Watershed Planning

This section of the Watershed Planning website is designed to walk you through each step of the watershed planning process. You may wish to use this information after you have used the Watershed Plan Builder to create a customized watershed plan outline.

The watershed planning process uses a series of cooperative, iterative steps to characterize existing conditions, identify and prioritize problems, define management objectives, and develop and implement protection or remediation strategies as necessary. It has been developed to help communities, watershed organizations, and state, local, tribal and federal environmental agencies develop and implement watershed plans to meet water quality standards and protect water resources. To get more information on the planning process see the Handbook for Developing Watershed Plans to Restore and Protect Our Waters.

Move through each step of the planning process by clicking on the icons at the top of the screen. Each topic is divided into subsections that can be viewed by clicking on the appropriate heading in the right hand topics box. The topics box will show the name of the section you are currently working in.

Come back to this section of the Watershed Planning site as often as you need to as you move forward to develop your watershed plan.