Save Our Streams - Volunteers Of The Month

Save Our Streams President of the Board, Kathy Martin was surprised to receive her volunteer award

Ellen & Lars Stromdahl were recognized for their dedicating to the Harford County Campaign.

Harford County Community College's Deborah Wrobel received her award as a thank you for her work as Harford County lab liaison and a Heartbeat volunteer

The Citizens for Stream Restoration Campaign recognized Jeff Gernand and Kathy Martin. Mr. Gernand is a geologist with Gannett Flemming Enterprises and since 1985 has volunteered with several SOS programs. In 1996, Jeff became a Heartbeat monitor for several Baltimore City and County sites and currently chairs the Baltimore County Action Committee that assists and provides support to organizing and planning Heartbeat trainings. He has become a trainer for the certification workshops and continually recruits new volunteers from his work and personal life for the Campaign's projects. Mrs. Martin, who grew up on the Bird River, has been involved with Save Our Streams since it was a fledgling environmental organization. Currently serving her second term as President of the SOS Board Of Directors, Kathy and her husband, Frank, donated a new computer network for the SOS office last spring and continues to provide advice for database and computer issues. This spring, Kathy inspired leaders of community groups in the Bird River watershed to organize a large-scale construction site inventory in the Bird River watershed and throughout the county.

The Harford County Stream Keeper Campaign presented awards to volunteers Deborah Wrobel and Ellen Stromdahl. Mrs. Wrobel is an Instructional Support Specialist for the Science and Mathematics Department of Harford Community College (HCC) and the liaison for Save Our Streams' partnership with HCC. HCC has provided laboratory space and equipment for monthly benthic macroinvertebrate identification labs and volunteer trainings. Mrs. Wrobel has been ever willing to assist with the Campaign in any way including preparing lab space for our monthly visits, promoting SOS events and serving as a point of contact for Harford County stream monitors when dropping off Project Heartbeat samples. Mrs. Stromdahl, an Entomologist with Aberdeen Proving Ground, has been an active SOS volunteer through the Adopt-A-Stream program and Project Heartbeat. She was awarded a Chesapeake Bay Trust grant to provide educational opportunities focused on investigating and improving water quality for students of Free State Montessori School. The students planted an extensive riparian buffer along North Stirrup Run in Jarrettsville and studied the stream's biological, physical and chemical parameters. Mrs. Stromdahl has also involved the students in monthly bug identification labs and in the biological monitoring of North Stirrup Run as part of the Stream Keeper Campaign.