About Us: New Hampshire Rivers Council

Annual Report 2012 (PDF 772kb: best printed double-side on legal-sized paper)

The New Hampshire Rivers Council has made many significant contributions to river and watershed conservation. The following is a small sample:

  • Partnered in a comprehensive study of the value of surface waters in New Hampshire.
  • Worked with grassroots organizations to implement minimum water levels on protected rivers.
  • Worked with policy makers to preserve protections against harm caused by sludge spreading along rivers and over aquifers.
  • Participated in the Citizens for New Hampshire Land & Community Heritage Coalition to work with the Governor's Commission on Land & Community Heritage to recommend a new, permanent and adequately funded program for land conservation in New Hampshire.
  • Advised numerous river groups considering or applying for inclusion to the State Rivers Management and Protection Program, most recently the Souhegan and Isinglass rivers.
  • Supported several Local River Advisory Committees in their successful quest to remove their exclusions in the Comprehensive Shoreland Protection Act to include the Upper and Lower Merrimack, Lamprey, Contoocook and North Branch, and Swift Rivers — rivers that are already covered in the River Management & Protection Act, but which were exempted from the important shoreland protection bill when it was passed.
  • In cooperation with other state, regional and national organizations, educated Congress to fund the Land & Water Conservation Fund — our nation's single most significant source of land and water protection funding.
  • Partnered with the New Hampshire Lakes Association to create a Watershed Stewardship Program.
  • Joined other New Hampshire organizations to negotiate a creative license agreement for the 15-mile Falls dam on the Connecticut River. In a cooperative, non-adversarial process, conservation and recreation groups worked with the dam owner on an agreement that will provide better protection to the river ecosystem and preserve almost 12,000 acres of land on the river and surrounding the Connecticut Lakes.

Current Goals
  1. Ensure that the "instream flow rules" that protect the ecosystem of rivers in the state management program are established.
  2. Contribute to a study of the economic value of the state's rivers and lakes.
  3. Conduct workshops for citizens and decision makers regarding important river issues.
  4. Coordinate river and watershed groups statewide to help them work on river and watershed issues.
  5. Strengthen our organization's leadership and membership

Priorities
  • Educating and informing the public and decision makers about the benefits and value of New Hampshire's rivers, watersheds and related natural resources;
  • Building a constituency for New Hampshire rivers by coordinating and supporting grassroots river and watershed organizations;
  • Advocating for policies, and funding that conserve river resources and improve their management;
  • Encouraging and supporting the nomination of additional rivers into the state's Rivers Management and Protection Program.

Officers

Michele L. Tremblay, Boscawen, NH
President

Michele L. Tremblay, Principal, naturesource communications, provides organizational development, policy, planning, and training services to federal, state, and local agencies and nonprofit and grassroots groups throughout the Northeast US and Canada from her office in Boscawen. Michele served as chair of the Watershed Advisory Group for the Executive Committee of the Merrimack River Initiative. She has served as a representative to the Upper Merrimack Local Advisory Committee and as its chair and Program Director for the committee's Upper Merrimack Monitoring Program since its inception in 1990. Michele was appointed by the Governor to represent conservation interests on the State Rivers Management Advisory Committee (currently vice-chair) and the State Conservation Committee on the State Lakes Advisory Committee, Historic Agricultural Structures Advisory Committee, and Conservation License Plate Advisory Committee. For two decades, she served on the Boscawen Conservation Commission (that manages the Boscawen Town Forest and Tree Farm) and was its chair for fifteen years. She is active in legislative issues and in 1998, coordinated river conservation groups for the initiation and successful passage of a bill that granted shoreland protection to previously excluded rivers in New Hampshire. She served on the Penacook-Boscawen Water Precinct Board of Commissioners for several years. A New Hampshire native, she has served the region and state in a variety of land, planning, river, and lake conservation groups and received the first NH River Conservationist of the Year in 1998, an Environmental Hero by Proctor Academy in 2002, and a River Network River Hero in 2003. Ms. Tremblay was honored to receive the Helen Award for Volunteerism in 2006 and a President's Volunteer Service Award from the Bush administration in 2008. Michele is a Justice of the Peace in the State of New Hampshire.

Matt Monahan, Goffstown, NH
Vice-president

Matt has been with the Central New Hampshire Regonal Planning Commission since 2006. At the Commission, he specializes in land use, planning board assistance, and economic development. He has also been involved with ordinance and regulation development and, recently, recovery planning. He has a BA in political science from Boston College, an MPA from the University of New Hampshire, and an MA in community economic development from Southern New Hampshire University. Matt served in the Army and Army reserves from 1995 to 2003 obtaining the rank of Staff Sergeant and is currently an officer in the Coast Guard Reserves.

Steven Lowe, Canterbury, NH
Secretary

Steven Lowe has been involved in rivers and streams starting as a boy learning to trout fish with his father. He and his wife Madeleine enjoyed canoeing the Merrimack River from Franklin to Concord many times after moving to Canterbury, NH in 1983. Most impressive to Steve were the abundance of hatching mayflies and caddisflies that indicate good water quality. Even more surprising was the feedback he received from many locals who still regarded the river as a sewer. From that flourished a passion for promoting the river and supporting the removal of the Sewall Falls dam. While already a member of Trout Unlimited and Ducks Unlimited Steven decided to increase his local involvement and became an early volunteer of the Upper Merrimack River Local Advisory Committee (UMRLAC). In the 1990s Steven and Madeleine started their own technical consulting business, Lowe Temperature Solutions, Inc. and raised their two sons. Now as he transitions to an empty nester Steve has been filling his time with UMRLAC rock baskets and ’Bug Nights’, NH Fish & Game salmon program and stream surveys, and TU’s ’Trout in the classroom program.’ As a Director of the Rivers Council Steve hopes to protect New Hampshire’s rivers for the future and to educate young and old in the value and importance of New Hampshire’s rivers and streams.

