Susan Lynch

Region: Hill Country

Topics: Rivers, Agriculture, Water, Non-profit, Private lands


In her early life and career, Ms Lynch trained in bacteriology and worked as a microbiologist.  Later she worked abroad as a reporter and editor for magazines, newspapers and wire services, focusing on Third World and alternative lifestyle subjects.  She put much of what she learned in writing about simpler and more sustainable ways of life toward a hands-on career as an organic farmer and artisan in France, and later as co-manager of the Frio Valley Vineyards and Nursery in Rio Frio, Texas.

Her life and work in the Frio River valley helped her understand that the River was being harmed by trash, dredging, driving, logging, and subdividing in and along the Frio.  Her concerns about the damage to the River led her to organize the Friends of the Frio conservation group in 1988, which she served as a board member and newsletter writer for the next decade.  The group was involved in river cleanups, monitoring projects, and successful lobbying for a ban on driving in the streambeds. 

These same concerns about the river brought her to serve on the board of the Nueces River Authority beginning in the early 1990s.  The Authority is responsible for the Frio, Atascosa and Nueces Rivers, reaching from the headwaters in the Hill Country to the outflow near Corpus Christi.  During her tenure, the Authority dealt with a variety of environmental issues, including the pipeline from Lake Texana to Corpus Christi, the proposal of a nuclear waste disposal site near Sanderson, and the regulation of releases from the Choke Canyon reservoir.  Though she has rotated off the board, she continues to serve on the Authority's Clean Rivers steering committee.

February 21, 2006
Uvalde, Texas
Reels 2355 and 2356