"The opportunity there is enormous. It would create an opportunity for Marton people to get some exercise and fresh air."
The society also wants to hold annual stream clean-ups with local schools, encourage landowners to undertake fencing and riparian planting, and create more public access to the stream.
"We should be a lot more focused on these precious resources that flow through our towns that we've used as our waste outlets for so long," Mr Carlyon said.
The society would agree on a plan with council before receiving any funding, which would go towards materials, with volunteers doing the physical work.
The stream starts at a spring about 10km outside Marton. It feeds the town's water treatment plant before heading into town. From town, it becomes increasingly polluted and more so past the Marton Wastewater Treatment Plant at Crofton, where it is currently receiving non-complying discharge.
"I think that, in our own small way, we should take action," Mr Carlyon said.
Deputy Mayor Dean McManaway said the council was spending $2.5 million on the Marton Wastewater Treatment Plant, one of the causes of the stream's poor health. "We've got to be really, really careful with our rates spending," he said.
Mr Carlyon said the cost to fix the plant would be much more than that and would take longer than council had planned to fix it. The society was one small thing the community could do.
Councillor Tim Harris questioned why some land owners hadn't fenced along the stream already. "I would've thought fencing would've been done straightaway. Is there any way we can make them fence that? It's absolutely ridiculous, it's open abuse."