Kentucky Communities Band Together to Meet NPDES Phase II Requirements

Combining efforts saves money and opens new funding options.

It was fall 2002, and the deadline loomed for municipalities with populations of less than 100,000 to comply with the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Phase II mandate. Almost every affected community across the United States was, by now, aware of NPDES. But many, even as late as a few months before the March 10, 2003, deadline, had not acted on it.

In an effort to be more flexible for the smaller municipal separate storm sewer systems (MS4s), the requirements of Phase II were less specific than those for Phse I. But in part because of the ambiguity, many MS4s didn't know where to begin - and so they put it off.

"I'll admit, until I got into it, I didn't realize it was going to be so much work," says Bobby Carpenter, the judge executive for Greenup County, KY. "I'm sure we weren't the only ones to initially put it on the back burner."

Many communities just didn't have the personnel or financial resources to meet the requirements of this unfunded mandate. Yet those who failed to comply by the March 10 deadline would face steep fines.

The smaller MS4s were required under NPDES Phase II to create a Storm Water Management Program (SWMP) document that:

• specifies best management practices (BMPs) for six minimum control measures - public education and outreach, public participation and involvement, illicit discharge detection and elimination, construction-site stormwater runoff and management, postconstruction stormwater management, and pollution prevention and good housekeeping practices - and ways to implement them to the "maximum extent practicable,"
• identifies measurable goals for these control measures,
• includes an implementation schedule for these control measures or frequency of activities,
• defines the responsible entity to implement these control measures.

Eight small communities in Greenup County, with barely a stormwater budget among them, found a solution in banding together. Joining forces in fall 2002, they worked through the ensuing months to develop a single SWMP that would meet NPDES Phase II permitting requirements. The plan, although created collectively, could be implemented individually by each community.

Woolpert LLP, a civil engineering and planning firm that for many years had served this area of northeastern Kentucky, also stepped in and suggested that working together would be in everyone's best interests. A single plan could be adopted and implemented for less money and in less time than if they each pursued their own individual plans. In fact, it was determined that if each community created separate plans, all of the plans together would cost upward of $100,000. By creating one collective plan, it would cost a total of $35,000.

Additionally, the shared approach could allow each community to better be able to afford future NPDES Phase II costs with minimum impact on their already strained budgets.

Using GPS equipment facilitated greater accuracy in outfall locations and efficient input into a GIS database.

Real Obstacles, Real Needs
The fact that these communities - Bellefonte, Flatwoods, Greenup City, Raceland, Russell, Worthington, Wurtland, and unincorporated areas of Greenup County - decided to collaborate is significant in and of itself. Each community had operated as an independent governmental entity for more than 100 years. "Rugged individualism" was rooted in the region.

The lack of collaboration wasn't for lack of trying, though.

In 2001, Kentucky's Division of Water held a meeting that brought affected communities up to speed on the NPDES requirements coming down the road, explains Dennis Gumbert, utilities superintendent for the City of Worthington. A follow-up meeting was held in nearby Ashland, and some of the mayors from the Greenup County region attended the meeting. It was at the Ashland meeting that the idea was first bounced around about collaborating on NPDES Phase II, Gumbert says. But as people went back to their offices and got caught up in the day-to-day concerns of running their communities, the idea of collaborating on NPDES went on the back burner.

Then, in 2002, the mayors of Raceland, Russell, and Worthington started meeting not to discuss NPDES but to talk about merging government services of the three towns, including water, wastewater, police, and fire. In the end, the residents of Raceland and Worthington clearly were not supportive of any kind of merger: They gave their incumbent mayors a vote of no confidence in the November 2002 election by electing other candidates to office.

