Keeping Sleepy Creek healthy is the cornerstone of our area's future

Awards

SCWA 2008 Volunteer of the Year
Robert H. Velte
from The Morgan Messenger, April 23, 2008

The Sleepy Creek Watershed Association wish to honor Robert H. Velte as their 2008 Volunteer of the Year. He was one of the original organizers of the association and was instrumental in setting up the organization in 2002 by helping write the by-laws and articles of incorporation. He has served as treasurer since its incorporation in 2003.

He was born in Hackensack, N.J., and chose a career in government service with the Central Intelligence Agency. While serving in Vienna, Austria, he met his future wife  Grita and they were married in California four years later. They have a son living in California, a daughter in Mr. Airy, Md., and four grand children.

The Veltes made their home in Rockville, Md., when they were in the United States. In 1988 on a weekend drive, they discovered a 46 acre property on Sleepy Creek and purchased it. They spent two years as weekenders while they remodeled the old farm house and moved to Morgan County permanently in 1990. Here they are avid bridge players in several groups, and he has organized a local book club.

Long-time stream monitor and SCWA member Eddie Bilizekian first interested him in Sleepy Creek. Bilizekian set up a monitoring site on the Velte's property and he began to help him survey the creek and "count bugs", those macro invertebrates that help determine the health of a stream. He continues to help monitor the stream and has taken training to become a certified stream monitor. He has also helped organize and participated in several riparian buffer plantings and streambank stabilization and reconstruction projects.

The Purple Loosestrife Task Force  has counted on him, the acting treasurer, to keep track of funds from a $20,000 grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Fund and more than $4,000 fro Canaan Valley Institute. The funds have been expended over a three-year period, and final accounting has been completed.

The association is grateful for his faithful accounting  of SCWA's funds and his help in tracking state and federal grants to the organization. They are pleased to honor Robert Velte as their Volunteer of the Year.

2005 District Watershed of the Year
in Recognition of Water Quality Enhancement Activities

Presented by the Eastern Panhandle Conservation District, October 2005

2005 Watershed Association of the Year

2005 West Virginia
Conservation Watershed Award

2003 Eastern Panhandle Conservation Watershed of the Year

Sleepy Creek Watershed Association
P.O. Box 991
Berkeley Springs, WV 25411