Crow Wing County Receives $30K Grant from BSWR Clean Water Fund

Crow Wing County recently received a $30,000 grant from the Minnesota Board of Water and Soil Resources.

The grant is a product of the BSWR’s Clean Water Fund program, which allocated $10 million towards improving water throughout the state.

Although clean groundwater isn’t an issue for Crow Wing County, Environmental Services manager Chris Pence says the county intends to put the grant money towards sealing unused wells, as the county’s sandy soils can present problems for the groundwater.

“Think of a well like a straw that’s sticking up on the surface and it goes down into that aquifer,” said Pence. “And if it’s not being used and it’s just open, that’s a direct conduit for any sort of pollutants and contaminants to have a direct access right down to the groundwater. And [what] we want is to protect that groundwater because trying to fix and remediate when groundwater becomes contaminated is really difficult and is very, very expensive.”

Pence says the county’s water table exceeds 10 feet in some areas, especially northern parts of the county.