On Dec. 11, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) awarded Easttown Township a Growing Greener grant. It provides the township $41,217 to build rain gardens and flow-through downspout planters on residential or commercial property over the next three years. The DEP gives the grant to projects related to watershed restoration and protection, abandoned mine reclamation, and abandoned oil and gas well plugging.
The Environmental Advisory Council (EAC), which is a section of the Easttown Board that identifies environmental concerns, promotes conservation and undertakes environmental projects. It has built four residential rain gardens and five downspout planters with the funds from the grant.
The council allocates funding to pay for a landscaper to dig out the rain gardens. The money is also used to pay the Darby Creek Association, which is a nonprofit dedicated to protecting the Darby Creek watershed, and Penn Resources Council, a statewide environmental organization committed to conservation and reducing waste, to help build the around a few hundred dollar downspout planters. The EAC have also used funding to donate 30 rain barrels which help collect and store rain water from roof gutters. Members have also hosted several workshops detailing how to build rain gardens individually, explaining how to set up rain barrels and touring existing rain gardens in the township.
According to Cara Rash, the EAC chair, rain gardens are a type of green infrastructure that most people could implement in their own yards in some capacity. Rain gardens are shallow holes with native plants that capture and slow water flow, while flow-through downspout planters capture gutter water before storing it in layers of gravel, soil and plants to reduce stormwater runoff.
“A lot of the EAC’s mission is to provide environmental education and advocacy to the public,” Rash said. “We try to do that through ways that are easy to understand, maintain and replicate at personal residences.”
However, Rash clarified that the gardens and planters were not meant to be complete stormwater solutions and that it was often a common misconception.
“For stormwater management, sometimes people want us to be managing their stormwater with a rain garden, and that’s not always possible,” Rash said.
Residents interested in obtaining a rain garden or planter can fill out the application form on the EAC website without cost for the labor or plants. However, residents are to care for and maintain the rain garden or planter by watering, weeding and mulching.
Sophomore Mayon Saha is a member of the Greening ’Stoga Task Force, a club at Conestoga that promotes sustainability, environmental awareness and eco-friendly practices within the school and local community. Saha feels that the rain gardens and the grant will not solve environmental concerns single-handedly but serve as significant steps forward.
“I don’t think one grant is just gonna take care of almost decades of over development, but it can certainly make a huge impact,” Saha said. “I think it focuses on the basics of green infrastructure, and I feel like once the public residents start seeing these gardens work, people might start trying by themselves.”
Alivia Woo can be reached at [email protected].
