Nixon announces grant for Lake

Funds earmarked for landscaping to reduce pollution in Lake

Gov. Jay Nixon on Thursday announced a $740,000 grant to help fund a program designed to improve the quality of water at the Lake.

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a few minutes before the guests arrive for the Brewmasters' Dinner

The grant, along with an additional $496,000 match by the Lake of the Ozarks Water Alliance, will fund a program that includes educating homeowners along an 18.8-mile section of shoreline on the use of landscaping to reduce pollutants carried into the Lake by rainwater.

The program will involve teaching the property owners how to use landscaping to slow down the amount of runoff that flows directly into the Lake after a rainstorm, then help those same property owners with the cost of installing the landscaping. Also included in the program will be educational segments dealing with proper wastewater treatment and shoreline stabilization as well as water testing and the distribution of low-phosphorus fertilizers.

Another segment of the program will be designed to encourage property owners to keep their onsite wastewater treatment equipment up to code and pumped out on a regular basis.

The total cost of the program, which will run from now to Dec. 31, 2014, is $1.2 million and will include participation by local businesses and community organizations such as Ameren Missouri, the University of Missouri Extension Service, Camden County Planning and Zoning, and others.