Meet a Monitor: Keith Hanson
Keith Hanson has always been drawn to water. Growing up in the land of ten thousand lakes, “water was always around.” As a child Keith could be found fishing or playing along the banks of the reservoir near his home and hunting for crayfish in the stream. Family vacations took him to his grandparent’s home along the Mississippi River or to lakes in Northern Minnesota to relax and explore. As Keith puts it, “water was always a part of who we were as a family.” In college, Keith chose to study water resources, which led to a long career working in wastewater treatment in Rochester, MN.
After retirement, Keith couldn’t stay away from water. In March of 2018, Keith attended a Save Our Streams field training hosted by the Rochester Chapter of the Izaak Walton League of America. The training taught Keith how to collect and identify macroinvertebrates in a stream to obtain an overall stream health score. This type of monitoring was appealing to Keith, and so was the community of likeminded individuals he met at the training. After the training, Keith continued monitoring with the Rochester IWLA Chapter and in 2020 he decided to become a member. Now, six years later, Keith is in his third year as Chapter President. He also leads a cohort of chapter members who monitor water quality – several of these Rochester IWLA Chapter members joined to be a part of the water monitoring effort, just as Keith did.
A team of roughly half a dozen members of the Rochester Chapter of the Izaak Walton League regularly monitors two creeks in the area using the League’s Save Our Streams Chemical and Biological methods. Several chapter members supplement this monitoring by using Salt Watch and Nitrate Watch to monitor additional waterways that they care about. You can view the data collected by the Rochester Chapter on the Clean Water Hub database.
The Chapter has also taken steps to share water monitoring information and opportunities with their community. Using outreach supplies provided by the Izaak Walton League’s national staff, the Rochester IWLA Chapter shares information about the League’s water quality monitoring programs at events such as the county fair and Earth Day celebrations. Talking to people at these public events is one of the ways Keith sees the Chapter’s work making a difference. Each person that learns about water quality issues is an opportunity for a small improvement at the individual level.
In January of 2025, Keith and the Rochester IWLA Chapter reached a broader audience in their outreach efforts surrounding Winter Salt Week. In collaboration with the Olmsted Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) and the City of Rochester, the Rochester IWLA Chapter’s water monitoring team committed to increased chemical monitoring on a few streams that were identified as under-monitored. The City and the SWCD would utilize this data in their decision-making surrounding salt application. This collaboration also focused on public outreach and engagement to promote wise salt use. The Chapter helped to equip and educate teams of community members who were new to Salt Watch monitoring, assisting them in testing chloride levels in local streams. In a local news segment, Keith was able to help spread the word about the importance of water monitoring and smart salting. This collaboration has continued in 2026 and expanded to include more extensive chemical monitoring on the streams identified as under-monitored.
It is Keith’s innate love of water that led him to the Izaak Walton League and volunteer water monitoring. It is the community he found that has kept him coming back for more. Keith is quick to point out that, for him, water monitoring is not a solo activity – it is a collective undertaking of the Rochester IWLA Chapter’s water monitoring team. The camaraderie among this team of volunteers, plus the knowledge that the data they collect can be used to improve the waterways they care for, is plenty of motivation to keep pulling Keith back to the water.
If you’d like to nominate yourself or someone you know to be featured in a future Meet a Monitor installment, reach out to the Save Our Streams team at sos@iwla.org.
Your kit will include a bottle containing 25 nitrate test strips which you can use to test your water source(s) throughout the year. You’ll also receive postcards explaining how to use your nitrate test strips and how to share your Nitrate Watch results on the Clean Water Hub.
Your kit will include four test strips so you can test your waterway throughout the season. You’ll also receive a chart to help you interpret your results and a postcard with instructions for completing a Salt Watch test and reporting your findings.