Salt levels are rising in lakes, streams and rivers: Here’s how you can help, according to ‘Salt Smart’ experts

Guest post by Jenny Whidden, moderator for the August 15 presentation.

​While salt currently plays an essential role in keeping our roads safe during snowy, cold weather, its overuse takes a lofty and often permanent environmental toll — especially within our fresh water bodies.
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Salt from winter deicing practices, potassium chloride fertilizer and water softening equipment can contaminate drinking water, endanger wildlife and damage property. That’s because once salt makes its way down roads and sidewalks, it finds itself in our water with no way to remove it.
 
“Once (salts containing chloride) come in contact with water, that chloride is very strongly bound to the water. Wherever that water goes, the chloride goes with it,” Brooke Aslesen, Watershed Specialist with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, said at an Aug. 15 webinar hosted by the League of Women Voters Upper Mississippi River Region Inter League Organization. “With it not breaking down and staying in the water, (chloride) tends to build up in a lot of our surface waters and in our groundwaters as well.”

​With the hope of reducing chloride pollution and inspiring ‘Salt Smart’ initiatives across the region, LWV UMRR hosted the educational awareness webinar in collaboration with experts from Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin.
 
“It is becoming clear that the current pattern in road salt usage is unsustainable, and there is a strong desire for communities to act before more surface waters become impaired due to high chloride levels,” Carolyn Mahlum-Jenkins, an UMRR Board Member from LWV LaCrosse, said at the event. “There are many pieces to the puzzle of reducing chloride pollution: A single recommendation will not work alone.”
 
Those puzzle pieces include education and training, regulation and policy, monitoring, and financial support among various programs and partnerships, Mahlum-Jenkins said.
 
While experts emphasized there is no natural or feasible way to pull existing salt out of our water bodies or to mitigate pollution once salt is put down, there is promise in collectively working toward best practices as individuals, communities and regions, they said.
 
For instance, programs like the Salt Smart Collaborative, a program of The Conservation Foundation, encourages the use of Salt Smart practices among the winter maintenance workforce by providing resources like workshops and trainings, the Salt Smart Certified program, and targeted outreach materials. 
 
These resources are made available across a range of organizations including transportation agencies, municipalities, park districts and private contractors. 

​At a larger scale, the Upper Mississippi River Region has seen some development in state legislatures. Both the Minnesota and Wisconsin legislatures had bills on salt management in 2024. Though they each failed to cross the finish line — with the Wisconsin bill in particular hitting a wall after Gov. Tony Evers vetoed it — advocates said there are a number of ways individuals can participate in outreach to educate their communities and support legislation moving forward. Those include reaching out to legislators, hosting a ‘Shovel More, Salt Less’ Campaign and promoting Winter Salt Awareness Week. 
 
“If you want to make a difference in your local community, I think getting some signage out can be really powerful,” Allison Madison, Manager of the Wisconsin Salt Wise Program, said at the Aug. 15 webinar. “We had a ‘Shovel More, Salt Less’ campaign in the Madison (Wisconsin) area that was really successful and I’d love to expand that to other communities with your help.”
 
Madison added that advocates can participate in Winter Salt Awareness Week, a January program that has grown from the state to the national level. Partners from a dozen states have committed so far, including Minnesota, Iowa and Missouri.

​Outreach resources, including social media posts, videos, graphics and posters are further available at the Salt Smart Collaborative website, said Hannah Miller, Watershed Program Manager with The Conservation Foundation in Illinois. The website also has blog posts that can be used in local newsletters.
 
For those based in Northeastern Illinois, Miller added the Salt Smart Collaborative has a traveling exhibit that can be displayed at local libraries. 
 
For more hands-on participation, Illinois advocates can become Winter Chloride Watchers of their local waterways through a partnership between The Conservation Foundation and Illinois RiverWatch. Volunteers collect and report results from November through May, with training offered in October.
 
Outside of Illinois, individuals across the nation can participate in a similar monitoring program through the Izaak Walton League of America’s Salt Watch initiative.
 
LWV UMRR’s Aug. 15 program, “A View from Illinois, Minnesota and Wisconsin on SaltSmart Practices,” was recorded on Zoom and can be found at tinyurl.com/UMMRSaltSmart.