A plan for $600,000 in necessary funding to maintain a University of Iowa water monitoring system vital for tracking nitrate, dissolved oxygen, and pH rates in streams across the state is set to be discussed in a meeting Friday between Johnson County and Polk County officials.

The monitoring system, known as the Iowa Water Quality Information System has monitored about 80 locations in streams across the state for the last 15 years. The program is run by researchers at the UI’s IIHR Hydroscience and Engineering Department.

Polk County supervisors voted Oct. 21 to grant $200,000 in funds, hoping to keep the UI monitoring system going after the state cut funding in 2023. 

The Walton Family Foundation temporarily funded the system starting in 2024, after the state cuts, but those funds are set to expire in the summer of  2026. 

Johnson County Board of Supervisor Jon Green said he has been thinking about supporting a water quality monitoring system since 2023. 

Green had the idea of forming a 28E agreement, an intergovernmental agreement where anybody with an interest in surface water quality could group together. Johnson County and any other party interested would buy the network out and operate it independently. 

Green said whoever invests in the agreement will contribute to a more sustainable and permanent annual funding system. 

“I was premature [in pitching this] two years ago, but now it seems like there may be some energy there,” he said. 

Green is meeting with McCoy on Friday to suggest the 28E agreement. 

He said it would ease the difficulties of two counties sustaining the statewide investment year after year.

“I hope that my conversation with McCoy on Friday is a catalyst where we can start discussing [the agreement],” he said. “So instead of putting [a] Band-Aid on it, let’s find a solution that’s going to work for the years to come.”

Matt McCoy, supervisor chair of Polk County, said the county will help fund the water monitoring system from 2026 through 2027. 

McCoy said he looks forward to seeing the Iowa legislature become a full or partial funder of the research. 

“My hope was that we would be a contributor in a partnership between the state and other counties in the state, and I certainly think that Iowa City and Johnson County see the importance of this as it relates to their water as well,” he said. 

McCoy’s decision to fund the monitoring system was guided by abundant requests from the public to monitor Polk County’s nitrate levels. 

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“There’s more interest in it in Polk County than I’ve ever seen in my 30 years of elective office, I thought, let’s figure out how to invest in this system so that [the program] can continue this really important research,” he said. 

This public interest was recently underscored in a Polk County presentation, the Central Iowa State Source Water Research assessment, at the Big Grove Brewery in Iowa City on Wednesday.

Hundreds of concerned citizens attended the presentation, understanding the concerns expressed through the assessment backed by 16 scientists who contributed 4,000 hours of work in the course of two years. 

The study put particular concern on nitrogen and phosphorus levels in central Iowa. 

Jerry Schnoor, a professor in the UI’s civil and environmental engineering department, said central Iowa has among the highest levels of nutrients in the nation. 

Schnoor said 80 percent of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus, contaminate drinking water sources and lead to algal balloons, which produces toxins harmful to humans, pets, and wildlife, in central Iowa.

John Norris, a water quality advocate at the presentation, said he hopes the information provided from the assessment will empower citizens with data to bring to Iowa lawmakers. 

“Until we make water quality a voting issue, we will not address this problem,” Norris said. “What we need in this state is to have an honest conversation about our water quality.”

Larry Weber, director of IIHR Hydroscience and Engineering, said the program needs about $600,000 annually to continue to upkeep the 60 water quality sensors the UI deployed throughout the state. 

The U.S. Geological Survey deployed 12 sensors while the U.S. Department of Agriculture, or USDA, deployed eight to meet the 80 locations. 

Weber said IIHR deploys their sensors in March and early April annually, taking them out in the winter to avoid damage when the rivers freeze over. 

Weber said IIHR has the resources to keep up with correlations between how rainfall, soil moisture, and nitrate levels impact farming practices and livestock. The $600,000 of annual funding allows for the quality control checks to be done adequately. 

Weber said the goal of the program is to eventually implement a nitrate forecasting system. With sustained adequate funding, the monitoring system could have such a forecasting system running within the next three to five years. 

Weber said understanding these projections will help identify what agricultural practices are leading to high nitrate levels in Iowa’s streams. 

If other counties are not able to cover the remaining $400,000, to allow for a total of $600,000 in funding, Weber said the program wouldn’t be able to keep the sensors operational. 

“We wouldn’t know what that data is, we wouldn’t know what is out there, we wouldn’t know how to make advisories to people that want to recreate in our rivers or streams or make advisories about if people should be eating the fish that are caught in these rivers,” he said. “That lack of data puts our public at risk.”