Rebecca Kreag devoted her entire career to water preservation, with a focus on public involvement and conflict resolution. Now retired, Kreag attributes her successes to her true love for the field.

“As an undergraduate studying math, I couldn’t see a clear future that would touch my heart. So I took time to focus on what brings me joy,” she said. “The answer came as a surprise while I was heading to the bookstore. It was a clear voice in my head saying, ‘If I worked in the field of water, I would be happy for the rest of my life.’”

The rest, as they say, is history: Kreag found that the University of Michigan’s interdisciplinary master’s program in Water Resources Management – funded in part by an EPA scholarship – was just what she needed. Degree in hand, she began a long, rewarding road through Sea Grant at Oregon State University to coastal zone management work, planning and protecting estuaries and wetlands. After working for a government urban run-off program and clean lakes study, Kreag anchored her public service career with the Oregon Water Resources Department. There, she was instrumental in establishing protection policies and restoration tools that helped alleviate the impact of the appropriation rights system on instream flows.

Kreag also coordinated and promoted legislation that created and funded watershed councils comprising diverse local interests, organizations and agencies, with the goal of developing projects to improve the health of watersheds.

“The councils have helped avoid or overcome much of the rancor that tended to exist between agricultural and environmental interests,” she said. This program has since morphed into the Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board, which has ongoing funding through the state’s lottery income.  Kreag went on to develop and implement the City of Portland’s plan for stormwater management, watershed protection, and combined sewer overflow-separation and treatment. To ameliorate a huge combined sewer overflow problem, the stormwater program had a major emphasis on reducing and delaying the arrival of stormwater flow into the drainage system. Approaches included detention and retention ponds, disconnection of gutters from directly flowing into storm drains, purchase of frequently flooded areas and re-establishing the natural flood control functions of the stream, rooftop gardens, street tree planting, infiltration projects and other things specifically target to improve water quality, such as storm sewer catchment cleaning and street sweeping. “When I retired from this program, the work wasn’t finished. It was slowed down because EPA didn’t accept our calculations for the reduction of stormwater inflow and required the same size huge pipe to collect and store stormwater for future treatment. This reduced funds available for the projects, but both have proceeded and the treatment structures are now complete. City watersheds are in much better shape and overflows are a rare occurrence,” Kreag said.

Today, Kreag focuses as much on spiritual connection to the environment as on the practical and more tangible. She participated in a month-long experience with Joanna Macy called Seeds for the Future, and conducted workshops to encourage people to reconnect with nature and to support an evolution toward a more sustainable – and more deeply satisfying – future. She and her partner have used their resources to create a home that reflects that sustainability, she has volunteered with the Portland Audubon Society, and she has been a part of the formation and continuation of her church’s EarthCare Team, which has worked on park restoration and environmental education and action. “We do what we can to stay informed and not get too upset about all of the ways the current president is working to undo the many years of progress that we have been a part of,” Kreag said. “It’s not easy.”