The climate for any kind of collaboration, in other words, seemed frigid. Yet it was a logical conclusion that the communities should at least meet once again to discuss options for collaborating on NPDES Phase II for several reasons:

1. EPA identifies the communities as a single entity, the Greenup County Urbanized Area, within the Huntington Metropolitan Service Area as defined by the US Census Bureau. Populations range from 837 residents in Bellefonte to 7,599 residents in Flatwoods for a total population of 19,460 among all communities.
2. The communities share similar demographics. Many residents are in low- or fixed-income households and cannot afford hefty hikes in taxes or fees to support NPDES requirements, thus building the case for collaboration, which would help keep costs low.
3. The communities are contiguous in eastern Kentucky's coal country - a rural, hilly area tucked along Ohio River just north of Ashland. Specifically the Greenup County Urbanized Area extends along the left bank of Ohio River. The drainage from the urbanized area enters the Ohio River from several main tributary streams: White Oak Creek, Meade Run, Pond Run, Chinns Branch, Uhlens Branch, Long Branch, Town Branch, and Little Sandy River. Terrain among the communities is similar. Land area collectively is 17.50 mi.2
4. The communities experience similar stormwater problems. In general, the flooding problems in the Greenup County Urbanized Area can be considered a nuisance. Most documented problems occur within the more developed areas of the urbanized area, where storm drainage systems were constructed as a relief to standing-water problems and the systems are not sized to handle high-intensity storm flows. The more common problems reported are those related to flooded basements and yards as backups within the systems occur during heavy rainfall events. The area has, however, experienced some relatively significant localized flood damage from storms of high intensity that have occurred within the last few years. The major reported damage has happened directly to streambanks and at culvert and bridge openings along rural roadways. In several instances, the streambank erosion led to major impact to roadway surfaces that failed as the bank was eroded and the supporting soil was washed from beneath the pavement. In a few cases, the inlets and outlets at culverts and small bridges eroded and caused failure of the structures themselves.
5. A stormwater structure was not formalized. None of the communities had in place a stormwater district or ordinance.
6. Stormwater tasks generally have been viewed as add-on responsibilities for departments that have other primary tasks. To varying degrees, the communities have existing staff, such as sanitary sewer, code enforcement, or road department personnel, handling stormwater operations and maintenance, regulation, and enforcement. None of the communities currently can afford to have a person handling stormwater general administration; planning, design, and engineering; water-quality planning and monitoring; and capital improvements and expenditures.

Meetings Begin
Soon after the initial separate discussions with the communities, Judge Executive Carpenter organized another joint meeting with the mayors of each of the communities. This working-lunch meeting was held at the Ashland Plaza Hotel in November 2002. At this first meeting, Woolpert, along with teaming partner PEH Engineers, gave a presentation to these community leaders on how a joint effort would be beneficial to the communities and the steps that could be followed for development of a comprehensive SWMP.

Using a PowerPoint presentation, Woolpert led a discussion on the Phase II program history, compliance requirements, and how cost savings could be achieved through the cooperative effort. Woolpert explained an approach of examining the similarities and differences of each community and, with this information, how a plan would be developed to meet the NPDES Phase II requirements.

An open discussion ensued. Questions from community representatives ran the gamut:

• Can we get out of doing NPDES?
• How much is this going to cost us?
• Is there a penalty for not doing anything?
• How do we go about working together?
• What will we need to do in the future?

Having a group meeting with all of the governing bodies cleared the way for working together by allowing information to be presented to everyone at the same time and to allow individual questions to be answered. There were mixed degrees of denial, understanding, and acceptance. But as the meeting continued, the tone evolved from one of "How are we going to do this?" to "We can do this."

Woolpert and PEH helped build consensus by emphasizing the positives of collaboration:

• Distribution of cost of compliance over a greater number of stormwater customers
• Less drain on existing manpower
• No duplication of administrative personnel
• Greater support from the state environmental enforcement agency
• Greater base of resources from which to draw technical, administrative, and operational support
• Building of cooperative spirit that can carry over into other areas of government

Once a consensus was reached that a collaborative effort was indeed in everyone's best interest, the process of developing a single SWMP document moved forward.

Needs Assessed
The next step was to conduct a stormwater-quality needs assessment for the Greenup County Urbanized Area. The general objectives of the needs assessment were to:

• gain a clear understanding of stormwater-quality management needs and goals,
• inventory existing stormwater infrastructure and services,
• define an action guide for systematically addressing the identified stormwater-quality problems and concerns.

