When we opened the Canteen we wanted to make sure we honored our presence on the Little River. Our LLC is named Little Eddy in honor of the small eddy that forms in the river beside our garden.
We left our home in West Virginia because fracking destroyed our community’s clean water and we realized how quickly water quality could decline. We joined MountainTrue’s swim guide program almost immediately upon opening and have been testing the water quality for 3 years.
Swimguide.org is an international water testing program that gives swimmers a guide to determine if a local swimming hole is safe. You can see the results of our testing for the past few years here: Swim Guide (theswimguide.org)
Last year we were alarmed by the results. We had to keep our gate to the river closed the majority of the summer due to unsafe E. coli levels in the river. It is only 4 miles from the headwaters of the river to the Canteen and we and others in our community want to find out where the contamination is coming from and help fix it.
In order to guide us on this we and Sherwood Forest Friends have asked MountainTrue to do a presentation at the Canteen April 13th at 11 am. They will talk about the water testing programs in our area. We are actually involved in two different programs, one in partnership with the Cedar Mountain Community Center. They will also guide us on finding the source.
We welcome everyone to join us so that we can learn and work together. With Sherwood Forest Friends, the Cedar Mountain Community Center and the Cedar Mountain Canteen working together we are positive we will resolve this issue.
In gratitude.
