How long should a good PR-Client relationship last?

A year? Six months?  Two years? Only on a per-need project basis -- timeline TBD?

At the Minnehaha Watershed District (MCWD) in the Twin Cities, its relationship with Media Savant Communications (MSC) lasted 10 years!  

That’s a long time, but in PR years, It’s almost unheard of. Nonetheless, the MCWD faced many turf and political battles, floods, irate citizens and other land-based boards, and the occasionally foolish plan, like the one to drain millions of gallons of water out of a city aquifer so the airport commission could build below-ground level terminals for overnight air express companies at the airport (that one did not go well with civic leaders and the general public, and, of course, the MCWD board, which was instrumental in forcing an alternative plan).

The watershed itself stretches 178-square miles from St. Bonifacius to south Minneapolis and includes Lake Minnetonka, the Minneapolis Chain of Lakes, Minnehaha Creek, and Minnehaha Falls. It includes eight major creeks, 129 lakes, and thousands of wetlands – plus it intersects all or part of 27 cities and two townships in Hennepin and Carver counties. Ultimately the MCWD is responsible for 178 square miles of water that drains into the Minnehaha Creek and ultimately the Mississippi River, where it flows to the Gulf of Mexico.

As the local unit of government responsible for managing and protecting the water resources of the Minnehaha Creek Watershed in parts of Minneapolis and its western suburbs, the MCWD has its work cut out for it in any given month. Its education programs, its public policy decisions, its many construction projects (from building stormwater runoff ponds to  bank stabilization to prevent erosion, plus its unending permit requests from private landowners and commercial interests alike, makes for a steady stream of information necessary to inform the public and decision makers in any given city within the MCWD matrix. 

It's a big job. And results from any given project can sometimes take years to yield cleaner water results, flood mitigation, wetland protection and enhancement and overall environmental improvements to both land and water. One such project – which MSC helped publicize as it went from the early approval process to actual physical work on a critical stretch of Minnehaha Creek in the western suburbs -- just recently came to fruition. You can read about that wonderful story here, “Rewilding Minnehaha: A decadelong plan to repair the degraded creek begins to pay off.”

Like most good things, the long MCWD-MSC relationship ended years ago when a new administration took over. But with recent stories like the one above, it’s gratifying to see the fruits of that quality partnership still producing long-term benefits for communities and the environment.