Stormwater Management Code Begins January 1st: Skagit County Residents Should Be Aware

All of Skagit County will need to follow the new stormwater management code starting January 1st, 2016.

The code update won a unanimous endorsement from the County Planning Commission earlier this year and was adopted by the Board of County Commissioners on September 8. Skagit County will be one of the first governments in the region to achieve compliance with the Department of Ecology’s updated Municipal Stormwater Permit for Western Washington.

Like much of Western Washington, Skagit County is subject to a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (“NPDES”) permit that is required by the federal Clean Water Act and managed in Washington by the State Department of Ecology. Most urban growth areas, including Bayview Ridge, and some rural areas, including Big Lake and Clear Lake, are part of the County’s NPDES Permit Area. Within that area, development will have to use Low-Impact Development (“LID”) techniques to manage and treat stormwater on site, whenever feasible.

All cities in Skagit County are also subject to the permit and will have to update their stormwater codes to require LID by the end of 2016. Skagit County’s code update affects development both inside and outside the NPDES Permit Area, although requirements outside the permit area are relaxed. “We heard residents and the Planning Commission loud and clear that they want better management of stormwater throughout the County,” said Dale Pernula, director of Skagit County’s Planning and Development Services Department. “These code updates will deliver that.”

 

The code changes, in summary:

·            Inside the County’s NPDES (stormwater) permit area, development must use LID techniques when feasible. Outside the County’s NPDES permit area, development may use LID techniques if desired.

·            Both inside and outside the NPDES permit area, the technical basis for stormwater management requirements will be Ecology’s 2012 Stormwater Management Manual for Western Washington.

·            Inside the permit area, full compliance with the stormwater manual is required; outside the permit area, some of the requirements of the manual are backed off proportionally to the intensity of the development.

·            All construction inside and outside the permit area will require a Construction Stormwater Pollution Prevention Plan.

The County Planning Department has updated its building permit application forms and handouts to implement the code changes. Contractors and frequent applicants should allow for a bit of extra time to review the new checklists and forms. “We’re committed to making implementation of the new requirements easy for applicants, especially outside the NPDES Permit Area,” Pernula promised. “We’ll tweak the code as necessary to ensure that’s the case.”

More information on the new stormwater code is available at www.skagitcounty.net/stormwaterpermitting.