• The Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy received $25,000 for survey costs in an effort to purchase 448 acres in eastern Haywood County. Earlier this year, the organization landed a $1.2 million grant from the Clean Water Management Trust Fund to help purchase the property, now called the Chestnut Mountain Park property and formerly known as the Canton Motorsports property. SAHC hopes to acquire the land and make it available for public recreation, permanently protecting designated trout waters and 9 miles of stream. It is currently exploring options with the Town of Canton and Haywood County to see if the land would make a good natural resource protective public park. 
• American Rivers received $30,500 to support the second and final phase of design, engineering and permitting of the Beaverdam Creek dam removal project in Canton.
• Haywood Waterways Association received a total of $67,655 split into two separate grants. Of that amount, $50,000 will go toward continued coordinated community efforts to address water quality issues, implement the Haywood Watershed Action Plan and increase public appreciation of water resources through educational programs and publications. The remaining $17,655 will help repair failing septic systems for low-income homeowners identified by the Haywood County Health Department. 
• The N.C. Arboretum Society received $22,000 to complete the transformation of a sediment catch basin into an innovative stormwater wetland complex by converting part of a parking lot to permeable pavers.
• Asheville GreenWorks received $25,000 to decrease the amount of litter, pollution and erosive material flowing into area waterways and to increase awareness about protecting resources, mainly through support to the Youth Environmental Leadership Program.
• The Environmental Quality Institute received $40,000 to help fund its VWIN and SMIE programs, as well as its AmeriCorps Project Conserve position, all of which support volunteer stream monitoring throughout the Pigeon and French Broad River basins.
• Mountain Valleys Resource Conservation & Development Council received $52,000 split between two separate grants. Of the total, $40,000 will fund projects including continued work with the Ivy River Partnership, youth education programs and the purchase and installation of a Trash Trout Junior to collect litter in a local stream. The remaining $12,000 will be used to decommission the package sewage treatment plant behind Laurel Elementary School located on Shelton Laurel Creek in Madison County.

Since 1996, the Pigeon River Fund has distributed more than $7.6 million in grants. The money comes from Duke Energy in exchange for the company’s damming the Pigeon River for hydropower. The fund is managed by the Community Foundation of Western North Carolina.