Haw River Assembly protects the Haw River Watershed.
This includes nine hundred and twenty miles of streams feeding into the Haw along the 110 miles of the river, the 14,000 acres of Jordan Lake, and the plants, animals, and people who depend on the river. We work as advocates to stop pollution through with our Haw Riverkeeper, and are building a watershed community that supports clean water through our outreach, education and water quality monitoring programs
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Learn About Current Watershed Issues
Join Us for the Online Screening of Invisible Hand - Rights of Nature Documentary
THURSDAY SEPTEMBER 23, FILM AVAILABLE STARTING AT 6:00 P.M. ET (AVAILABLE FOR 24HRS), REGISTER FOR SCREENING HERE
JOIN US FOR A POST SCREENING LIVE Q&A STARTS AT 7:45 P.M. ET (JOIN WITH ZOOM INFORMATION ON OUR WEBSITE)
2021 Summer Swim Guide
It’s summer, and a great time to head to your favorite swimming, wading or tubing spot. We’re monitoring favorite swimming places on the Haw River and at Jordan Lake this summer. Sites get a green swimmer logo for SAFE and a red logo for UNSAFE based on E-coli counts.
For the weekend of September 3 – Labor Day – 10 of the eleven sites we monitor had safe results (chart at left). Remember: water quality can change quickly for the worse after storms – and never swim in floodwaters!
We publish the Swim Guide results each Friday through Labor Day in our E-newsletter (sign up on our home page) or look for it on our website, or Facebook and Instagram pages. You can subscribe to text updates by texting HAW to (844) 956-1139. Download the Swim Guide app for free on your smartphone. See more info at https://hawriver.org/swim-guide/
Slides from Forum on Industrial Contaminants
Haw River Assembly held a public meeting on August 26 to discuss the industrial contaminants in the Haw, Pittsboro’s drinking water – and solutions – with a panel of leading scientists researching this issue.
Powerpoint slides from the presentations by scientists:
Chatham Park Development Agreement Public Hearing Continued Until September
The Pittsboro Town Board will continue the public hearing from August 23 on the Development Agreement for the 7000+ acres of Chatham Park, and will hear more public comments on the North Village Small Area Plan. Both items are woefully short on actually protecting the Haw River, Jordan Lake and tributaries. The Development Agreement would lock Pittsboro into 40 years, despite major changes in climate or the economy during that time.Go to our Chatham Park webpage to get more information and HRA’s talking points
HRA Joins NC DEQ to Defend their Denial of Key Permit for MVP Southgate
NCDEQ has used it’s authority to reissue the denial of the stream crossing permit for the MVP Southgate project. This followed an original denial letter in August of 2020 and a federal court hearing that ruled NCDEQ had the authority to deny the permit. This is a huge win for impacted community members, and communities in the Dan and Haw River watersheds.
Haw River Assembly, represented by Southern Environmental Law Center, has been approved to join the case to defend NC Department of Environmental Quality’s decision to deny the 401 permit. That decision, denied in August of 2020, was based heavily on the likelihood of MVP mainline not being successfully completed due to ongoing legal challenges, ballooning costs, and environmental violations. These challenges were also faced in the Atlantic Coast pipeline project, which was canceled and abandoned earlier this summer.
Additionally, MVP Southgate is now THREE YEARS behind schedule. The mainline project is four years behind schedule and $2.5 Billion over budget. These pipelines face an increasingly uncertain future. To read the full blog for MVP Southgate updates, click here.