This document summarizes strategies and findings from an environmental initiative in Itasca County, Minnesota. It discusses (1) marketing and behavior change strategies to encourage stewardship, (2) results from a survey of shoreland owners that found most want to be good stewards but lack knowledge of ordinances, (3) focus group feedback requesting more information and assistance, (4) observations from boat surveys that shorelines could be improved, and (5) the Itasca Lake Challenge program that provides shoreline evaluations and resources to property owners. Next steps include developing a web version of the Lake Challenge and further expanding the program model to new regions, demographics, and lake development levels.

1. Environmental Initiative
St.Cloud, MN
2011 November 7
Mary Blickenderfer
U of MN Extension Educator

2. Additional funding provided by Itasca County
Environmental Trust Fund

3. Erika Rivers, MN DNR
Karlyn Eckman, U of MN research fellow
Michael Goldberg, Action Media
Mark Hauck, MN DNR
Steve Henry, Otter Tail SWCD
Itasca County Itasca SWCD
Itasca Master Gardeners
Volunteers

4. Itasca NSBI Program Building:
1. Marketing and behavior change strategies
2. Knowledge, Attitude and Practices (KAP) survey
3. Focus group of shoreland owners
4. Boat-by “survey”
5. Fourteen years experience
TAKE-HOME MESSAGES…

5. Marketing/behavior change strategies
 Frame Message/Word choice
 Peer-peer delivery most effective (dissemination)
 Small incentives can be effective
 Community norms/modeling
 Remove barriers
 Entry-level activity
 Public commitment
Karlyn Eckman, personal communication
Action Media, personal communication
McKenzie-Mohr, D. and W. Smith. 1999. Fostering Sustainable Behavior.

6. KAP survey*
 2/3 are SEASONAL owners
 Lake association is great link to owners
 68% prefer native shorelines
 ALL want to be good stewards of their property
 Huge interest in fish & wildlife
 40% enjoy lawn maintenance
 Little perception of lake trends 68%
 None could describe ordinances
*results based upon 109 door-door and 116 mail-in survey responses of 340
total 10K property owners on 5 lakes in Itasca Co.

7. KAP survey (cont.)
 Incentives: Detailed information and instruction (64%),
technical support (51%), “how-to” workshop (48%),
input on design (48%), financial support (42%), labor
assistance (37%)
 Constraints: already have a natural shore (81%), like
shore the way it is (19%), time (7%), don’t know where to
start (6%), physical limitations (5%), like lawn (5%),
cost (4%), too much work (4%), block view (2%)

8. Focus Group
 More information/assistance on buffers
 Individual site visit by trained professional

9. Boat-by survey
 Ground-truth KAP survey (many shores have buffer)
 Nearly all shorelines could be improved (for wildlife
habitat, run-off, visual screen, etc.)

10. Fourteen years of experience:
 Shoreland owner continuum
 Buffer installation overwhelming (on large frontages)
 Little recognition/options for those already with buffers

11. Itasca NSBI Program
 Local resource network
 Program Promotion (primarily via Lake Associations)
 Trained Master Gardeners conduct site visits
 Follow-up with requested resources
 Recognition of participants
 Data entry and management
 Evaluation
***Local coordinator***

12. The Lake Challenge
 On site shore evaluation tool
 Face-to-face site visit
 No cost, no obligation
 Simple
 Educational
 Follow-up assistance

13. The Lake Challenge (cont.)
 Something for everyone
 Immediate feedback/suggestions
 Owners choose Challenges

17. KAP #2 Results*
 Little change in Knowledge and Attitude
 25 % knew of the Lake Challenge
 78% of these via lake association or neighbor
 15% engaged in lake- and wildlife-friendly behavior
due to Lake Challenge (buffer, citizen research, frog
survey, fish sticks, etc.)
 Motivating factor to take Lake Challenge was
opportunity to interact with professional
(stewardship)
* Eckman, K. 2011. Itasca NSBI Social Research Report.

18. Next steps...
 Web version of the Itasca Lake Challenge

19. Next steps (cont.)
 Further develop “program”
 Test program applicability to different regions?
Different demographics? Different levels of lake
development?
 Statewide use? Beyond?

20. Questions?