Great news: The Ausable River Porta-John program will continue. They reached their crowd-sourcing goal of $4,000 earlier this month to pay for handicap accessible Porta-Johns required by the state. More than 100 people supported the campaign.

Now they’ve added another $1,000 stretch goal to pay for an initial round of E. coli and total coliform testing of 10 back-country sites this summer and fall, according to Brendan Wiltse, science & stewardship director for the Ausable River Association.

“Our hope is to get some understanding of whether improper waste disposal is leading to contamination of water sources,” Wiltse said in an e-mail.

The results of this test will help make decisions about further testing next year.

There are fourteen days left in this campaign and they are just $730 from their goal. if you’d like to donate and help protect rivers, streams and lakes, here’s your chance.