The Langley Main Street Association (LMSA) was recently awarded a $500 grant from the Whidbey Island Garden Tour for its Second Street rain garden.

The grant was one of nine grants given by Whidbey Island Garden Tour this year to nonprofits, which help in creating garden projects for community improvement and enhancement. After a previous garden failed, it was redesigned in 2015 by Langley Main Street Association intern Emily Martin, a horticulture graduate from the University of Oregon State and 2011 graduate of South Whidbey High School. Martin designed a rocky channel for better water flow through the middle of the garden and to guide water throughout the rest of the bed. New plants were also planted with more diverse variety in size, color and fragrance.

Rain gardens capture and filter polluted runoff from road surfaces.

The association also plans to make the rain garden an educational tool to help explain their importance in filtering street runoff that often contains heavy metals, gas and oil. It’s also part of a pilot project to help encourage and education building owners about stormwater run-off and methods to clean it before it enters storm systems and Puget Sound.