The City of Issaquah’s Public Works Department will soon look into ways to retain greater control of stormwater regulations in the city.
This may include the creation of a regional facility, or the implementation of a neighborhood by neighborhood program that would give the city greater flexibility in its regulation of stormwater detention and the alleviation of stormwater impacts on the environment.
First though, the city is required to update its current regulations to comply with the Washington State Department of Ecology’s (DOE) new “National Pollution Discharge Elimination System” (NPDES) Phase II municipal stormwater permit.
The new permit aims to reduce the volume of pollutants entering natural bodies of water, and to protect streams from erosion.
Broadly what this means is some new projects, and some redevelopment, will have to provide significantly more stormwater detention.
According to the City of Issaquah Web site, this would mostly apply to projects on Issaquah’s valley floor, as projects on the City’s hillsides already have stricter requirements.
The Council Utilities Committee was expected to take action on the drafted amendments to the city’s stormwater code necessary to meet DOE requirements, at its meeting on Thursday, June 11.
The new regulations must come into effect no later than November 15.
But City of Issaquah Surface Water Manager Kerry Ritland said that the DOE requirements could be vastly improved upon, if the city was given the authority to make decisions about storwater retention itself.
“I feel there are more effective ways to deal with waterways than just putting the burden on new development,” he said.
He said the city had commissioned a study by environmental consulting group Parametrix to explore other ways to minimize the impact of development on area aquifers and watersheds.
“The current stormwater directives are based on broad assumptions,” he said.
“But all streams and bodies of water are different. Some provide a spawning habitat, and some don’t.”
He said that his department was just beginning to assess whether the Department of Ecology would be interested in relinquishing the immediate regulation of stormwater detention.
“A lot of this is new ground for (the Department of) Ecology,” he said. “This permitting requires a lot of work, and they have limited staff and resources.”
For more information visit www.ci.issaquah.wa.us/stormwater.
