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HomeMy WebLinkAbout8.3 Update Municipal Regional Permitor'DU~~~ CITY CLERK ~1~ File # ©©©®'®0 ~- ~ -~• a~ ,C~~// \~l~T Tn^TINl~ AGENDA STATEMENT CITY COUNCIL MEETING DATE: March 17, 2009 SUBJECT: Update on Municipal Regional Permit for Stormwater and Adoption of Resolution Authorizing Submittal of Comment Letter to the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Report Prepared by: Mark Lander, City Engineer ATTACHMENTS: 1. Draft Letter to the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board (Including Prior Comment Letters dated February 6, 2008, July 13, 2007, and November 6, 2006) 2. Resolution Approving Comment Letter to the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board, Requesting Modification of the Permit RECOMMENDATION: 1. Accept the report, and 2. Adopt the Resolution Approving a Letter o the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board ~~ Outlining Concerns with the Proposed Municipal Regional ~~ Permit for Stormwater and Requesting Modifications to the ~/ ' Permit FINANCIAL STATEMENT: Once adopted, the Municipal Regional Permit will require that municipalities perform additional administrative, operational, and maintenance tasks associated with stormwater quality, as well as complete extensive capital improvements to existing stormwater systems. Staff estimates total NEW costs over the five-year life of the Permit at $1,120,000, or an average annual INCREASE of $224,000. The City's current annual cost for permit compliance is 179,000; this will increase to an average annual cost of $403,000. For Fiscal Year 2009-2010, the INCREASED costs are estimated at COPY TO: Jim Scanlin, Alameda County Clean Water Program Page 1 of 18 ITEM NO. G: INPDESIMRP - NPDES Permitb2, Agst, MRP, 3-17-09.doc $56,000; most of this is additional staff time. In future years, there will be additional costs for studies, programs, and capital improvements. In addition to the above direct permit compliance costs, the City annually budgets the additional funds for activities related to stormwater quality: $145,605 for street sweeping, $43,822 for drain inlet inspection and cleaning, and $13,786 for spill cleanup. Permit compliance costs are paid out of the General Fund. There is currently no other funding source for these increased costs. These additive costs may result in the reduction of other services which the City provides. The draft letter from the Mayor to the Regional Board requests that a number of tasks of marginal or questionable benefit to water quality improvement be removed from the Permit. These revisions would reduce the annual cost of Permit compliance for municipalities. DESCRIPTION: Background The City of Dublin operates a municipal stormwater system, which is covered under a Permit from the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board. The Permit governs municipal activities directly related to drainage operations and maintenance, as well as other City activities such as land development and construction that could impact water quality. The Federal Clean Water Act of 1972 focused on water quality by addressing point sources of pollution, such as sewer system outfalls and industrial plants. The Act was amended in 1987 to include nonpoint sources of pollution, primarily urban storm runoff. Enforcement of the Clean Water Act within California was delegated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to the State Water Resources Control Board and the eight Regional Water Quality Control Boards. Alameda County falls under the jurisdiction of the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board (Regional Board). The fourteen incorporated cities in Alameda County, along with the County of Alameda, the Alameda County Flood Control District, and the Zone 7 Water Agency, have formed the Alameda County Clean Water Program (ACCWP) to comply with Federal and State water quality requirements. The Regional Board has issued a series of five-year Permits to the ACCWP. The current Permit was issued in 2003 and was scheduled to expire in 2008, but will remain in effect until a new permit is adopted. The Regional Board has determined that, in lieu of a series of countywide Permits for the next five-year period, a single Municipal Regional Permit (MRP) will be issued for San Mateo, Santa Clara, Alameda, Contra Costa, and portions of Solano Counties. The Regional Board has also expanded the specific water quality issues to be included under the MRP. The new Permit requirements will result in significantly greater effort and funding on the part of municipalities in order to comply with the Permit. Page 2 of 18 Current and Proposed Permit Requirements and Cost Comparison The current Permit requires activities by the ACCWP and individual cities in the categories of municipal maintenance, new development, illicit discharge control, business inspections, public outreach, monitoring, and annual reporting. The City is currently spending $178,917 per year in Permit compliance (this does not include costs for street sweeping or storm inlet cleaning, as the City would likely perform these activities anyway in the absence of a Permit). Staffing is currently 0.85 full time employees (FTE), provided by the Public Works Administrative Analyst (0.60 FTE) and the City Engineer (0.25 FTE). The proposed Permit expands the requirements in each of these categories and adds a number of new categories. Under the new Permit, staff time devoted for -the program would increase for both the Administrative Analyst (1.00 FTE) and the. City Engineer (0.56 FTE), or a total of 1.56 FTE. Total annual cost increases for the five-year permit are $223,781, increasing total annual permit compliance costs to $402,698 Staff has reviewed the Permit and believes that a number of the requirements in the new Permit provide questionable or marginal benefit in terms of cost, staff time, or other resources. Removal or modification of the following Permit requirements would result in savings to the City's program of $89,861 per year, reducing the annual cost increase from $223,781 to $133,920. Annual compliance costs would be $312,837. A comparison of the current and proposed Permits is as follows: Overall Program (Meetin s, Re orts, etc.) Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Meetin s, Reports, Pro am and Project Coordination $52,339 Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Increased Level of Meetings, Reports, Program and Project Coordination $36,839 New Cost $89,178 Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • None ($0) Modified New Permit Costs Modified • Increased Level of Meetings, Reports, Program and Project Coordination Permit Cost Increase $36,839 Modified Permit New Cost $89,178 Page 3 of 18 Section C.2 Municipal Maintenance Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Street sweeping $21,162 • Storm inlet cleaning • Irate ated Pest Management (Reduced Pesticide Use} Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Increased reporting. $2,110 • Testing of water quality at flood control pump stations (eleven in Alameda County) and on-going monitoring of selected pump stations (Not applicable to New Cost the City of Dublin) $23,272 Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • None ($0) New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified • Increased reporting. Permit Cost • Testing of water quality at flood control pump stations (eleven in Alameda Increase County) and on-going monitoring of selected pump stations $2,110 Modified Permit New Costs $23,272 Page 4 of 18 Section C.3 New Develo ment Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Installation of stormwater treatment measures $9,055 • Erosion control and pollution control during construction • Ongoing monitoring and maintenance of stormwater measures • Stormwater treatment for new development projects with over 1 acre of impervious surface Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Stormwater treatment for new development projects with over 10,000 sf of $19,364 impervious surface (drops to 5,000 sf in two years) • Stormwater treatment for new public capital projects with over 10,000 sf of New Cost impervious surface (drops to 5,000 sf in two years) $28,419 • Stormwater treatment for new bicycle lanes and sidewalks • Limitations on use of underground treatment units for storm runoff filtering and requirements for use of surface landscaping treatment for new development (STAFF COMMENT: This is problematic for development or redevelopment of sites in the downtown due to limited available open space for treatment) • Specific requirements for use of Low Impact Development (LID) measures in new development (STAFF COMMENT: This includes requirements not directly related to water quality) • Construction often "Green Street" projects within the region; requirements include pedestrian-friendly features, low-water use landscaping and other elements (STAFF COMMENT: While commendable, some of these requirements have no specific relation to water quality) • Development of new database tracking water quality measures for entitled projects • Stormwater treatment for single family homes creating more than 2,500 sf of impervious surface • Increased record keeping and reporting Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Stormwater treatment for new development projects with over 5,000 sf (in two ($1-9,364) years) • Stormwater treatment for new public capital projects over 5,000 sf (in two years) • Stormwater treatment for new bicycle lanes and sidewalks • Limitations on use of underground treatment units • Specific requirements for use of Low Irri act Development (LID) Page 5 of 18 • Construction of ten "Green Street" projects • New database tracking water quality measures for entitled projects • Stormwater treatment for single family homes • Increased record keeping and reporting New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified • Stormwater treatment for new development projects with over 10,000 sf of Permit Cost impervious surface Increase • Stormwater treatment for new public capital projects with over 10,000 sf of $0 impervious surface Modified Permit New Cost ' $9,055 Section C.4 Illicit Discharge Control Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Spill response/cleanup $19,912 • Identification and correction of pollutant source connections to storm drains Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Development of a Formal Emergency Response Plan (ERP) for spills or $2,110 discharges • Increased record keeping and reporting, including development of a new database Total New tracking incidents Costs $22,022 Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Increased record keeping and reporting, including development of a new database ($2,110) tracking incidents New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified • Development of a Formal Emergency Response Plan (ERP) for spills or Permit Cost discharges Increase $0 Modified Permit New Cost $19,912 Page 6 of 18 Section C.5 Business Ins ections Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Ongoing inspection of businesses for otential water uality impacts $14,507 Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Development of a Formal Emergency Response Plan (ERP) for spills or $2,110 discharges • Increased record keeping and reporting, including development of a new database New Cost tracking incidents $16,617 Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Increased record keeping and reporting, including development of a new database ($2,110) tracking incidents New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified • Development of a Formal Emergency Response Plan (ERP) for spills or Permit Cost discharges Increase $0 Modified Permit New Cost. $14,507 Page 7 of 18 Section C.6 Construction Ins ection Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Ongoing inspection of construction sites to ensure that water-quality measures are $7,255 in lace and functioning Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Development of a Formal Emergency Response Plan (ERP) for spills or $2,110 discharges • Increased record keeping and reporting, including development of a new database New Cost tracking incidents $9,365. Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Increased record keeping and reporting, including development of a new database ($2,110) tracking incidents New Permit Requirements to Remain .Modified • Development of a Formal Emergency Response Plan (ERP) for spills or Permit Cost discharges Increase $0 Modified Permit New Cost $7,255 Page 8 of 18 Section C.7 Public Outreach and Education Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Sponsoring local events that increase public awareness of water quality issues $34,112 (Day on the Glen, Dublin Pride Week, creek cleanups) • Participation in regional education or advertising program Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Increased minimum number of annual events per year (Dublin increases from 4 $11,029 events to 6 events, or 50%) • Advertising campaign New Cost • Reporting requirements for measuring effectiveness of programs (including $45,141 behavior changes and changes in awareness) • Required Nonpoint Education for Municipal Officials (MEMO) • Increased record keeping and reporting Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Increased minimum number of annual events per year (Dublin increases from 4 ($11,209) events to 6 events, or 50%) • Advertising campaign • Reporting requirements for measuring effectiveness of programs (including behavior changes and changes in awareness) • Required Nonpoint Education for Municipal Officials (NEMO) • Increased record keeping and reporting New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified Permit Cost Increase $0 Modified Permit New Permit $34,112 Page 9 of 18 Section C.8 Monitorin Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost • Financial contribution to San Francisco Estuary Institute Regional Monitoring $11,825 Plan Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Development of long-term monitoring sites at specific locations (two sites in $19,066 Alameda County) • Annual status monitoring of selected local creeks (eleven sites in Alameda New Cost County) $30,891 • Additional follow-up monitoring for stressor/ source identification, treatment measure monitoring, and geomorphology studies • Testing for pollutants of concern in selected watersheds (two in Alameda County). • Preparation of annual monitoring report to Regional Board, as well as a final integrated regional report in 2012. Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Development of long-term monitoring sites at specific locations (two sites in ($19,066) Alameda County) • Annual status monitoring of selected local creeks (eleven sites in Alameda County) • Additional follow-up monitoring for stressor/ source identification, treatment measure monitoring, and geomorphology studies • Testing for pollutants of concern in selected watersheds (two in Alameda County). Preparation of annual monitoring report to Regional Board, as well as a final integrated regional re ort in 2012. New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified Permit Cost Increase $0 Modified Permit New. Cost $11,825 Page 10 of 18 Section C.9 Pesticides Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost N/A $0 Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Participation in regulatory process for pesticides and assumption of $3,473 responsibilities for development and enforcement of regulations currently handled by Federal and State agencies. New Cost • Public outreach and education for pest control and landscaping contractors, and $3,473 documentation of behavioral changes. • New reporting requirements Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings Requires further analysis ($0} New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified Requires further analysis Permit Cost Increase $3,473 Modified Permit New Cost $3,473 Page 11 of 18 Section C.10 Trash Assessment and Abatement Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost N/A $1,250 Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Identify trash "hot spots" within a jurisdiction and develop a program to abate $19,169 trash in these areas (the number of "hot spots" varies dependent on size and population of a jurisdiction; Dublin would be required to identify and treat four New Cost (4) locations). $20,419 (STAFF COMMENT: The City participated with several other local agencies in Alameda County in a pilot trash assessment study. Based on this study, as well as ongoing business inspections and discharge response, staff has identified a number of sites that marginally meet the "hot spot" criteria in the permit. At most sites, abatement can be handled by ongoing monitoring and hand-cleaning. The cost of cleanup is estimated at under $10,000 annually; some sites would be suitable for volunteer cleanups, which would reduce the cost to the City. • Installation of full-trash capture devices such as storm runoff filter manholes at storm drain outfalls for an area equal to 30% of a jurisdiction's commercial/ retail acreage. The acreage is based on 2005 Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) land use data; Dublin would be required to treat 30% of 377 acres, or 113 acres. Trash capture measures shall be in place by July 1, 2013 (four years from estimated date of Permit issuance). (STAFF COMMENT: The cost of this work is estimated at $7,000-8,000 .per acre, or approximately $1,000,000. However, there are currently 18 underground treatment units in 11 locations within the City that meet the full-trash capture criteria, serving 95 acres. In addition, there are an additional 8 units planned andl or funded at 4 locations (as part of private development projects or using grant funds), providing treatment for an additional 94 acres. It is likely that some or all of these units will be on line prior to 2013, allowing the City to meet the 113-acre treatment requirement without the need to provide additional funding for capital improvements to meet this requirement. • Ongoing monitoring and assessment of trash efforts. • Development of a long-term trash management plan resulting in no impacts to beneficial uses. Plan to be complete by 2013 -implemented by 2024. (STAFF COMMENT: This language was taken verbatim from the permit. The performance goals are broad and vague. Compliance with "no" impacts could be prohibitively expensive and/or could expose the City to be cited .for non- compliance with the permit). • New reporting re uirements. Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Ongoing monitoring and assessment of trash efforts. ($10,000) • Development of a long-term trash management plan resulting in no impacts to beneficial uses. Plan to be complete by 2013 -implemented by 2024. (STAFF COMMENT: This language was taken verbatim from the permit. The Page 12 of 18 performance goals are broad and vague. Compliance with "no" impacts could be prohibitively expensive and/or could expose the City to be cited for non- compliancewith the permit). • New reporting requirements. New Permit Requirements to Remain Modred • Identify trash "hot spots" within a jurisdiction and develop a program to abate Permit Cost trash in these areas (the number of "hot spots" varies dependent on size and Increase population of a jurisdiction; Dublin would be required to identify and treat four $9,169 (4) locations). • Installation of full-trash capture devices such as storm runoff filter manholes at Modified storm drain outfalls for an area equal to 30% of a jurisdiction's commercial/ retail Permit New acreage. The acreage is based on 2005 Association of Bay Area Governments Cost (ABAG) land use data; Dublin would be required to treat 30% of 377 acres, or $10,419 113 acres. Trash capture measures shall be in place by July 1, 2013 (four years from estimated date of Permit issuance). Page 13 of 18 Sections C.11-14 Pollutants of Concern Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost N/A $0 Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Additional testing, monitoring, and studies to determine sources and deposits of $98,400 specific pollutants including mercury, copper, polychlorinated byphenyls (PCB's), polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE's), and selenium New Cost • Development of enhanced mercury pollution control practices for municipal $98,400 maintenance activities • Development of 10 pilot programs each for removal of mercury and PCB's in stormwater systems • Development of pilot programs for enhanced copper removal for municipal maintenance activities • Develop plan for expansion of pilot programs after 2012 • Divert low-weather storm flows from five existing stormwater pump stations to wastewater treatment plants (five diversions each for mercury and PCB's) • Develop a mercury and PCB health risk reduction program for fish consumed from San Francisco Bay • Identify PCB's on private property as part of ongoing clean water business inspections, and coordination with State/ Federal regulatory agencies to facilitate removal of PCB's • Adoption of an ordinance prohibiting washing of buildings with copper architectural features. • New reporting requirements Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Development of pilot programs for enhanced copper removal for municipal ($15,891) maintenance activities (STAFF COMMENT: The Permit requires additional copper-reduction measures, including specific changes to the municipal code regarding washing of buildings with copper architectural features. This is in spite of the San Francisco Estuary Institute's 2008 Regional Monitoring Report indicating that copper levels in the Bay are within allowable health standard levels, and that copper was removed as a contributing pollutant to the Bay's status as an impaired water body under Section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act. Copper removal from storm runoff will continue under existing Permittee activities; in fact, copper removal may be enhanced as a result of other required activities for mercury, PCB's, etc.) • Divert low-weather storm flows from five existing stormwater pump stations to wastewater treatment plants (five diversions each for mercury and PCB's) • Develop a mercury and PCB health risk reduction program for fish consumed from San Francisco Bay • Identify PCB's on private property as part of ongoing clean water business Page 14 of 18 inspections, and coordination with State/ Federal regulatory agencies to facilitate removal of PCB's • Adoption of an ordinance prohibiting washing of buildings with copper architectural features. New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified • Additional testing, monitoring, and studies to determine sources and deposits of Permit Cost specific pollutants including mercury, copper, polychlorinated byphenyls Increase (PCB's), polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDE's), and selenium $82,509 • Development of enhanced mercury pollution control practices for municipal maintenance activities Modified • Development of 10 pilot programs each for removal of mercury and PCB's in Permit New stormwater systems Cost • Develop plan for expansion of pilot programs after 2012 $82,509 • New reporting requirements Section C.15 Exempt Discharges Existing Permit Activities Existing Cost N/A $0 Additional Requirements Under New Permit Cost Increase • Requirements that permittees monitor and report discharges of nonpolluted water $8,001 by other parties (such as groundwater pumping, water line breaks, or firefighting) • New Reporting Requirements New Cost $8,001 Requirements Recommended for Deletion Savings • Requirements that permittees monitor and report discharges of nonpolluted water ($8,001) by other parties (such as groundwater pumping, water line breaks, or firefighting) • New Reporting Requirements New Permit Requirements to Remain Modified Permit Cost Increase $0 Modified Permit New Costs $0 Page 15 of 18 Permit Fees (Paid to San Francisco Ba Re Tonal Water Quali Control Board Current Fee $7,500 Pro osed Fee 7,500 Increase $0 Total Costs Existin Costs $178,917 Increased Costs, Proposed Permit $223,781 Total Costs, Pro osed Permit $402,698 Cost Savin s, Recommended Chan es ($89,861 Revised Increased Costs $133,920 Total Costs, per Recommended Amended Permit $312,837 Funding Options As noted above, the City funds current stormwater compliance costs using the General Fund. Increased costs under the new Permit would also need to be provided from the General Fund, which would