Department of Water Resources
A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment
January 24, 2008
4. Water Quality
WATER RUNOFF ISSUES:
New runoff rules pushed back: After fires, county, cities get 60-day extension on stormwater studies
By Gig Conaughton, staff writer
County and city officials have been given extra time because of the recent wildfires to show how they are complying, or plan to comply, with a controversial stormwater permit passed a year ago.
The permit requires local governments to cut pollution flowing down streets and storm drains to the sea, fouling streams and lagoons and closing beaches.
That would have been about one year since the water board approved the 119-page permit on Jan. 24, 2007, over objections from government, business, development and other groups who said it was too expensive.
The water board extended its deadline until March 22, because the October wildfires required county and city personnel to work on the disaster's cleanup, debris removal and erosion control, not the permit.
Water board officials said Tuesday that the county and cities could eventually be fined up to $10,000 a day or more if they fail to submit compliance plans in March.
That would add to the increasing millions of dollars the permit will cost taxpayers to clean streams and beaches.
That hike is part of what amounts to a 75 percent spike in just two years in the cost of a regional water monitoring program run by
John Van Rhyn, the county's manager of water quality, said the program's cost increased from $1.1 million in 2006-07 to $1.49 million in 2007-08, and was expected to increase to $1.93 million in 2008-09.
Regulating runoff
The region's first stormwater permit was passed in 1990 and has been updated twice.
The 2007 revision will require the county and cities to increase their monitoring and testing of many existing programs such as street sweeping, testing streams and storm drains to track pollution, and monitoring equipment meant to extract pollutants from runoff.
It will also require local governments to take new actions. Those will include encouraging developers to build so that rain from rooftops and gutters fall onto open ground, where pollutants can seep harmlessly into the soil rather than down driveways and streets into storm drains.
Officials said that even though previous versions of the stormwater permit have been in effect for years, almost all lagoons, streams and watersheds are polluted and that beach closures occur when it rains.
That requires the 2007 revision's stricter monitoring and enforcement, they said.
The permit, a regional application of the federal Clean Water Act, requires the county, 18 cities, the Port District and San Diego County Regional Airport Authority to create rules to make sure that builders, businesses and the public comply with the permit as well.
Control board officials and environmental activists say the permit is the best way to protect waterways, now and in the future.
David Gibson, supervisor of control board's southern watershed unit, said stormwater runoff was "public enemy number one" when it came to water pollution in
Stormwater runoff is defined as rain and irrigation water that runs down gutters and storm drains, carrying pesticides, fertilizers, animal fecal matter, oil from cars, sediment from building sites, and other pollutants to beaches, streams and lagoons.
"Hopefully, residents should see cleaner water and fewer beach closures in the summer," Gibson said of the revised permit.
Costs rising for cities
But taxpayer costs are also increasing, a collection of city and county officials said this week.
Carlsbad Public Works manager Linda Kermott said that the city's stormwater budget in fiscal year 2006-07 was $1,780,483, with roughly eight full-time employees.
She said that increased to $2,726,943 in 2007-08, plus three more employees. Kermott said it was too soon to know what the city's costs would be in 2008-09.
Filar said that those costs could rise by $300,000 to $400,000 in the coming year, and that the city was probably going to have to hire private companies to increase its street sweeping.
But Strommer said the 2007-08 figure was inflated because the city was legally required to spend $300,000 to help monitor the Agua Hedionda and
Strommer said
Builders worried
Some officials said they are already carrying out some of the new actions required by the revised stormwater permit, but more work remained to come into compliance.
Van Rhyn said the county and cities are still trying to create a public education campaign aimed at prodding citizens into controlling pollution.
He gave as an example reducing the amount of pesticides and fertilizers used on lawns and gardens that could be washed by irrigation and rainfall to storm drains.
Cid Tesoro, program manager for the county's Land Use and Environmental Group, said planners had not completed ordinance changes that would make businesses and developers treat polluted water at their sites, and in some cases, prevent it as much as possible from running off.
Those rules could make new buildings less safe, said representatives of the Building Industry Association. The association, along with cities, the county and school districts, unsuccessfully asked the state to intervene and overturn the new permit last year.
"Infiltration (of water) could undermine foundations if not done properly," association spokesman Scott Molloy said.
The building association also says that the new permit puts an unfair burden on development.
New ordinances that require more stringent monitoring and runoff collection at construction sites, Molloy said, would have no effect on the pollution constantly created by older housing and business sites that allow irrigation and rainwater to carry pollutants and sediments off their land.
"It's very aggressive, very costly, and will raise the price of housing, no doubt about it," Molloy said of the permit. "And it's not going to significantly improve the overall water quality of stormwater runoff entering our bays and ocean."
But the water board's Gibson, remembering the days when people would cavalierly dump motor oil and other pollutants down storm drains, said the permit was badly needed to help clean up the environment.
"People used to consider storm drains trash cans," Gibson said. "They'd put all sorts of debris into them and hope that by some miracle somebody else was taking care of it.
"Well, the truth was that nobody was taking care of it, and that it was ending up on our beaches and waterways."
http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2008/01/24/news/top_stories/1_03_491_23_08.txt
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