Lime Creeek Watershed Council—meets at Lime Creek Park near Brandon to get an update on work by students in the chemistry program at Coe College in monitoring the water on Lime Creek to measure efforts to reduce contaminants. Lime Creek, a tributary of the Cedar River, just south of Hwy 20, southwest of Independence and empties into the Cedar River at the frontier of Buchanan and Benton counties. Contaminants in runoff from Iowa contribute to a "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico.