The National Wild and Scenic Rivers Act protects less than ¼ of a percent of the United States’ river miles, focusing on free-flowing rivers of good water quality with outstandingly remarkable values for recreation, scenery, and other unique river attributes. It predates the enactment of the Clean Water Act, yet includes a clear anti-degradation principle, that pollution should be reduced and eliminated on designated rivers, in cooperation with the federal Environmental Protection Agency and state pollution control agencies. However, the federal Clean Water Act lacks a clear management framework for implementing restoration activities to reduce non-point source pollution, of which bacterial contamination impacts nearly 40% of the Wild and Scenic Rivers. A case study of the Musconetcong River, in rural mountainous New Jersey, indicates that the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act can be utilized to mobilize and align non-governmental, governmental, philanthropic, and private land-owner resources for restoring river water quality. For example, coordinated restoration efforts on one tributary reduced bacterial contamination by 95%, surpassing the TMDL goal of a 93% reduction. Stakeholder interviews and focus groups indicated widespread knowledge and motivation to improve water quality, but resource constraints limited the scale and scope of restoration efforts. The authors postulate that the Partnership framework, enabled in the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act, facilitated neo-endogenous rural development through improving water quality for recreational usage, whereby bottom-up restoration activities were catalyzed via federal designation and resource provision. However, further efforts to address water quality via voluntary participatory frameworks were ultimately limited by the public sector’s inadequate funding and inaction with regard to water and wildlife resources in the public trust.

The Musconetcong (New Jersey) and the Sudbury-Assabet-Concord (Massachusetts) are federally-designated Partnership Wild and Scenic Rivers, a model for river conservation under the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. These two rivers are embedded in a patchwork of private and public land ownership. The Act has been used to facilitate partnerships among municipal, state, federal and local non-profit actors to implement river conservation plans. These partnerships have supported community science-based monitoring to make the case for dam removal and stricter water pollution controls. Two case studies examine using community science to provide actionable data to decision-makers. In New Jersey, a documented increase in macroinvertebrates post-dam removal supported additional dam removals, leading to the return of American shad to the river. Quality controls and training proved to be key components. In Massachusetts, stricter effluent discharge permits reduced instream Total Phosphorus from 0.8 mg/L in 1999 to the eutrophication threshold of 0.023–0.05 mg/L. Community engagement in river science and stewardship was an important co-benefit. As many US rivers evolve from generating hydropower and conveying waste into major recreational resources, local organizations are uniquely positioned to engage the public and generate quality-controlled data to use in advocating for major improvements in water and habitat quality. Useful policy and regulatory frameworks for broader applicability are suggested.