Also from the DI"Cutting the [University of Iowa] UI campus in half, the brownish, green-tinged Iowa River is a mess of pollutants, ranging from fish-killing nitrates to fecal bacteria, and it more closely resembles Willy Wonka's river of chocolate than a major source of fresh water for the state.
The Iowa River also has been declared one of the most endangered rivers in the nation by American Rivers, ranked third behind the Sante Fe River in New Mexico and the San Mateo Creek in California in a report released Tuesday by the environmental group."
"For years, Iowa has lagged behind enforcing the Clean Waters Act," said Healthy Waters Campaign director Katherine Baer of American Rivers. "And here's an opportunity for the state to protect the river."
Yet officials say the state Department of Natural Resources has had trouble addressing the problem, even 10 years later."Large parts of the Clean Water Act don't apply to non-point source pollution, which is the largest contributor to most of the water-quality problems we have on the Iowa River," said Bob Libra, a state geologist with Natural Resources.
Contributors to pollution in the Iowa River run the gamut from inefficient or ineffective sewage-treatment plants in smaller communities to non-point sources of pollution, such as concentrated animal-feeding operations on farmland, which abuts 80 percent of the Iowa River watershed, Libra said.
"[Anti-degradation policies are] such a critical piece of the Clean Water Act that we don't do in Iowa," Heathcote said.
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