impact the City's ability to continue to fund other services at their current level. In the early 1990's, when the initial stormwater permits were issued, many cities in the Bay Area adopted a local stormwater assessment for developed properties within their jurisdiction, in order to fund the new activities required under the permits. The City of Dublin adopted such an assessment in 1991, in the amount of $14.62 per single-family residence (SFR); the fee generated approximately $165,000 annually. The fee was reduced to $7.30 per SFR in 1997 and eliminated entirely in 1998, on the premise that General Fund revenues were adequate to fund stormwater activities. Under Proposition 218, creation of a new assessment would require a special election, with approval by a majority of the property owners to be assessed. Consequences of Non-Compliance The Permit requires that permittees complete certain permit requirements within deadlines specified over the five-year life of the permit. The first deadlines are in February 2010, with the first full annual report due in September 2010. Should a permittee fail to submit the required materials by the deadlines, the .Board could find the. permittee in non-compliance and issue a Notice of Violation (NOV). The NOV would require that the permittee take steps to come into compliance within a certain time period. The allowable period for compliance is variable, but could be as short as two weeks. If a permittee fails to respond to a second NOV, the Board is required to schedule a hearing on the issue. The hearing would likely result in the issuance of Administrative Civil Liabilities (ACC's), or fines. Fines can be up to $10,000 PER DAY for the violation. In addition to the fines, the permittee would still need to comply with the original non-compliance issue. Page 16 of 18 Continued non-compliance would likely result in a Cease and Desist Order (CDO), which would prohibit the permittee from engaging in activities that could potentially impact stormwater quality, such as issuance of building or grading permits. The Board could also refer the issue to the State Attorney General for criminal prosecution. The City could also face challenges or legal action by third parties who believe the City is not in compliance with the permit. Permit Review Process The Regional Board issued an administrative draft of the Permit in October 2006. Staff reviewed the draft and responded with an eight-page comment letter on November 6, 2006. Comments were also received from ACCWP, various cities within the Bay Area, other clean water programs, and the Bay Area Storm Management Agency Association (BASMAA). The Regional Board issued a subsequent administrative draft in May 2007. Staff reviewed this version of the draft and. responded with a 15-page comment letter on July 13, 2007. Comments were received from numerous other agencies as well. The Regional Board issued a tentative order for the regional Permit on December 4, 2007. The order provided for a deadline of February 1, 2008, for the submittal of written comments, with a public hearing scheduled on February 13. As a result of a request by various permittees, the Regional Board agreed to reschedule the written comment deadline from February 1 to February 29, and postpone the initial public hearing until March 11. The City of Dublin submitted an 8-page comment letter (signed by the Mayor) on February 6, 2008, reiterating most of the comments in the prior letters. This letter and the two staff letters are attached to the draft comment letter dated March 18, 2009. Then-Vice Mayor Sbranti also provided verbal comments at the March 11, 2008 public hearing. The public hearing was attended by several hundred people, including representatives of most of the 74 local agencies governed by the permit, and resulted in almost nine hours of testimony from attendees. Most of the testimony described the permit as being overly prescriptive and not cost-effective in terms of water quality benefits. At the conclusion of the hearing, the Board expressed its desire to see an effective permit in place, but recognized that significant changes were appropriate to address local agency concerns. The Board directed staff to review the comments in detail and set up a process to resolve the issues. In April 2008, Board staff reported back to the Board with its intent to develop a series of stakeholder meetings as part of the permit revision process. Since that time, Board staff has issued a number of "previews" of the proposed revisions to the permit, and has held several meetings with BASMAA, but there has been little solicitation for input from the local level. Board staff indicated, at various times, that the revised permit would be issued in September 2008, then November 2008, December 2008, January 2009, and early February 2009, with a 60-day comment period. The revised permit was issued on February 13 with an April 3 deadline for submittal of written comments, which equates to a 50-day comment period. Since the comment deadline precluded review by the City Council at the first meeting in April (an issue shared by many other agencies who hoped to have their City. Councils review comments on the Permit), the Alameda County Clean Water Program submitted a request to the Board on February 17, 2009 to extend the deadline for written comments by one-two weeks. Board staff denied the request on February 23, 2009. Page 17 of 18 A public hearing for the revised Permit will be held on Wednesday, May 13, 2009. Board staff has been asked and, to date, has been unable to clarify if the intent of the hearing is to collect testimony or to take action to adopt the Permit. It is noted that the Board has not yet issued a response to comments received at the March 2008 public hearing, and has indicated that it will do so two weeks prior to the hearing (which is after the April 3, 2009 deadline for submittal of new comments). In order to provide the City Council with a draft comment letter for review prior to the April 3, 2009 deadline, staff has accelerated review of the new Permit. Based on that review, staff believes that the Permit contains a number of revisions that