BROWN COUNTY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — Brown County is doing its part in cleaning up local waterways.
Part of the county’s 2027 budget proposal includes funding to build basins for farmland water runoff.
Brown County is planning to add two agriculture sediment basins to the area.
The $60,000 project will help with flood mitigation and capture phosphorus runoff, adding better protection to the environment.
“From my administration ever since elected, this has been kind of like an important aspect because we want to protect the water. But we also recognize that the agriculture community needs every piece of their land in production,” Brown County Executive Troy Streckenbach said.
Streckenbach called this project a win-win approach in helping farmers as well as the environment.
The two basins will be placed at the edge of a farm in the lower Fox River watershed.
Brown County’s Conservationist said the idea of the basins is similar to a stormwater pond found in the city after a heavy rainfall.
“Any suspended soil that’s moving that runoff water and any phosphorus that’s attached to that soil will get trapped in these basins,” Brown County Conservationist Nick Peltier said.
Eventually the water is filtered out and becomes about 50% cleaner than how it started as it heads into the Fox River.
“If we can capture some of that runoff water in the upland, it really minimizes both flooding impacts and water quality impacts downstream,” Peltier said.
While this funding is for two basins coming in 2027, Brown County is also building four others before the end of 2026 from its previous budget.
One Wrightstown farmer already has one on his property built by Outagamie County, with another on the way from Brown County.
“We’re just trying to make sure that we’re taking care of the property for my kids and the grandkids and generations after them. The resources and the fish, wildlife, deer, birds, everything have perfect habitat to thrive on,” Plum Pride Holsteins Farm Marvin Biese said.
Biese has been working closely with the county on this project.
He hopes other farmers see the environmental benefits and step up to help the community.
The new sediment basins are expected to be built within the next year.
