The town of Windham has opened the application window for its watershed protection program.

Mary Wicklund, environmental and sustainability coordinator for Windham, said the grant program has existed since 2018 and was created using the excise tax from watercraft registration. The program covers all bodies of water within the town of Windham, including those shared with other communities, such as Highland Lake and Little Sebago Lake.

According to a town document, the projects applying for the grant must “promote community-based efforts to protect and restore diverse natural resources,” and can include environmental education programs, removal and replacements of noxious vegetation, inventories and monitoring of natural areas, as well as infrastructure improvements that fit with stormwater best management practices.

The grants will require a minimum of 50% total match, which may consist of in-kind labor, materials, equipment or other funding sources. Volunteer hours, which will be valued at $34.79 an hour, can only constitute 25% of the total. In 2024, for every $1 of town grant funds awarded, the Watershed Grant Program resulted in $3 matched from the applicants, Wicklund said.

Some of the grant’s recipients in 2024 included the Collins Pond Improvement Association and Little Sebago Lake Association, which were awarded $5,000 and $15,329, respectively, to prevent the spread of invasive milfoil in local bodies of water; the Duck Pond West Road Association, which was awarded $15,338 for improvements to Highland Shore Road; and the Lower Lantern Lane Road Association, which was awarded $5,600 for the first phase of its drain improvement project.

While Windham has not received any applications yet, Wicklund said people have reached out about the grant program. The program is reaching out to road associations in order to get the word out, and the application window has been moved up by a month compared to previous years, with the hope that, by the time the town has reviewed the applications and selected recipients, it will have more time to line up contractors for the projects.

In addition to the grant program, Wicklund also said Windham has been working with Falmouth for a number of years on preserving Highland Lake and is looking at a similar partnership with Gray regarding shared bodies of water such as the Pleasant River.

Applications for the grant are open until March 2. Application interviews will be conducted on March 18, with the grant recipients selected by April 14. The application can be found at windhammaine.us. For more information, contact Wicklund at 777-1948 or [email protected].