Mid-Monongahela leads voting for River of the Year
BROWNSVILLE — The middle Monongahela River, from Maxwell to Elizabeth, is in the running for River of the Year.
The designation is determined by votes from the public in a program sponsored by the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. The program is meant to increase awareness of the importance of recreational, ecological and historic resources related to the state’s rivers and streams. The winning applicant will receive a $10,000 grant to use for river-related activities.
The middle Monongahela River was nominated by the Brownsville Area Revitalization Corp. (BARC) and made it into the top four finalists that are now vying for the grant money.
BARC member Norma Ryan said she had received an email about the competition and the application wasn’t very complicated.
Ryan said the program fits well with a project BARC has been working on for the past several years to map the middle Monongahela River for recreational boaters.
“There were maps for the lower Mon and the upper Mon, but nothing for the middle Mon to tell boaters where launches were or what was available to them in the communities such as restaurants and attractions,” Ryan said.
Ryan said she sent out emails to all of her friends, asking them to vote and to share the voting link with their friends. As of Tuesday, the middle Monongahela River was in the lead with 36.1 percent of the vote, followed by Stonycreek River in Somerset County with 28.7 percent, the Kiskiminetas River in Armstrong County with 24.1 percent and the upper Juniata River in Blair County with 11.1 percent of the vote.
Ryan said a requirement of the River of the Year competition is that the winner hold a canoe/kayak event on the river, which BARC has sponsored for the past several years on the Monongahela River, with more than one river sojourn planned for next year.
Ryan said the grant money also would help with other river-related events.
“We will be doing the Ducky Race that we’ve been doing for the past three years. It will be enhanced,” Ryan said. “We will also be having a Music on the Mon event at the wharf and an event that includes communities along the Mon.”
Ryan said Brownsville will be the final stop for the American Wind Symphony next summer, with a performance at the wharf in late July.
Ryan said that voting is open until midnight Saturday, so she isn’t taking the lead for granted.
She is once again sending notes to her friends, asking them to ask their friends to vote for the middle Monongahela River at http://pawatersheds.org/vote.