry and engaged his community in restoring the site. 

"People come up with the most amazing projects when they feel empowered to use their voices and energies to help heal our watershed.”

Applications for this free program are due May 4, 2022. You can find out more at the websites of Sound Salmon Solutions and Mid Sound Fisheries Enhancement Group, the two organizations jointly organizing Community Action Training School in WRIAs 7 and 8.

“I’ve always cared about salmon. But by participating in the CATS program, I better understood where I could best fit my talents into the road to salmon restoration,” says Dana Kemmerling, past CATS participant. 

“The speakers they brought in covered a range of the issues that are important to my community. Then, I was able to use my enthusiasm—and my marketing experience—to help co-workers and friends become inspired to help rip out blackberries and plant native plants along the Sammamish River.”

This program is funded by the King County Flood Control District, directed by the Snoqualmie Watershed Forum and the Cedar / Sammamish / Lake Washington watersheds.