In its work creating SWMPs for NPDES Phase I communities, Woolpert found that five management duties and their subtasks characterize a successful SWMP. While the Phase I requirements were more stringent and required much greater implementation of controls than did the Phase II program, Woolpert concluded that the Phase I program information would benefit the Greenup County Urbanized Area by providing a basis from which to build its own SWMP. Thus, as part of the needs assessment, Woolpert examined each of the following five SWMP management duties and subtasks - including whether personnel and financial resources had been assigned and to what degree each duty/task was being implemented - for each community in the urbanized area:

1. Administration, Financial Management, and Program Development

• General administration
• Financial management
• Program planning and development
• Capital outlay and overhead costs
• Public awareness and involvement

2. Planning, Design, and Engineering

• Design criteria, standards, and guidance
• Field data collection and monitoring
• Quantity and quality master planning
• Design, field, and operations engineering
• Hazard mitigation
• BMP programs

3. Operations and Maintenance

• Maintenance management
• Routine maintenance
• Remedial maintenance
• Emergency response maintenance and cleanup

4. Regulation and Enforcement

• Code development and enforcement
• Permit administration
• Drainage system inspection and regulation
• Floodplain management

5. Capital Improvements and Expenditures

• Major capital improvements
• Minor capital improvements
• Land, easement, and rights-of-way acquisition

Many outfalls were readily obvious during the investigative phase, but many unmapped outfalls will require greater investigation efforts to locate.

To gather the applicable information, in-person and telephone interviews were conducted with community staff members who directly or indirectly deal with stormwater issues, including those in public works, utilities, engineering, parks and recreation, planning, public information, finance, and geographical information systems (GIS).

A preliminary in-the-field investigation with each community's stormwater representative was used to identify all stormwater outfalls. All stormwater outfalls known to exist were mapped as required by the initial permitting requirements. The locations were presented on US Geological Survey topographical maps for initial reference, with greater detailed mapping of each of the entire stormwater systems to be developed at a later date as a part of the implementation of the overall SWMP.

Using information gathered from the interviews and in-the-field investigations in addition to written information provided directly by the communities, Woolpert developed a single custom SWMP document that includes:

• a description of the six minimum control measures and the BMPs recommended to implement them,
• the performance requirements for each minimum control measure,
• the current relevant activities and their respective deficiencies for each minimum control measure,
• an action plan to address those deficiencies for each minimum control measure.

Several additional meetings were held with the individual communities' stormwater representatives to revise and refine the SWMP before it was submitted to the State of Kentucky. The plan was completed and submitted by the March 10 deadline to the Kentucky Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Cabinet, which EPA has delegated as the state's permitting authority.

Each community entered into a cooperative agreement with the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet to provide for the cabinet to become a co-permittee. It was established that each individual community and the Transportation Cabinet would, for now, retain responsibility to implement its own individual programs for stormwater management. The primary areas where resources - but not responsibility - will be shared are related to public education and involvement. The information related to stormwater management activities to be undertaken by the Transportation Cabinet was developed and provided by the cabinet and then incorporated into the community plan.

Next Steps
Now that the Greenup County Urbanized Area communities have moved successfully beyond the first hurdle, they are looking toward implementing the SWMP. The first year involves creating a formal organization to implement the plan. An initial $100,000 grant from the State of Kentucky helps fund first-year efforts. The second year will involve setting up stormwater ordinances and establishing public-outreach programs. The third year will involve additional mapping of the entire stormwater collection system of each community. It is anticipated that the mapping will be developed within a GIS environment to provide a working tool for the communities to use in overall stormwater management that is both related and unrelated to the Phase II program.

Since they formed as a group and began work on the plan, seven of the eight original communities have continued to meet on a regular basis (the City of Greenup in June 2003 opted to move forward on its own with plan implementation and permitting). The seven communities are currently holding discussions about a formal name for the group, working with the Kentucky Division of Water on how the group will reapply for one collective permit to replace the seven individual permits and exploring how such a group should be structured and funded in the future.