result in significant cost reductions in comparison to the 2007 permit, specifically in the areas of trash reduction and street sweeping. However, the Permit still contains requirements for excessive and redundant monitoring, requirements for new development that result in marginal water quality benefits and infringe on local planning efforts, excessive record keeping, procedural changes, reporting requirements, and increased public outreach and education. Cumulatively, staff has determined that these requirements will increase the City's cost of Permit compliance by over $220,000 annually. Staff believes that there are further revisions could reduce costs by as much as $90,000 annually without impacting water quality objectives. City Staff has prepared a draft comment letter to the Regional Board members, requesting specific changes to the Permit to address the City's concerns. Recommendation It is recommended that the City Council 1) accept the report, and 2) Adopt the Resolution Approving a Letter to the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control .Board Outlining Concerns with the Proposed Municipal Regional Permit for Stormwater and Requesting Modifications to the Permit. Page 18 of 18 ~~ March 18, 2009 Mr. John Muller Chair San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board 1515 Clay Street, Ste. 1400 Oakland, CA 94612 Subject: Tentative Order for Municipal Regional Permit Dear Mr. Muller: The City of Dublin appreciates the opportunity to review the Regional Permit (Permit) which was released by the San Quality Control Board on February 13, 2009. Tentative Order for the Municipal Francisco Bay Regional Water The City Council for the City of Dublin reviewed an analysis of the Permit by the City's Department of Public Works at its meeting of March 17. Following this review, the City Council unanimously adopted Resolution No. -09, approving the submittal of this letter to the Board by the Mayor do behalf of the City Council. As an agency of the State of California, we believe that you can fully appreciate that, since we last submitted comments to you a year ago, government revenues have radically dropped while costs have continued to increase. A year ago, we would have described many of the requirements in the permit as fiscally unreasonable; today we must describe them as fiscally unrealistic. The City of Dublin is committed to performing our share of the effort needed for continued reduction of pollutants and improvements to water quality within the Bay Area. The City has taken a progressive approach to addressing environmental quality issues through- its Green Building Program for City facilities, Green Building requirements for new development, and development of two transit centers at the West and East Dublin BART Stations. The City has approved a Bikeways Master Plan and funds ongoing implementation of the Plan, with the intent of promoting bicycle use .over vehicle use. The City has dedicated the necessary resources to ensure that it remains in compliance with both the letter and the spirit of its current Municipal Storm Water Permit, and recently worked with both Caltrans and the Regional. Board in developing the first cooperative stormwater treatment projects under these agencies' alternate treatment measures program. The City has. participated_(at its. cost) in a F-!em 83 3-~~-0~ A1TA61~i /. ~ ~~ Mr. John Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page2of9 pilot trash assessment study with the Alameda Countywide Clean Water Program, which has generated data that will assist all agencies in addressing trash impacts around the Bay Area. At the March 2008 public hearing held by the Regional Board on the prior version of the Permit, the City of Dublin (along with numerous other local agencies) expressed concerns regarding many prescriptive and costly components of the Permit that did little to improve water quality. After almost nine hours of testimony, the Board directed their staff to revise the Permit to take into consideration the comments expressed at the meeting, and to set up a process whereby stakeholders could provide input to the revisions. Unfortunately, over a year later, we must express our deep disappointment in both in the process used to develop the current version of the Permit and the content of the Permit. While Board staff has provided "previews" of the revised Permit over the last year, there has been little opportunity for input from stakeholders. Furthermore, although a full year has passed since the public hearing, a response to comments has not been received from the Board. We have attached our comment letter dated February 6, 2008, for which we are still awaiting a reply. Board staff had indicated that a 60-day comment period would be provided for the new Permit; given that extensive comments on the last Permit and the. substantial rewrites; we believe that this provided marginal time for review and comment. However, when the Permit was issued on February 13, the deadline for submittal of written comments was listed as April 3, which is only a 50-day comment period. The Alameda Countywide Clean Water Program, at the request of the member agencies, made a specific request to the Board staff on February 17, requesting that the comment period be extended. This request was denied by Board staff on February 23. After spending a full year to rewrite the Permit, Board staff granting said one-two week extension would not seem to unreasonably delay the adoption and implementation of the Permit. Since the Board was unwilling to grant the extension, our staff has accelerated its review of the Permit and we are able to provide the. following comments, only as a result of extraordinary effort to force the time onto an already lengthy City Council agenda for consideration. As expressed in our comment letter from last year, we remain concerned that many requirements of the Permit will result in questionable or marginal improvements to actual water quality, and may in fact detract from local agencies' ability to carry out existing or improved local clean water programs due to demands on funding, staff, and other resources. Specific concerns are as follows: Section C.3, Increased Treatment Requirements for New Development The threshold for requiring- installation and monitoring of water quality measures for new development has been reduced from 1 acre to 10,000 sf, dropping to 5,000 sf in two years. 