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On October 4, 2000 the City of Decatur entered into an agreement with the <br /> Macon County Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) to implement the Sand <br /> Creek Sediment Reduction Inventory Report. The City of Decatur gave the SWCD <br /> $75,000 to cost-share with landowners willing to put erosion control practices on their <br /> property. The SWCD agreed to implement the plan without an increase in administration <br /> funding so that all of the $75,000 could go to actually stopping sediment from entering <br /> Lake Decatur. <br /> The first thing that we did after receiving the money was to go over the Sand <br /> Creek Report with City, Natural Resources Conservation Service and SWCD personnel, <br /> to determine what practices would work best to solve the problems in the watershed, and <br /> to what extent should the practices be cost-shared. The small committee determined that <br /> several conservation treatments could be used. These practices included Terraces, Water <br /> and Sediment Control Structures, Waterways, Filter strips, Grade Stabilization Structures, <br /> Ponds and Stream Bank Stabilization. The committee also determined that 75-25% <br /> would be the amount that each project would be cost-shared. For example, if a <br /> landowner signed up to build a pond the SWCD would cost-sha.re with the owner on 75% <br /> of the project. The remaining 25% would be at the landowner's expense. The committee <br /> also determined that there should be a cap on the dollars to be allocated for each project. <br /> Ta.king the example above, the landowner would get 75% of the project up to $5,000. If <br /> there where several practices on that particular piece of land, then the landowner could <br /> receive up the $15,000 but only $5,000 per project. While this may seem very confusing, <br /> this is pretty typical on how we run our federal, staxe and city cost-share programs. Most <br /> landowners and operators are aware of these limits. <br /> After we determined our procedures for the Sand Creek Watershed, we started to <br /> advertise the program. As a kick-off, we held a press conference at the mouth of Sand <br /> Creek, where it enters Lake Decatur. We had good coverage by WAND, Herald & <br /> Review and the Decatur Tribune at the press conference. We also sent out a mailing to <br /> each landowner and operator in the Sand Creek Watershed. After promoting the program <br /> through the above means, we had several different landowners contact us to participate. <br /> When a landowner or operator came into our office and wanted cost-share money <br /> in the Sand Creek watershed, we did not just sign them up for the Sand Creek program. <br /> We met with the landowner, looked at the problem with them, and then steered them to <br /> the program that would both accomplish our needs and give them the most dollars. The <br /> majority of the time we were asking them to sign-up for federal Conservation Reserve <br /> Program (CRP) waterways or filter strips. <br /> Federal CRP allowed us to put lands that usually flooded into a filter strip or <br /> buffer strip for 10 or 1 S yea.rs. During the l 0 or 15 years the landowner must maintain <br /> the filter strip or buffer area in exchange for a yea.rly payment from the federal <br /> government. The payment is based on the soil type and what type of land cover the <br /> landowner chooses. The yearly payment in our county ranges anywhere from $120 - <br /> $190/acre for a filter strip or buffer area. The landowner also gets up to 50% cost-share <br />