Watershed report cards are powerful tools used around the world to describe ecosystem status, increase public awareness, and inform decision makers. This is the first iteration of holistic report cards in Southeast Michigan. These documents assess the condition of the rivers themselves and the surrounding watersheds. The development of a watershed report card is collaborative. A variety of stakeholders—scientists, government officials, business owners, and interested civilians—come together to define what is valuable about an ecosystem and what threatens that value. The resulting report cards are “socioenvironmental” because they contain more than just environmental concerns; rivers have recreational and economic value to the people who live in their watersheds. Report card scores are calculated based on data-driven thresholds for each facet of watershed condition. A high report card score reflects more than current conditions; communities and ecosystems that are in good condition are well-prepared for future changes. In Southeast Michigan, a combination of increasing development and changing climate requires careful planning and management of resources based on scientific data and collaboration.
Watershed report cards are driven by scientific data and carefully selected thresholds. These thresholds and the resulting scores inform management decision-making. In order to calculate scores that fully reflect conditions in a watershed, consistent and rigorous data is necessary. A larger number of samples better captures normal watershed conditions and any seasonal variation or unexpected highs and lows. Some suggested indicators are discarded if there is not sufficient data. Unfortunately, many datasets are lacking in some way: data is not collected regularly or by the same method, and some data is sparsely labeled. Because of this inconsistency and scarcity of data, indicators were scored at varying time scales. Some indicators only use recent data, while others look at historic data to track changes.
This report card is a timely, transparent assessment of five river watersheds in Southeast Michigan, the Clinton, Detroit, Huron, Raisin, and Rouge. These lands are the traditional home of the Ojibwe, Ottawa, Pottawatomi, and Wyandot peoples. This document was produced by the Clinton River Watershed Council (https://www.crwc.org), Friends of the Detroit River (https://www.detroitriver.org), Huron River Watershed Council (https://www.hrwc.org), River Raisin Watershed Council (https://www.riverraisin.org), and Friends of the Rouge (https://therouge.org), and the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science (UMCES). Funding was provided by the Fred A. and Barbara M. Erb Family Foundation (https://www.erbff.org). Council Fire, LLC was integral to developing economic indicators and consulted on economic data analysis. Over 100 stakeholders from 65 organizations contributed to this project.
Data sources include: Audubon; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention/Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry; Federal Emergency Management Agency; Friends of the Rouge; Friends of the Detroit River; Huron River Watershed Council; Clinton River Watershed Council; River Raisin Watershed Council; Google Earth Engine; Implan; Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy; Michigan Department of Health and Human Services; Michigan Department of Natural Resources; Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics Consortium; National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; National Water Quality Monitoring Council; Trust for Public Land; U.S. Census Bureau; U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; U.S. Geological Survey; and Your Economy. To find more information about the data and analyses used, please refer to the methodology.