By visiting a favorite “watering hole” during the month of September, anyone can participate in a campaign to preserve a vital source of water in Tuscaloosa.
Students and residents of Tuscaloosa who visit these various dining and drinking locations can leave behind a fish upon the wall or leave with a custom Sweetwater Save the Black Warrior River pint glass or T-shirt.
The Sweetwater Black Warrior River campaign to raise money to support the Black Warrior Riverkeeper river patrol and water quality monitor partnerships began on Sept. 1 and will continue through the rest of the month.
According to the website, savetheblackwarrior.com, the campaign has already raised more than $20,000 to support the Black Warrior Riverkeeper.
The campaign receives donations through paper fish, pint glass purchases and T-shirt purchases.
The paper fish can be purchased for $1, $5 or $10 and all proceeds are given to the campaign. The T-shirts will usually have the Sweetwater Save the Black Warrior River logo on the back and the supporting establishment’s logo on the front.
Establishments in Tuscaloosa that are participating include the Alcove, Brown’s Corner, Buffalo Wild Wings, Cypress Inn, Downtown Pub, Egan’s, the Houndstooth, Innisfree, Kennedy’s, Mellow Mushroom, Moe’s Original BBQ and the Dixie.
Sarah Halliday, the manager of Cypress Inn, said this is only the second year that Tuscaloosa has participated in the campaign, which also takes place in Birmingham.
Halliday said the campaign is a way to get information about the river and pollution out to the community.
“We’re letting people know how pollution in the river is affecting our community,” Halliday said. “If you go on their website it gives you all the information—like what it is and how pollution affects the water. The money that we’re raising helps to bring awareness about the issue. It raises money to get people out there to find the people that are actually polluting the river and trying to stop it at the source.”
Halliday said the campaign has been going well so far.
“We’ve never participated in the campaign before, and this is only the second year that Tuscaloosa businesses have been involved,” Halliday said. “We didn’t know much about it at first and we had to re-educate ourselves, but actually in the first couple of days we already made $75.”
Erin Loyd, the manager of the Mellow Mushroom in Tuscaloosa, also said the campaign was progressing well.
“We’ve been doing it for a couple years now and we’ve slowly been selling the fish,” Loyd said. “We haven’t sold as many as we could, but it’s just taking off.”
Loyd said employees at Mellow Mushroom have ties to the campaign, which makes everyone at the restaurant even more excited and invested in how it goes.
“We have a few employees that are a part of the foundation, so we have lots of ties to it so we love to support that kind of thing,” Loyd said.
Justin Luke, the manager of Buffalo Wild Wings, said that the campaign is still just getting on its feet.
“It just started,” Luke said. “This is our first time to actually do it. Some of our other locations in Birmingham have been doing it for a while, and they always have great donations and made lots of money to save the river. Hopefully we can match what they get.”
Savetheblackwarrior.com states that, “The Black Warrior River watershed is a vital source of wildlife habitat, recreation and drinking water for the Tuscaloosa and Birmingham areas.”
The website encourages people to participate by simply visiting their favorite “watering holes” in the month of September and purchasing one of the promotional items.
Save the Black Warrior River campaigning locations:
Alcove, Brown’s Corner, Buffalo Wild Wings, Cypress Inn, Downtown Pub, Egan’s, the Houndstooth, Innisfree, Kennedy’s, Mellow Mushroom, Moe’s Original BBQ and the Dixie.
