A program that has been monitoring water quality in Missouri’s lakes for almost 50 years is ending next year after losing federal funding.
The Statewide Lake Assessment Program is run by the University of Missouri and tests water from 65 lakes each year, including Lake of the Ozarks, Table Rock Lake and Mark Twain Lake, to understand trends in things like farm runoff and harmful algae blooms.
The program was funded by the Environmental Protection Agency through Missouri’s Department of Natural Resources. The state agency provided the money to the university, totaling about $330,000 each year. It will end in March.
University of Missouri associate professor Rebecca North leads the assessment program, which has been operating since 1978, making it one of the longest-running statewide programs in the country.
“Now more than ever, as we have a lot of change happening in our environment, it's really important to have these monitoring programs,” North said. “Ending a 50-year monitoring program is obviously impactful for the state of Missouri, but also for the entirety of the U.S., and even globally.”
Changing funding priorities
The Department of Natural Resources has been funding the Statewide Lake Assessment Program with a waiver from the EPA to use federal money that was meant for another purpose. The EPA initiative is for community programs tackling water pollution that comes from diffuse sources, like chemical runoff from farms or roads. Missouri now has a full slate of community watershed plans, so it no longer qualifies for the waiver.
As costs to run the core program have increased over the years, federal funding has remained flat or decreased, according to John Hoke, deputy director of DNR’s division of environmental quality.
He said DNR had to make “hard choices” on what projects to continue while still meeting the requirements of the Clean Water Act, a federal law regulating water pollution.
“The data loss here is unfortunate, but the cost trajectory is unsustainable moving forward,” Hoke said in a statement.
North and her team collected data each summer to learn about levels of algae, nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus, and cyanotoxins that are produced by cyanobacteria. The samples also include factors like temperature and suspended solids, which make water murky. The measures give a long-term picture of the health of lake ecosystems for aquatic life and have been used to contribute to global research, including a 2021 Nature paper, which compared data from Missouri lakes to others around the world and found oxygen concentrations are decreasing in the bottom lakes everywhere.
“The ability to make these comparisons helped to put Missouri water quality in perspective and contributes to the global understanding of lake water quality and trends over time,” North said.
The data the program collects is also provided to the state Department of Natural Resources and Department of Health and Senior Services. It is used to designate lakes as “impaired” under the Clean Water Act and to create plans to improve the lakes.
“Without this monitoring data, the state won't know which lakes are impaired or if impaired lakes are getting better,” North said. “So basically, they're operating blind.”
Now, DNR may need to write more restoration plans for water bodies that aren’t actually impaired, said Mike Kruse, chief of the watershed protection section at DNR.
“The lack of data in this instance, may just mean that we won't have data to show if the water bodies are improving, so they'll be on the list longer,” Kruse said.
But Kruse emphasized the data is not associated with human health concerns. Missouri will continue to test for E. coli at state park beaches, and drinking water sources will continue to be monitored to meet Safe Drinking Water Act requirements.
Still, there are examples of harmful events that relate to data the Statewide Lake Assessment Program collects, North said. A rare brain-eating amoeba that can be found in lakes needs warm water to survive, and the program’s data can show if a certain lake is warming enough to be of concern. The program also tests for cyanotoxins, which are produced by toxic algae that can kill pets.
“Whenever you ask questions of, ‘Was there more? Has there been a change?’ you need long-term data to be able to answer those questions,” North said.
Volunteer testing also impacted
Another volunteer-based program that similarly tests Missouri lakes is also losing funding because of the end of DNR’s use of the EPA waiver.
The Lakes of Missouri Volunteer Program enlists citizen-scientists across the state to collect water samples, which are then analyzed at a lab at the University of Missouri. The program has been operating for more than 30 years and was founded by the same professor who founded the Statewide Lake Assessment Program.
“Both of these projects are pretty darn inexpensive,” said Tony Thorpe, who manages the program. “I mean, they're both great bargains considering the amount of data we collect.”
The volunteer program also provides data to DNR to inform the impaired waters list. Without funding from the EPA, the scope of its testing will have to change, Thorpe said.
For about eight years, volunteer Bob Virag has monitored Mallard Lake and its adjacent Creve Coeur Lake for the program. In the short term, he observes fluctuations in phosphorus and nitrogen, for example.
“It's hard to see through that noise where it's going,” Virag said. “And what you have to do is you have to map it out over a long period of time.”
Virag said it would be a “disaster” to punch a hole in the trend lines these programs have been mapping for decades.
“Missouri boasts 330,000 lakes and ponds,” Virag said. “This is a water state, and for us to turn our back on water just doesn't make sense to me at all.”
North and Thorpe are exploring ways to potentially fundraise to make up the loss. North is hoping to launch a fundraiser on her lab’s website. Thorpe is also planning to ask for donations.
“Something will remain, and if that's just us funding out of our own pockets to sample, we're going to do something,” Thorpe said. “But the character and the nature of the program is certain to change.”