Danna Truslow, Rye NH

Danna Truslow has been wading in and studying streams, rivers, lakes and estuaries in New Hampshire and throughout Northern New England for over 30 years since she moved here to attend University of New Hampshire. She lives in Rye, New Hampshire with her husband Bill, children Hannah and Sam and dog, Bailey. Her company, Truslow Resource Consulting, LLC, is located in Portsmouth where she specializes in restoration hydrology and water resource evaluation and planning. From 2000 to 2005, she was the executive director of the Seacoast Land Trust, which focused on land protection on a watershed scale. In 2003 she was honored with the Gulf of Maine visionary award for her work in land protection. She volunteers with the Southeast Land Trust of New Hampshire and the newly formed Winnicut River Coalition. Danna looks forward to serving on the NHRC board and hopes to assist with outreach to the many volunteers and professionals who work on river issues in New Hampshire and on issues surrounding the critical headwater areas that support and feed our rivers.

Directors

Rachel Brown, Manchester, NH

Rachel Brown enjoys working as the Senior Program Naturalist for the Amoskeag Fishways Learning and Visitors Center in Manchester. She is a graduate of the University of Vermont, holding a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Biology. Rachel serves on the Upper Merrimack River Local Advisory Committee and has been participating in the water quality monitoring program since 2007. She is the Co-president of the New Hampshire Environmental Educators and is a Board member of the New England Environmental Education Alliance.

Ellen Bryan, Concord, NH

Ellen Heronemus Bryan joins the NHRC Board newly retired after 22 years at St. Paul’s School in Concord, NH. She holds an Applied Baccalaureate in Biology from Wheaton College and a Masters Degree in Environmental Science ’ Limnology from the University of Texas. She has spent 39 years teaching math and science in private institutions in MA, NY, TX and NH from middle school through college levels. Ellen introduced Ecology students to the Turkey River system with classroom and in the field experiences. She taught a designed curriculum for the Merrimack River watershed and the Gulf of Maine. Ellen helped establish a connection with the Upper Merrimack Monitoring Program known as ’Bug Nights’ to allow students to participate on campus as part of the school’s Community Outreach Program. She enjoyed serving on the St. Paul’s School Energy and Environmental Stewardship Committees, using real examples of how ’being a good steward’ of finite resources, especially water and energy, could make a positive difference within a community. Living a more sustainable life has been an on-going personal and educational theme as she has helped educate the next generation of environmental stewards. When not sailing GODOT on the Gulf of Maine with her husband Randy, Ellen can be found riding her horse Quinn, enjoying the beauty of the New Hampshire outdoors.

Dave Magnon, Errol, NH

Dave Magnon comes to the NHRC Board of Directors as the former Chair of the New Hampshire Trout Unlimited Council. During that tenure he was instrumental initiating projects focusing on the coldwater fisheries restorations of the Upper Connecticut River headwaters area and Nash Stream. In addition, he was involved in establishing Trout Unlimited's very successful New Hampshire Youth Trout Camp. As a Certified Fly-Fishing Instructor for the NH Fish and Game Department, Dave has volunteered hundreds of teaching hours each year to the "Let's Go Fishing" and Becoming an Outdoorswoman Programs. He has also mentored survivors of breast cancer in the NH/VT Casting for Recovery retreats, and disabled veterans participating in Project Healing Waters. Mr. Magnon holds BS and MA degrees from Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, Tennessee. He has taught construction and alternative energy technologies at Manchester Community College and is a former adjunct Instructor in English at Hesser College. He lives in Millsfield near the Androscoggin River with the love of his life, Jacqueline, and their dog Buddy.

Rachel Ruppel, Sutton, NH

Rachel Ruppel lives in North Sutton, serves on the Sutton Conservation Commission and volunteers with Ausbon Sargent Land Preservation Trust. She works with Upper Valley Lake Sunapee Regional Planning Commission as a GIS analyst and planner, where she has had the opportunity to work on several natural resource inventories with town Conservation Commissions and support the work of the Connecticut River Joint Commissions and Mascoma River Local Advisory Committee. Before entering the planning field, Rachel served as an AmeriCorps member with Vermont Institute of Natural Science through the Vermont Community Stewardship Program and worked in environmental research in Oregon and in the Catskill Mountains. She earned a B.S. in Environmental Science from the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse, NY. Rachel shares her life with her husband Adam, as well as Briar the dog, Magalloway the cat and a small flock of chickens.

Frank Tupper, Canterbury, NH

Frank Tupper, former NH State Representative and Canterbury Town Selectmen, brings valuable experience and knowledge to the Council after having served on the Resources, Recreation, and Development House Committee as well as the Environment and Agriculture Committee. His love for water and fishing has been life long, spanning all the way to Alaska. Frank enjoyed fishing for a living in Alaska, working as a special education teacher, and producing documentary videos. Frank led the fight to keep a large solid waste landfill off the shores of the Merrimack River.

Honorary Directors

Stephen Blackmer, Canterbury, NH
Camilla Lockwood, Temple, NH
Patricia Schlesinger, New Hampton, NH
Kelly Short, Canterbury, NH