IOWA DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES

Jan. 18, 2001

SIX TMDL MEETINGS SCHEDULED FOR NEXT WEEK

Public meetings on six impaired waterbodies n Iowa will be held during the
next week.

The meetings on Slip Bluff Lake in Decatur County and Lake Miami in Monroe
County will be held Monday, Jan. 22. The Slip Bluff Lake meeting will be at
1:30 p.m. in the Community Center in Lamoni. The Lake Miami meeting will be
held at 7 p.m. at the courthouse in Albia.

A meeting on Arrowhead Lake in Pottawattamie County will be at 1:30 p.m.
Tuesday, Jan. 23 at the shelterhouse in Arrowhead Park near Neola. The
meeting on Yellowsmoke Lake will be at 7 p.m. on Jan. 23 at the Yellow
Smoke Lookout Shelter near Denison.

Meetings on Fairfield Reservoir #2 and Bob White Lake will be held on
Thursday, Jan. 25. The Fairfield meeting will be at 1:30 p.m. at the First
National Bank in Fairfield. The meeting on Bob White is at 7 p.m. in the
basement meeting room of the courthouse in Corydon.

Everyone who is interested is encouraged to attend one of the public
meetings.

"If the waterbody you are interested in is held at a time when you can't
attend, feel free to come to any of the other meetings," said Bill Ehm,
coordinator of the TMDL program for the DNR.

TMDL's - or Total Maximum Daily Loads - is the name of the process being
used to address waters considered to be impaired. Simply put, TMDL's are
calculations used to determine how much of a pollutant a water body can
receive and still maintain its designated use such as maintaining aquatic
life, allowing body contact such as swimming or being used as a drinking
water supply.

Iowa has 157 waterbodies listed as impaired. Ehm said use of the term
"impaired water" often unintentionally implies more serious problems than
what are actually being experienced.

"People hear the word 'impaired' and the first thing that comes to mind is
chemicals or some kind of cancer-causing pollutant. By far, the biggest
problem in this state in terms of water quality is that our water is simply
too darn muddy. For example, all six of the waterbodies we will be
discussing next week are impaired because of siltation or siltation and
nutrients which means we have too much soil eroding into our water," Ehm
said.

Much of the focus at the upcoming meetings will be on what data has been
collected on the waterbody to document the problem and what steps are being
taken to develop a plan to address the impairment.

"The good news is that we have the knowledge and expertise to address many
of the problems associated with erosion and there are governmental programs
available to provide some financial assistance to private landowners
interested in doing things to improve water quality," Ehm said.

The schedule for additional TMDL meetings to be held in the next two weeks
is as follows:

Orient Lake: 1:30 p.m. Jan. 29, Farmers & Merchants Bank meeting room,
Orient.
West Lake and Binder Lake: 7 p.m. Jan. 29, Community Center, 601 Sixth St.,
Corning.
Silver Lake: 1:30 p.m. Feb. 1, City Hall community room, 316 Franklin St.,
Delhi.
Cedar Lake: 7 p.m. Feb. 1, Lynch Room, Gage Memorial Union, Coe College,
Cedar Rapids.

Additional information on the TMDL program is available on the DNR's
website at: http://www.state.ia.us/epd/wtresrce/303dnotc.htm.

For more information, contact Kevin Baskins at (515) 281-8395 or Bill Ehm
at (515) 281-8143.

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