Structure
A crucial element of successful SWMPs is the concentration of resource control under one entity. Successful SWMPs often are those that go beyond political boundaries to encompass the total impacted watershed or watersheds. One example within Kentucky where such a management program was implemented was in Louisville, where the Metropolitan Sewer District was used to implement its stormwater management program.

Budget woes also build the case for one stormwater entity in the Greenup County Urbanized Area. The budgetary outlook for the additional Phase II costs is tight. Revenues have been impacted within the communities by the recent economic downturn. Rising health-care and worker-benefit costs put additional pressure on the budgets.

Faced with these financial constraints, the communities realize they must look at ways to reduce costs for the Phase II program. Because of the success of the cost savings achieved during the preparation of the initial SWMP, the communities are working toward organizing a regional stormwater management consortium to take advantage of cost savings achieved through eliminating duplication of efforts. Preliminary estimates are that the communities can achieve a cost savings within the range of 30–70% for the various items implemented under the Phase II stormwater program over the next five years.

Thus, under consideration is an option to have one person oversee stormwater operations for the participating urbanized area communities. The person would be employed by and located in Kentucky's FIVCO Area Development District. "FIVCO" stands for five counties in northeastern Kentucky, including Greenup County. The person would report to a consortium board consisting of representatives of each of the seven communities; the board would be governed according to Kentucky law.

Funding
The funding options that the group is considering include the following:

• General fund (pay as you go)
• Stormwater user fees (utility)
• Revenue bonding for capital improvements
• In lieu of construction fees
• System development charges
• Plan review and inspection fees
• Federal, state, and regional funding
• Special inspection fees

Woolpert has suggested that a stormwater user fee is the preferred funding mechanism to pay for the cost of implementing the NPDES Phase II program and to supplement the urbanized area's growing stormwater system needs. A stormwater user fee would provide the most reliable, consistent, and predictable source of revenue for the Greenup County Urbanized Area communities. In addition, because the stormwater control costs now and in the near future will be related primarily to impacts from the sources being generated from existing homes and businesses, the stormwater user fee provides funds for program implementation directly from the responsible sources.

Similar to water and sanitary sewer user fees, a rate schedule may be established that distributes costs fairly among the stormwater generators based on their individual contribution.

Single-use funding mechanisms, such as revenue bonding, in lieu of construction fees, system development charges, and special inspection fees, were initially eliminated from consideration while each community pursued the Phase II stormwater program on an individual basis because of their narrow scope and limited revenue-generating capacity. In addition to federal funding sources, state and regional funding sources initially were removed from consideration due to their limited availability and scope when approached on an individual community basis. While use of the general fund also was considered to be a nonviable alternative at first - as these funds already have dedicated uses - the cost savings from a joint approach makes funding from the joint general funds another viable source for consideration as planning continues.

The use of plan review fees is not considered a viable option to fund the entire NPDES Phase II program implementation because of limited new development and the ability of such a mechanism to generate the required funds to implement the entire program. The Greenup County Urbanized Area, however, communities are considering implementing a plan review fee to cover costs of developer plan reviews and construction activity enforcement for any new development as a part of their control-of-construction-activity-runoff efforts.

Advice for Others
Although the March 10, 2003, deadline has passed, communities still have until 2008 to fully implement the programs developed in their SWMPs. Communities across the US that share similar size, population, budgets, terrain, and staffing issues might want to consider the benefits of collaboration.

"The collaborative process for us has worked well," Carpenter says. "Woolpert helped us see what was expected of our communities, and we came together to create a plan that ultimately was approved by the state environmental authority. We're looking forward to developing regional stormwater leadership as we implement our Phase II plan."

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There also are lessons to be learned from the Greenup County Urbanized Area's experience: Cultural barriers and mindsets are not always broken easily; change takes time and gentle persistence.

"In the end, though, the payoff can be big: Communities can come together on one project, such as NPDES, and find that they can help each other in other ways too," Gumbert comments from the City of Worthington. "Collaboration doesn't mean communities necessarily have to merge, but by finding creative ways to help each other, they can save time and money while building better programs for their citizenry."

Author's Bio: Steve Cole, P.E., PLS, is group manager for Woolpert LLP's Water Management Services in Ashland, KY.