On Jan. 17, Ecology issued the NPDES and State Waste Discharge Permit for Discharges from small Municipal Separate Storm Sewers in Western Washington (the Phase II Permit) that covers at least 80 cities and five counties that had not been previously regulated.

As authorized by the Clean Water Act, the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Phase II of the NPDES storm water program will expand permitting requirements to include the small MS4s serving populations within an “urbanized area” often including different jurisdictions based on US census counts. The 2000 census identified urban concentrations under the rule to include the cities — Gig Harbor, Bainbridge Island, Poulsbo, Bremerton, Port Orchard — and Silverdale in unincorporated Kitsap County.

Under the Phase II permits, the state will require cities and counties to develop and use a stormwater management program to control stormwater discharges into their storm sewer systems. As required by the federal Clean Water Act, discharges covered under this permit must effectively prohibit non-stormwater discharges into storm sewers that discharge to surface waters and apply controls to reduce the discharge of pollutants to the Maximum Extent Practicable (MEP). Ecology is also taking action (through the issuance of this permit) to control impacts of stormwater discharges to all waters of Washington State, including ground waters.

Stormwater contains pollutants that wash off rooftops, parking lots, rural areas, industrial facilities and streets. For example, water flowing in the streets picks up trash, dust, dirt and other materials that have been deposited on the pavement. The dust includes fine particles of rubber and metals from tire wear, settled air pollutants, trace metals from brake pads and other mechanical sources, and pet feces. Cars drip motor oil onto the pavement and flows often carry petroleum sheens. Many of these sources are not under the direct control of the municipalities that own or operate the storm sewers. Pollutants include heavy metals (e.g., chromium, cadmium, copper, lead, mercury, nickel, zinc), pesticides, herbicides, nutrients, bacteria, and synthetic organic compounds such as fuels, waste oils, solvents, lubricants and grease.

Stormwater is the leading contributor to water quality pollution in our urban waterways and as urban areas grow, it is also Washington’s fastest growing water quality problem. Pollutants resulting from stormwater can cause a wide range of impacts. Untreated stormwater is not safe for people to drink, is unsafe for swimming, and can be toxic to aquatic organisms because it contains toxic metals, organic toxins, bacteria, oil and grease. Sediments cause tissue abrasion and gill clogging in fish, they reduce light and impair algal growth, they smother fish spawning habitat and transport other pollutants. Nutrients accelerate eutrophication of lakes and ponds resulting in nuisance algal blooms, reduced clarity, odors and reduced drinking water quality.

The large impervious surfaces in urban areas increase the quantity and peak flows of runoff, which in turn cause hydrologic impacts such as scoured streambed channels, in-stream sedimentation and loss of habitat. Furthermore, because of the enormous volume of runoff discharges, mass loads of pollutants in stormwater can be significant, causing water quality problems such as fish and benthos disease and mortality, swimming beach and shellfish bed closures and contamination of wells.

In the Olympic peninsula, urban stormwater impairs streams that provide salmon habitat and paved surfaces cause higher winter stormwater flows that erode stream channels, destroying spawning beds. Also, because more water flows away during the wet season, streams can lose summertime base flows, drying out habitat needed for salmon rearing.

Storm water management has been put on the back burner for years in many of these newly regulated small MS4s because it just isn’t as visible of a priority to communities as the repair of roads, or police and fire protection. As a result, storm water systems in these communities are decrepit and in need of repair while increasing development and expanding roads have amplified runoff problems and overloaded existing systems.

Ecology encourages the removal of administrative barriers to the use of Low Impact Development (LID) techniques and has incorporated into the Western Washington Continuous Simulation Hydrology Model (WWHM) flow credits for various flow related LID techniques. These credits reflect the expected flow reductions using LID techniques and, depending on the project, result in significant reductions or even elimination of the need for more traditional flow control BMPs.

LID-designed sites have fewer impervious surfaces and use vegetation, healthy soils, small-scale storage, and dispersion and infiltration techniques to manage stormwater close to where it originates. The result is less polluted runoff that needs to be managed in smaller, centralized stormwater facilities, such as ponds. In some cases, centralized stormwater facilities may not be necessary. LID strategies both distribute storm water runoff and collect rainwater through utilization/harvest, recycling, small-scale treatment techniques, managing flow and filtration that achieve the hydrologic function equivalent to predevelopment conditions.

