As it held its annual Water Festival in Riverton Memorial Park on Oct. 27, the Pompeston Creek Watershed Association also used the day to mark a very important milestone, the association’s 50th anniversary.
The group held the event for all locals who wished to learn more about how to protect the watershed and also hosted activities for children who participated in a scavenger hunt around the creek for items including wild pine and spruce.
“We saw a lot of different kinds of animals,” Moorestown Friends School sixth grader Ella Hannamirian said.
Formed in 1963, the PCWA was created as a response to growing concern in the community in regard to effluent from the Cinnaminson Sewage Treatment plant pouring into the creek, according to the PCWA website.
“Having a sewage plant dumping into the little creek was just too much,” vice president of PCWA Debbie Lord said.
In addition, Lord said there was also some growing concern over mosquito sprayings that had occurred in the area and their effect on the creek.
“This group started with the purpose of protecting the creek,” Lord said.
With two main water-monitoring sites in Moorestown and Cinnaminson, the watershed also extends into parts of Riverton and Delran.
According to the PCWA website, while it is relatively small, the creek empties into the Delaware River, at a point that is less than 1.5 miles from the surface water intake for the New Jersey-American Water Company pipeline in Delran. Therefore, the water serves as drinking water for many residents.
Lord explained that water testing conducted by PCWA confirmed the association’s concerns.
“We found that the river violated the standards for E. coli, fecal coliform and phosphorus,” Lord said.
With water quality testing beginning in Moorestown in 1998, PCWA members began gathering samples, which were then analyzed in state Department of Environmental Protection-certified laboratories.
“When we found this stuff in the water, we went to Rutgers and got a grant,” Lord said.
Adding a second water-monitoring site in Cinnaminson in 2004, the PCWA worked with the NJDEP, the Rutgers Cooperative Extension Water Resources Program and The Watershed Institute and collected data between 2001 and 2008 that was deemed sufficient for the NJDEP to accept.
Subsequently, Pompeston Creek was added with a priority ranking to the List of Water Quality Limited Waters.
The partnership between the Rutgers Cooperative Extension Water Resources Program and PCWA was then awarded a $1 million grant from the NJDEP to help aid best practices preventing pollutants from entering the creek, such as installing rain gardens and rain barrels.
The PCWA also published its findings in “The Status of Pompeston Creek from 1998–2008: A Water Quality Monitoring Report.”
In addition, the PCWA also holds regular cleanup efforts around the creek, including a Fountain Farms Park Cleanup, which was held at the Cinnaminson part of Pompeston Creek on Willow Drive on Nov. 2. PCWA was also on hand with a macro invertebrate table for Wet Fest, hosted by Cinnaminson Township Public Schools on Oct. 4 at Palmyra Nature Cove in Palmyra.
Although PCWA has temporarily stopped chemical and bacterial monitoring, Lord explained that the association still conducts a yearly bio assessment of macro invertebrate organisms (those without a backbone, but can be seen with the naked eye) living in the creek.
With samples of the organisms present at the Water Festival, Lord explained that the organisms help the association discern the state of the creek by looking at the level of pollutants in which the organism can survive.
Some of the organisms pulled from the watershed included freshwater clams, lung snails, dragonfly nymphs and aquatic worms.
“The water is staying dirty,” Lord said.
She also added that most of the organisms found in the water are still considered Group 2 and Group 3 organisms, which are able to live in moderately polluted and heavily polluted water, respectively.
Moorestown Friends School fourth grader Emmet Kimberly said of all the organisms presented at the festival, his favorites were the tadpoles of both a green frog and a grey tree frog, which are not part of the macro invertebrate classification.
“Since they didn’t have an exoskeleton, they had organs, I liked them better,” Kimberly said.
In addition, PCWA also visits local schools and community centers to educate residents and students about the creek and best practices for keeping pollutants out of the water.
PCWA president Mark Jendrzejewski also stressed the importance of teaching younger generations in the watershed towns, since they play a hand in the future of the creek.
“You have to give them examples of how to do it,” Jendrzejewski said.
For example, Jendrzejewski explained that two years ago, the PCWA visited a school in Riverton and installed rain gardens, which help prevent pollutants from running off into the storm drains.
“Our main focus is the education, because if everyone isn’t involved, it does matter,” Jendrzejewski said.
For more information about PCWA, visit pompestoncreek.org.