3 ~ ~~ Mr. John Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page 3 of 9 We do not take issue with the 10,000 sf threshold. However, we do not believe that reduction to the 5,000 sf threshold will capture new development with significant pollutant loadings. Reducing the treatment threshold will result in nominal improvement to water quality in terms of staff time needed for plan processing and review; reporting; and ongoing monitoring. This will also result in installation of redundant site-specific water quality measures, since the Permit will likely result in a whole new set of community-wide controls as well. In addition to the 5,000 sf threshold for new development, the Permit also contains a provision that new single family homes or small non-residential projects that create over 2,500 sf of new impervious surface provide one or more site design measures that reduce runoff. This will result in additional plan review costs by the City, as the City currently provides plan review for building permits and conditional use permits for a fixed fee.. The Permit also requires the construction of ten (10) "Green Street" projects within the region by July 1, 2013. Two of these projects would likely be located in Alameda County. The requirements for "Green Streets" include not only water-quality features but also streetscape and urban greenway features, pedestrian and bicycle facilities, parking innovations, and other features that have little direct connection with water quality. While it is possible that these features could be incorporated into private development projects, it is uncertain that these developments will be approved and constructed by July 2013 in the current economic climate, leaving local agencies to fund the cost of this requirement. As a practical matter, many of the above features are already being incorporated into new development as a result of local planning efforts; the Permit requirements are redundant and create a dangerous precedence for the Permit requirements to infringe on local planning authority. An additional requirement of the Permit is severe limitation on the use of underground storm runoff treatment devices and a requirement that new development or redevelopment utilize vegetated treatment measures to treat at least 50% of the runoff from a site. This is in spite of (1) there being no sound evidence that structural controls are not effective and (2) no guarantee that vegetated treatment measures will work indefinitely without ongoing monitoring and maintenance. The Permit denies the choice of treatment measures to be determined by site constraints. While this does not create a specific cost increase for the City, it will impact the ability of built-out properties in the developed areas to redevelop due to the lack of available space for surface landscape treatment measures. Storm runoff from existing developments built more than twenty years ago predates nonpoint pollution control requirements and is likely not treated. Therefore, we believe that the Board would concur that redevelopment of these properties should be encouraged so that some treatment could be provided. Furthermore, we believe that you would concur that redevelopment of developed sites meets many of the same goals of Low Impact Development that the new permit is encouraging. To that end, it is unclear why you would approve a permit that appears to do the opposite. ~ (~ ~'°7 Mr. John Muller ~ (~ San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page 4 of 9 It is recommended that the restrictions on the use of underground treatment devices be eliminated, and that the choice of treatment should be determined based on site constraints and engineering analysis as opposed to mandate. The added cost for staff to review and monitor new development is estimated at $9,000 per year. The added cost of the City's share of "Green Street" projects is estimated at $10,000 per year. Sections C.4, C.5, and C.6, Development of Additional Inspection and Spill Response Procedures The Permit requires development of a formalized Emergency Response Plan (ERP) for use with business inspections, spill response, and construction, which would detail how the City responds to these incidents, as well as other processes, record keeping, and reporting. Included in the ERP are requirements to adopt, by ordinance, escalating penalties for noncompliance. The City of Dublin, during the 2007-08 Fiscal Year, responded to a total of 36 spills or discharges, of which 34 incidents were abated that year, with the remaining 2 cases requiring physical improvements at the site which were completed by the end of the 2008. The majority of these dealt with oil leaks from parked vehicles, construction debris being dropped in a street, or similar problems. The most extreme incidents involved a sewage spill due to a plugged sewer main, dumping of cooking oil by a res#aurant into a private storm drain, and trash generated at a market. In addition, the City completed 43 business inspections, .with half of the businesses in compliance; compliance issues were generally minor operational issues such trash dumpster lids being left .open. Each of these situations was either corrected or is in the process of being corrected by the end of the fiscal year. With regards to construction, the City requires erosion control and pollution prevention plans for all projects, sends out annual notices to development in September requiring that erosion control measures be in place, and conducts ongoing inspection of construction sites throughout the rainy season. In summary, the City of Dublin's current spill response, business inspection practices, and construction inspection practices are effective, and adoption of additional formal measures would provide no incremental benefit to water quality. The added cost of adopting additional business and spill response measures is estimated at $6,000 