Chattahoochee Riverkeeper (CRK) -- formerly known as Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeeper (UCR) -- is an environmental advocacy organization with 10,000 members dedicated solely to protecting and restoring the Chattahoochee River Basin. CRK was modeled after New York’s Hudson Riverkeeper and was the 11th licensed program in the international Waterkeeper Alliance. In 2012, the organization officially changed its name to simply Chattahoochee Riverkeeper (CRK), dropping the "Upper" to better reflect its stewardship over the entire river basin. CRK’s primary geographic focus begins at the river's headwaters in the north Georgia mountains above Helen and continues downstream to West Point Lake, encompassing more than 200 miles (320 km) of the Chattahoochee River and 3,600 square miles (9,300 km2) of watershed. The Chattahoochee River meets the Flint River above Lake Seminole to become the Apalachicola River in Florida. CRK is best known for its legal action against the City of Atlanta which resulted in the city revitalizing their infrastructure to address a major sewage problem, thus ensuring a cleaner river for the community. CRK "actively uses advocacy, education, research, communication, cooperation, monitoring and legal actions to protect and preserve the Chattahoochee and its watershed." History Upper Chattahoochee Riverkeeper was founded in 1994 by Laura Turner Seydel and Rutherford Seydel. Modeling the Chattahoochee program after New York's aggressive and successful Hudson Riverkeeper, they sought to create a focused environmental advocacy initiative led by professional staff and committed volunteers. With funding from the Turner Foundation and other local supporters, UCR officially opened its doors for business on March 1, 1994. Since 1994, a dedicated and diverse board of directors has guided the organization in its transformation from a scrappy group of paddlers, scientists, anglers and environmental activists to a respected organization that has won many victories for the Chattahoochee River Basin. Since its founding, Sally Bethea has served as Executive Director and Riverkeeper. The group changed its name to Chattahoochee Riverkeeper in 2012. After 20 years of running the organization, Sally Bethea retired at the end of 2014. The organization had grown substantially since its founding, and, as a result, CRK divided Bethea’s role into two separate positions: riverkeeper and executive director. The role of riverkeeper was filled by longtime staff member Jason Ulseth, and CRK’s general counsel, Juliet Cohen, became the new executive director. In 2015, the non-profit won a $10 million Clean Water Act settlement: one of the largest in Georgia's history. A U.S.