As part of Governor Chris Gregoire’s long-term effort to help protect and restore Puget Sound, Ecology provided $2.5 million to 10 local governments in the Puget Sound region to help fund innovative, LID stormwater management projects — including four in Kitsap County.

Bremerton’s Blueberry Park and Urban Gardens was awarded $195,000 so the seven-acre park on Sylvan Way can become a showcase for LID techniques. Permeable pavement in parking areas and trails will allow water to soak into the ground. Rain gardens, bioretention areas, vertical gardens along outside restroom walls and a picnic shelter with a “green roof” are part of the design. The project will be carefully monitored for effectiveness while interpretive signs and outreach education will teach how LID works.

“It was time to improve this park and the LID is a perfect fit! Since the City bought the property in the 1980s and created a master plan in 1995, we’ve known this site had a lot of potential and needed to be expanded for more users in addition to the well-used community gardens,” explained Tom Cressman of Bremerton Parks and Recreation, “We contracted with Grant-Solutions and worked out some of the improvements in a proposal to the IAC’s Land & Water Conservation Fund that ranked #1 project in the state.”

“With this LID grant, we’ll have money to do all of the paving using the permeable concrete and demonstrate its durability for use in other projects around the city. We needed a real-life example to convince our maintenance and public works folks that it works.”

Wyn Birkenthal, the city’s parks director, supported and advised on the LID modifications to fit into the Master Plan farm theme last September. The Kitsap Trees & Shoreline Association (KiTSA) donated drawings; Art Castle of the Kitsap Home Builders Foundation (KHBF) supported coordination with the LID implementation grant, while Dr. Chris May will provide guidance to the City on a performance monitoring plan.

The Bremerton project had also planned a rainwater harvesting system but this would have been in violation of Ecology’s own 1917 water code that states the rains pouring off your roof belong to the State of Washington. Several attempts have been made to pass legislation creating an exemption to the decades-old water use law that would allow for rainwater harvesting, most-recently in January, 2005. Senate Bill 5113, presented to the Committee on Water, Energy & Environment, proposed an amendment that would have given Ecology the power to permit rainwater in collection in cisterns and barrels. The legislation, however, never made it out of committee.

Recent efforts to adopt uniform LID standards, led by the KHBF non-profit 501 (c) (3), may offer alternatives to unsightly stormwater detention ponds and some relief to high development costs. The project is working with Kitsap County, and the four cities to develop and implement a uniform set of LID standards into local permitting processes while building the foundation to provide technical resources and guidance for developers.

The Cities of Bremerton and Poulsbo may consider implementing LID for new development and where no stormwater infrastructure exists, similar to that of Seattle’s Sea Street Program, which retrofits old, established neighborhoods utilizing basic principles of LID such as raingardens and alternative treatment. This reduces volumes municipalities will have to handle while improving the quality of the end products in that run-off. Localized solutions and micromanagement of stormwater at its source will save taxpayer dollars as a result, by reducing the amount requiring treatment.

While six Phase II counties were identified, only their urban portions require Phase II coverage, creating potential implementation problems. Kitsap County Commissioner Chris Endresen supports LID but believes that there are portions of the permit that make infill development cost prohibitive and that supports the financial rationale for developing green fields in rural areas. “I have long said, we need to make infill development attractive — not discourage it.”

“I think that reducing pollution from stormwater runoff is one of THE most important things we can do to improve the health of Puget Sound. I am 150 percent behind Art Castle and the KHBF’s LID proposal and was disappointed that we didn’t have it from the planning commission before the end of the year to approve. We will approve LID policies this year,” said Endresen in an email Jan.18.

For more information on the NPDES Storm Water Program go to Ecology’s official site: www.ecy.wa.gov/programs/wq/stormwater/municipal/phase_II_ww/ww_ph_ii-permit.html.

Examples of LID projects include permeable pavement, rain gardens, vegetated roofs, reverse-slope sidewalks and rainwater-harvest projects. A range of LID techniques are described in the Low Impact Development Technical Guidance Manual for Puget Sound, which is available online at: http://www.psat.wa.gov/Publications/LID_tech_manual05/LID_manual2005.pdf.