The Cayuga Lake Watershed Intermunicipal Organization (Quio) presented its work program to the Tompkins County Council of Governments, highlighted ongoing projects across county lines and notified municipalities of a phased increase in membership dues to support a full-time watershed manager and modest project funding.

Why it matters: Quio supports municipalities across the Cayuga Lake watershed by helping to design projects, seek grant funding and coordinate multi-jurisdictional responses to water-quality threats such as harmful algal blooms (HABs), stormwater and invasive species.

Quio said its dues formula, adopted in 2022, is being phased up to cover a higher total operating goal ($130,000 in the organization’s presentation). The dues split is one-third for counties and two-thirds for cities, towns and villages. Quio asked current members to maintain membership and invited nonmembers in Tompkins County to consider joining; it said submitting a project and obtaining grant funding is the most direct way for municipalities to recoup the cost of membership.

Quio’s staff described recent and planned work: a DEC-funded salt-storage facility under construction; hemlock woolly adelgid treatment across multiple state parks (including Robert H. Treman and Buttermilk Falls in Tompkins County); a road-ditch and culvert assessment work in Seneca County being coordinated with Tompkins County efforts; and low-impact stormwater design planning in the Town of Lansing and City of Ithaca aimed to avoid extensive permitting and to prepare shovel-ready projects for implementation funding.

Quio emphasized that watershed boundaries do not line up neatly with municipal borders and that regional coordination is generally more efficient for addressing diffuse problems such as phosphorus loading, HABs and climate-driven storm impacts. Quio also encouraged municipalities to use the watershed manager’s technical assistance for grant-writing and project design.

Questions from TCOG members focused on the geographic scope of the Seneca County ditch assessment, whether it covered town and village roads (Quio said the Department of State-funded LWRP project covers most lake-fronting villages but noted some jurisdictions are outside the lake watershed and therefore excluded), and whether implementation funding might include larger retention basins (Quio said that would likely require separate, larger grants beyond the current implementation ask).

Quio closed by offering to provide municipal-specific dues letters for budget planning and to meet with any municipality that has not yet joined the organization.