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Lackawanna River Corridor Association Earns Five Stars, $10,000 for Creek Restoration Project

Release Date: 9/6/2002
Contact Information: Bonnie Smith, (215) 814-5543

Bonnie Smith, (215) 814-5543

PHILADELPHIA – The Lackawanna River Corridor Association has been awarded $10,000 for restoration efforts along Leggetts Creek in the City of Scranton. Specifically, the association will use the funds to restore vegetation and canopy trees to a portion of the 60-acre reclaimed anthracite coal mine site.

The award is part of the Five-Star Restoration Grant Program, providing community-based partnership grants for wetlands and stream side restoration projects.

“We are proud to support this greening program, which will help to reclaim land damaged by past mining practices and help turn this city property into a community asset,” said Donald S. Welsh, U.S. EPA mid-Atlantic regional administrator.

Native species will be planted within a 20-acre section along 2,000 feet of stream corridor to create a greenway trail on City property. The trail will link Rockwell Park, a city playground, with the Dutch Gap Little League field. The planting project is a follow up to the mine reclamation work presently underway on the site.

Primary funding for Five-Star Restoration Projects are provided by the EPA’s Office of Wetlands, Oceans, and Watersheds and the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration’s Fisheries’ Community-based Restoration Program. Additional funding is provided by EPA’s Chesapeake Bay Program, EPA Region III and Lockheed Martin Corporation.
Five-Star Restoration Projects involve a high degree of cooperation between at least five participants from local governments, corporations and businesses, schools and youth groups, environmental and citizen organizations, and federal and state government agencies.

Partners work together to improve water quality and restore important fish and wildlife habitats. The projects funded were selected from a competitive pool of nearly 200 applicants. Funding is based on the program’s educational and training opportunities for students and at-risk youth, the ecological benefits, and other cultural and economic benefits to the community.