Water Quality Monitoring
Volunteers collect samples at 62 fixed sites every month, year-round. The data goes into a public database and into regulatory filings. When a number moves the wrong way, we know within weeks rather than years.
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Protecting the Riverbend watershed since 1997
Clean water is not
a cause. It is
infrastructure.
We monitor, restore, and defend 340 miles of river across three counties — with volunteers, science, and a very small staff.
Charity Navigator 4-Star · 89 cents of every dollar goes to programs
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Miles of river monitored
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Volunteers active this year
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Restoration projects completed
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Households with cleaner water
What we do
Four Programs, One Watershed
Streambank Restoration
We stabilise eroding banks with native plantings and engineered log structures. Restored segments hold sediment, cool the water, and bring back the insects that everything else eats. Eighty-six projects completed since 2004.
Learn moreAdvocacy & Permits
We read every discharge permit application in the watershed, and we comment on the ones that matter. It is unglamorous work that has prevented more pollution than any cleanup we have ever run.
Learn moreWatershed Education
Field programs for 4,000 students a year, plus landowner workshops on riparian buffers and septic maintenance. The next generation of stewards is currently in sixth grade.
Learn moreGive
Choose an amount. See what it does.
Your $60 funds one week of river-quality monitoring.
Riverbend Foundation is a registered 501(c)(3). EIN 45-2810394. All gifts are tax-deductible to the extent allowed by law.
From the field
What It Looks Like on the Ground
Field Story
Bringing the Muddy Fork back
Four years, 1,800 native plants, and one very patient landowner. The trout returned in year three.
Read the story →
Advocacy
The permit nobody else read
How a routine-looking discharge application turned into an eighteen-month fight, and why we won it.
Read the story →
Volunteers
Sixty-two volunteers, one Saturday
Our largest single cleanup pulled 3.4 tons out of a two-mile stretch. Here is what we found.
Read the story →Join us
Three Ways to Help
Volunteer
Monthly cleanups, monitoring runs, and planting days. No experience needed, and we always feed you.
Become a Steward
Adopt a half-mile segment and walk it four times a year. Stewards are our early-warning system.
Give Monthly
Join The Current, our monthly giving circle. Predictable funding is what lets us commit to multi-year restoration.
Where the Money Goes
Programs 89%Fundraising 7%Administration 4%
We publish our financials in full because we ask you to trust us with money. Eighty-nine cents of every dollar goes directly to programs — monitoring, restoration, advocacy, and education. The rest keeps the lights on and the grants coming.
With support from
State Water TrustFairhaven Community FundNorthern Counties CoalitionRidgeline Outdoor Co.University Watershed LabAnonymous Family Foundation
Two emails a month. Both worth opening.
Field updates, water quality results, and the occasional call to show up somewhere.