LEWISTON – Water quality experts are hoping south Lewiston neighbors will help clean up a winding brook that feeds the Androscoggin River.

City and state officials are creating a plan to improve and protect the watershed feeding into Hart Brook. They’ve scheduled a meeting to discuss ways to protect the area at 7 p.m. April 5 at L-A College.

Their goal is to repair damage to the stream that wanders around southern Lewiston, from the Lewiston Industrial Park past Plourde Parkway to the Androscoggin River. The proposed watershed would include 2,000 acres, from Pleasant Street in the east, Randall Road in the north, Webster Road in the west and south past the Maine Turnpike.

“The brook itself is pretty small, but a lot of what happens to larger streams and pond happens here,” said environmental engineer Kristie Rabasca of Edwards and Kelcey.

Continued development along southern Lewiston means less runoff trickles through the ground to feed and filter the brook’s water table. The brook dwindles down to nothing.

“Then, when a big storm comes along, it washes all of the pollutants from the streets and parking lots right into the brook,” she said.

The brook did have fish at one time, but not anymore.

“I don’t think anything is going to live in it now,” she said.

The river was given a below-B status rating by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection. B is a middle-to-low rating on a scale that ranges from a high of AA to a low of C.

“So the goal is to find a way to get that brook back to meeting those water quality standards,” Rabasca said.

Solutions in other states have included planting filtering plants along the stream and educational programs aimed at neighbors.

“What we do locally depends on these meetings,” Rabasca said. There will be four meetings overall, culminating in a final report to the DEP in the fall.