Programs

• SMPL
• ABC
• Stream Restoration Workshops
• Environmental Education

Stream Management Program for Landowners (SMPL).

This program assists private property owners in Contra Costa County with stream-related problems. It is designed to offer property owners advice on low-cost, environmentally sound streamside management practices and alternatives to concrete and riprap. It educates landowners about native plants and wildlife habitat, including introducing the National Wildlife Federation's Backyard Habitat Program.

This program is made possible by Contra Costa County Clean Water Program.

MATERIALS

Are you a homeowner looking for ideas on how to solve problems in your creek? Download any of these Adobe PDF files on erosion control, native plants, and bank stabilization:

• Stream Bioengineering Handbook (8 MB - contains lots of information!)
  
• Erosion control for stream banks

• Native Plant List

• Permitting Information for riparian areas and where to plant cuttings

• UCC Complete Permitting Guide
  
• Biofertilizers and Mycorrhizae for Seeding Slopes
  
• Live Staking (Live tree cuttings for habitat and erosion control)
  
• Live Staking and Joint Planting

• How to make root wads for bank stabilization and fish habitat

• Brush layering and Brush matting-- two different ways to stabilize banks naturally

• Spruce Revetments-- stabilize your banks with a wall of spruce trees

• Fascines--bundles of live stakes that grow into trees and stabilize banks

• Willow walls--build a new bank with sediment-trapping willows

• Coir Logs for heavy duty bank stabilization

• Vegetation Growth Stages -- channel roughness increases with age!

• Consultants List
  Use this list to find a reputable biologist, hydrologist, engineering firm, landscape firm, native plant nursery, or erosion control supplier who can help you with your project.
  
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ABC (Advocacy for Bay Area Creeks)

The ABC program allows UCC to act on water and creek related advocacy and policy issues in the San Francisco Bay Area, particularly in Alameda County. This program is intended to bridge the gap between creeks and residents in the Bay Area to help residents better understand and care for their creeks and to aid UCC in its advocacy work on behalf of urban streams.

The ABC program allows UCC to provide assistance to private property owners with stream-related problems in Alameda County. Like the SMPL program, this service offers property owners advice about low-cost, environmentally sound streamside management practices. Limited funding is available for site consultations and policy/advocacy work by UCC on behalf of your creek or watershed.

Please contact UCC if you are interested in a site consultation or have a creek-related concern.

Recent ABC-Funded Activities:

• UCC is working with several organizations across California, collectively the California Watershed Coalition, to create a sustainable source of funding for watershed planning, protection and restoration in the form of a fund established through Senate Bill 917. See the Action Alert.
• UCC conducted a site consultation for a group working to improve their neighborhood park and its creek in Oakland.
• UCC responded to a chloramine spill on Strawberry Creek in Berkeley and documented the related fish kill. The incident received significant news coverage.
• UCC is working with several property owners in Berkeley to organize a proposal to restore a section of Strawberry Creek for native habitat and streambank stabilization / sediment reduction.

**The ABC program is funded entirely by individual donations and local foundation grants. If you appreciate and want to help continue UCC's work on behalf of our creeks and watersheds, please see our Give page to donate.
Our creeks need your help!

For creekside homeowners looking for assistance please refer to the informational materials in SMPL.

This program is supported by generous grants from the San Francisco Foundation and the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Fund.

Stream Restoration Workshops.
UCC works with the Waterways Restoration Institute to give workshops to local and state conservation corps, city and county planners and engineering staff, and the US Army Corps of Engineers about stream processes and bank stabilization using soil-bioengineering techniques. Our workshops encourage recreating the most natural conditions possible to damaged urban streams, with the goal of restoring a state of dynamic equilibrium to the system -- one in which the stream is not excessively eroding or depositing sediment. In both our workshops and our projects, we perform watershed analyses, collecting historic and hydrologic data and conducting field surveys in order to design the appropriate channel geometry for the stream.
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Environmental Education.
In conjunction with our hands-on projects, we work with schools and community groups to build a sense of stewardship for local creeks. Activities include learning about creek ecology, and with high school teachers, teaching students to understand how streams and rivers function, how to survey and graph creek cross-sections and profiles, to conduct pebble counts, and to identify native riparian trees and other plants. From time to time we partner with other local education organizations to hold soil bioengineering workshops, training days, volunteer days and other watershed-related learning opportunities.

Note: If you are interested in non-UCC-project related environmental education programs, you may want to contact the Watershed Project or Kids for the Bay.
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