13.  The River Conservation Registry

The Pennsylvania River Conservation Registry is a program maintained by the River Conservation Office of the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.  The Registry is a non-regulatory, voluntary program which recognizes that a river conservation plan for a particular waterway or watershed has been completed.  One or several municipalities may endorse the recommendations and petition for the inclusion of the Lackawanna on the Registry.  The municipalities and the LRCA will then work within the context of the plan to implement the recommendations given considerations of time, funding, and the consensus of the community stakeholders to develop specific proposals to address the various recommendations.

There are no time constraints or regulatory requirements to perform or refrain from any action, program or project recommended in the plan.  By petitioning the DCNR to include the Lackawanna River and its tributary watersheds on the Registry, municipalities indicate their interest in working on a voluntary basis to implement projects at their own discretion.

The Lackawanna River Corridor Association and the participants in the Lackawanna River Watershed Conservation Plan recommend that the twenty-six municipalities in the Lackawanna River watershed consider the adoption of resolutions endorsing the plan and its recommendations relative to their individual municipalities and further, the resolution petitions the Commonwealth to include the Lackawanna River and its watershed tributary streams on the Pennsylvania River Conservation Registry.

Upon acceptance of the Lackawanna on the Registry, all of the projects and programs recommended in the plan become eligible for 50/50 matching grants through the River Conservation Program.  These implementation grants are only available to rivers and municipalities where a plan has been completed and Registry status has been granted.

The model resolution on the following page is offered for the consideration of Lackawanna watershed municipalities.