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Superior Watershed Partnership justly recognized

The Superior Watershed Partnership has won the 2020 Lake Superior Magazine Achievement Award, and if anybody needs convincing that the organization is truly deserving of the honor, they need look no farther than the beach grass that grows along some parts of the Lake Superior shoreline.

SWP has been involved in such habitat projects as well as a plethora of other good works.

The organization coordinates or cooperates in projects on all four Lake Superior shores and on lakes Michigan and Huron. The partnership has wide-ranging projects for Great Lakes habitat protection and restoration, community pollution prevention, climate change adaptation planning and implementation, invasive species removal and prevention, and water quality and stormwater management.

It also has projects for native plant restoration, land protection, youth programs and public education, and Upper Peninsula community assistance, including assisting low-income families with energy bills, solar energy options and energy conservation.

The SWP never knows when it will be called on to serve. For instance, seasonal workers in its Great Lakes Conservation Corps helped clean up after the 2019 Father’s Day flood in Houghton.

Its projects take place on land — and on the water too. For instance, SWP owns the Stannard Rock Lighthouse, where it allows groups to conduct water and weather monitoring.

Each year since 1994, Lake Superior Magazine honors an organization or individual for significantly contributing to the well-being of Lake Superior and its people. Editor Konnie LeMay said SWP was an easy choice for the honor this time around.

“We love its broad-reaching, solution-finding focus and its willingness to partner and protect the environment while acknowledging the economic and social needs of the Big Lake’s residents,” LeMay was quoted as saying. “It approaches problems by looking for practical solutions, which is why it so frequently succeeds in its goals.”

SWP Executive Director Carl Lindquist credits partners with helping the organization achieve its goals.

“If the Superior Watershed Partnership model teaches anything, I truly believe it is the power of local,” Lindquist said in a news release. “The power of relying on local partners, of relying on each other, and doing whatever you can to help, where you are.”

Proof of that reliance is evident in SWP’s recent involvement with the Great Lakes One Water partnership and the Community Foundation of Marquette County in the creation of four rain gardens in the city of Marquette.

Read the full Lake Superior Magazine story,“The Practical Partner, SWP Delivers the Solutions,” about SWP and view the full list of past Achievement Award winners at www.LakeSuperior.com. The announcement comes in the October/November issue.

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