State of the Raritan

Status and trends from across the region, where do we go from here?

Friday, June 9, 2017

Douglass Student Center, New Brunswick, NJ

9th Annual Sustainable Raritan Conference and Awards Ceremony

Our 2017 conference showcased a series of status and trends reports by Raritan stakeholders from across the region.  Presentations described several decades of change in key indicators of watershed health for the Raritan River, basin and bay. And during lunch, keynote speaker, Andrew Johnson of the William Penn Foundation reflected on the strategic approach developed and applied through the Delaware River Watershed Initiative to address the same types of issues we face in the Raritan.  What do these reports say about the health of the Raritan and what are the key concerns that still need to be addressed?  How do we best leverage existing resources to tackle them?  These are a few of the questions panelists and participants considered during this day long conference.

We also presented the 2017 Sustainable Raritan River Awards to recognize outstanding achievements in efforts to revitalize, restore and protect Raritan River resources and to make the Raritan region a premiere place to live, work and raise a family.  Eight recipients were recognized.  You can follow the link below to learn more about them and their good works for a more sustainable Raritan.

New at this year’s conference was a Data Blitz.  The Data Blitz — a series of eleven five-minute long lightning talks — covered a broad range of topics highlighting  current academic research, community actions, policy and planning efforts by stakeholders across the Raritan region.  Each talk was supported by a poster, and the conference closed with a poster session and networking reception.

Click HERE to visit the SRRI site to view the conference materials and presentations.