Anchorage Waterways Council

The mission of AWC is to protect, restore, and enhance the waterways, wetlands, and associated uplands of Anchorage.

The Anchorage Waterways Council (AWC) was incorporated as a 501 (c) (3) organization in 1984 by a group of individuals and agency members who were concerned about the deteriorating state of the Municipality's creeks and watersheds. Over the past 38 years, the organization has worked diligently to garner grants and contracts that would support AWC’s work to improve the health of local creeks and lakes. A volunteer water quality monitoring program was developed in 1998, and today there are over 40 sites that have been sampled for water quality. AWC is the only organization in the Municipality that regularly monitors its creeks. Education and outreach to students, residents and business owners have become a large part of AWC's mission in the past decade. Many people do not realize that urban runoff goes directly, untreated, into our creeks. AWC's objective is to reduce pet waste, vehicle drips, ice and snow melt products, yard chemicals, car washing detergents and other polluting agents that negatively affect our creeks, lakes, and the fish and wildlife that make their homes in and along them.

AWC organizes and sponsors the Annual Creek Cleanup event, where tons of debris have been removed from local creeks by thousands of volunteers. Our "Creeks as Classrooms" program puts staff with students so they can work creekside on a variety of issues while learning about what is and is not healthy for waterways. Anchorage’s Scoop the Poop program is also organized by AWC, and our staff appears at a variety of outreach events every year to educate about the problems with pet waste in our waterways. Additionally, AWC responds to issues that affect Anchorage's waterways. Currently we are focusing on issues regarding the horrendous proliferation of plastic in our waterways, a changing climate which causes fluctuations in creek temperatures that are harmful to aquatic critters, and the impacts of road salts and other road pollutants on fish.

Because our waterways are used for fishing, swimming, kayaking, canoeing, rafting, tubing, wading, nature watching and other activities, it is imperative that we know of any potential problems so they can be addressed and rectified. Support from Pick.Click.Give. greatly helps us in accomplishing these tasks.