For more than 25 years, Chattahoochee Riverkeeper has worked as guardian of one of the most valuable resources on Earth — water.

Since becoming established in 1994, the nonprofit has implemented myriad initiatives, programs and other efforts to protect and preserve the Chattahoochee River, its lakes and watershed.

The nonprofit’s roots span across the entire Chattahoochee River Basin, starting above Lake Lanier in Helen and joined by the Flint and Apalachicola rivers all the way to Apalachicola, Florida, and the Gulf of Mexico.

“Everyone has a vested interested in clean water,” Hannah Warner, Gainesville’s headwaters office outreach coordinator said. “There’s not a single person in the world that can live without clean water. Even if you’re not in the Chattahoochee Watershed, you’re standing in a watershed regardless of where you are. You have to protect that resource.”

Planting the first seed grant

Chattahoochee Riverkeeper was born after Atlanta’s Turner Foundation provided a seed grant of $50,000 to the new nonprofit in 1994.

The organization was founded by Rutherford and Laura Seydel and started with an office in Atlanta.

Sally Bethea served for 20 years as executive director and riverkeeper overseeing the organization’s programs. Bethea retired in 2014 and becoming the nonprofit’s senior adviser.

Jason Ulseth now serves as the riverkeeper, and Juliet Cohen works as the executive director.

Starting as a small organization, Chattahoochee Riverkeeper grew from having only an office in Atlanta, to opening satellite offices in Gainesville and LaGrange.

Dale Caldwell, Gainesville’s headwaters director, said Chattahoochee Riverkeeper compiled a record of accomplishments, discovering that the organization’s efforts resulted in an expenditure of more than $2.1 billion by government agencies, developers, industries and landowners to restore the watershed.

“For every dollar that has been contributed in the last 25 years, there has been at least $75 worth of measurable benefits to the people, communities and wildlife in the Chattahoochee River Watershed,” Warner said.

Early in the nonprofit’s history, one of its notable initiatives involved the 1995 lawsuit against the City of Atlanta to correct its failing sewer and stormwater systems, which were dumping raw sewage into the river and streams flowing through neighborhoods.

The city overhauled its stormwater and sewer infrastructure.

“When we sued the city in 1995, the result was a consent decree that forced the city to spend $2 billion to address the issue,” Caldwell said.

Through examining the water quality data from the 1990s and comparing them to today, Chattahoochee Riverkeeper concludes the bacteria levels in the Chattahoochee downstream of Atlanta are 80 percent lower.

Programs impacting water quality

Caldwell, who has worked at the nonprofit’s office in Gainesville for more than three years, said a couple of the organization’s noteworthy programs include the Neighborhood Water Watch, Lake Lanier monitoring and industrial stormwater program.