Every storm is a decision point. Rain that soaks into healthy ground recharges our streams. Rain that races off pavement grabs whatever it touches and carries it to the nearest creek. On Tuesday, October 20, the Mid Mon Stormwater Workshop brings together the people who decide which of those two things happens in their town, and it is free to attend. Before the day itself, it is worth two minutes to see why the natural approach works.
The Mid Mon Stormwater Workshop is a free, practical day on managing stormwater and protecting watersheds, Tuesday, October 20, 2026, from 9 AM to 2 PM at the Fayette County Recycling Convenience Center in Uniontown. The H2O Water Network is a co-host. It is built for the people who shape what happens to the rain: municipal staff, local officials, engineers, educators, students, and community leaders. The short film below, from the river conservation group American Rivers, sets up one of the day’s biggest themes: giving water room to spread out.
Here is the idea in about two minutes, from American Rivers:
Floodplains are flood control you do not have to build
Small, regular floods are part of a healthy river’s normal rhythm. The trouble is that decades of filling and paving, plus storms that keep getting bigger and more frequent, have turned those ordinary high-water days into damaging ones. The video makes the case that a natural approach to floodplains, the low-lying ground alongside a river, can take the edge off. When a river has room to spill into a wooded flat or a wetland, that water slows down, drops its sediment, and soaks in instead of tearing downstream into someone’s basement. The same ground that absorbs a flood also feeds the streams in a dry spell and gives fish, waterfowl, and freshwater species a place to live. It is the cheapest flood control there is, because the river builds and maintains it for free.
That is the thinking behind a lot of modern stormwater work, and it is exactly what the Mid Mon Stormwater Workshop is organized around at the community scale.
9 AM to 2 PM, with registration opening at 8:15, at the Fayette County Recycling Convenience Center, 105 Romeo Lane, Uniontown, PA 15401. No cost to attend.
What the day is built around
The workshop is designed to be useful, not theoretical. The organizers sum it up in three words: learn, connect, take action. The goal is to help the people who manage our landscapes understand how stormwater actually behaves, connect with others facing the same headaches across the Mon Valley, and walk out with concrete steps they can bring home to their own communities. If you have a hand in how your town plans, builds, or maintains anything that touches stormwater, from a parking lot to a stream crossing to a municipal separate storm sewer system, this day was built for you.
Why it matters for the rest of us
Stormwater is the problem that touches every other water problem in the basin. It is how pollution reaches a creek, how a streambank washes out, and how a town ends up with water where it does not want it. A free day that teaches the people with their hands on the levers how to do it better is worth clearing a Tuesday for. Watch the video, see why giving water room pays off, and then come spend the day with the folks working on it next door. Registration is open now on the event page.
Video: “Restoring Floodplains,” American Rivers (2025). Workshop details from the Mid Mon Stormwater Workshop event page, co-hosted by the H2O Water Network. Tuesday, October 20, 2026, in Uniontown, PA. Current as of October 1, 2026.
