Municipal storm water management for local governments has evolved over time from an urban flood control function, to water and resource management function, to an environmental protection and regulatory function. All three functions now co-exist as responsibilities of local government.
What Is Municipal Stormwater? Municipal storm water is surface water runoff from public and private lands in urban areas. Typically municipal storm water is collected in municipal separate storm sewer systems consisting of drains, pipes, and ditches, and conveyed to nearby streams, rivers, lakes, estuaries, basins, wetlands, and oceans carrying with it a variety of urban pollutants.
The United States Environmental Protection Administration (USEPA) in their Phase I Municipal Stormwater regulations defined storm water to mean “…storm water runoff, snow melt runoff, and surface runoff and drainage.” In their Phase II storm water regulations EPA defined a “municipal separate storm sewer” to mean in part, a conveyance or system of conveyances, including roads with drainage systems and municipal streets, that is owned or operated by a State, city, town, borough, county, parish, district, association, or other public body designed or used for collecting of conveying storm water which is not a combined sewer and which is not part of a Publicly Owned Treatment Works.
Phase II will address the following components:
- Public education and outreach
- Public involvement
- Illicit discharge detection and elimination
- Construction Site Runoff Control
- Post-Construction Runoff Control
- Pollution Prevention/Good Housekeeping for Municipal Operations
More information regarding these components is available on the following website links:
Part of the Village of Glendale Heights efforts to eliminate polluted Storm Water runoff include street sweeping, storm sewer cleaning, and recycling, such as at the Glendale Lakes Golf Club which uses irrigation water from its 10 ponds that accumulate storm water runoff.
Links to annual reports and the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination Program Permit can be found below.
Village of Glendale Heights