The Alliance Director of Environmental Stewardship, Michelle Luebke, has received the Expert Award in Environmental Education from the Urban Waters Learning Network, a collaboration of US EPA, River Network, and Groundworks USA. The Bronx River Alliance is recognized by leaders across the nation as the trailblazing force behind the resurgence of the Bronx River. Director of Environmental Stewardship Michelle Luebke traveled to Cleveland in June to accept this award on behalf of the Alliance.
The Alliance was recognized for our community science and environmental education programming. Since 2015 the Bronx River Alliance has been steadily expanding their water quality monitoring, environmental education programming, and community outreach to reduce major pollutants across the full watershed through source detection and to address the cumulative impacts of pollutants at the mouth of the river on the communities in the South Bronx. In particular, the award recognizes Project Water DROP (Detecting River Outfalls & Pollutants) (an all-volunteer-run community science program focused on fecal pollution to complement the existing water quality monitoring program) and Project WASTE (Waterway And Street Trash Elimination), which focuses on assessment and source reduction of trash pollution within the Bronx River watershed using a series of trash booms and in-stream structures to determine the quantities, types, materials, and brands of trash found in different areas of the river.
The Award Winners will be honored at this year’s Urban Waters Learning Forum on Friday, June 21, at River Rally 2019.