per year. Section C.7, Public Outreach Mr. John Muller S 7 San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page 5 of 9 The City of Dublin is required to complete additional local public outreach events (six events compared to four under the current Permit). In past years,. the City has met or exceeded this minimum requirement. The City has organized volunteer groups to install storm inlet markers, remove trash from creeks, and clean parks. The Permit increases the requirements for public outreach events by 50%. In addition, it also requires additional region-level outreach and education, including measurement of effectiveness. We question the practicality of measuring items such as "awareness" or "behavioral changes". Furthermore, given the major new efforts required to deal with trash and other pollutants of concern, staff suggests that this is not the year to add additional required public outreach work, and to impose additional record keeping and reporting requirements for this activity. Added costs for public outreach are estimated at $11,000 per year. Section C.8, Additional Monitoring Requirements The Permit requires extensive new monitoring, testing, and reporting efforts by local agencies on local watersheds. This is in addition to the current efforts by the San Francisco Bay Estuary Institute (SFEI) to maintain an ongoing Regional Monitoring Program (RMP) for San Francisco Bay. SFEI recently published its 2008 report, based on hundreds of samples taken in bay water and sediment over the last five years. The report provides tremendous insight on watershed-specific sources of pollutants in the bay and trends for improvement or degradation due to specific pollutants. Given this background knowledge, it is questionable that additional monitoring data will influence pollution reduction efforts that are required by the permit regardless of the monitoring results. Elimination or reduction of the required new monitoring would not impact pollution reduction efforts and would allow available resources to be put into actual water quality improvement efforts. The added cost of new monitoring efforts to the City of Dublin is estimated at $19,000 per year. Section C.9, Pesticides, and Sections C.11-C.14, Pollutants of Concern The Permit requires that local agencies take on duties currently assigned to State and Federal agencies with regards to abatement or monitoring of certain pollutants of concern. Specifically, the Permit requires that: 1) Local agencies monitor and participate in the regulatory process. for pesticides and assume responsibility for development and enforcement of regulations currently handled by Federal and State agencies. This activity is beyond the technical and legal scope of local government, and is and should continue to be handled at the State and Federal level. Further, if the Regional Board (a State agency) already has reason to believe that certain pesticides should not be used because of water quality impacts, it should take the case Mr. John Muller ~ ~~ San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page 6 of 9 directly to the State agencies responsible for pesticide control and not rely on local government to perform these duties. 2) The Permit requires that local agencies identify Polychlorinated Biphenyls (PCB's) on private property as part of ongoing clean water business inspections, and coordination with State/ Federal regulatory agencies to facilitate removal of PCB's. Local agency action should be limited to reporting knowledge of potential PCB releases or contamination on private property to the appropriate State and Federal agencies, with abatement of the problem by those agencies. 3) The Permit requires that local agencies develop or participate in a PCB and mercury health risk reduction program for fish consumed from San Francisco Bay. Again, this is an activity that is the responsibility of County, State, and Federal public health agencies, and should not be delegated to the local level. While the cost for these additional duties is indeterminate at this time, we believe that the delegation by the State to local government of duties that rightfully should be performed at the State and Federal level should not occur without compensation to local government for this mandated work. Section C.10, Trash Reduction Under the Permit, the City of Dublin would be required to identify four (4) trash "hot spots" and develop measures to abate trash in these areas, as well as treat 30% of its' commercial/ retail area with full trash capture devices. The City participated with several other local agencies in Alameda County in a pilot trash assessment study. Based on this study, as well as ongoing business inspections and discharge response, staff has identified a number of sites that marginally meet the Santa Clara'Valley Urban Runoff Pollution Prevention Program (SCVURPP) "hot spot" criteria of 100 pieces of trash per 100' of creek length, as required in the permit. Nevertheless, the City of Dublin will attempt to meet the Permit requirements for trash reduction in these areas. However, in addition to trash abatement, the Permit requires that the City conduct ongoing surveying, photo documentation, and .other monitoring of the sites, and report on the findings each year. The monitoring includes counting of individual trash pieces by type, number, and location, as required by the SCVURPPP criteria. Based on the pilot trash assessment that was completed in 2008, survey of trash problem areas can be completed in ways that are far less time intensive than detailed counting of trash pieces, and the reporting requirements can be less rigorous without compromising cleanup efforts. Furthermore, the requirement for development of a Long Term Trash Management Plan by 2013 with the goal of "no" impacts to beneficial uses needs to be realistic in terms of municipalities' ability to control trash. Based on the pilot trash assessment, the City found that the source of trash in waterways was more often than not due to random littering, windblown from other locations, or generated from freeways or school sites (over which the City has no code enforcement authority), as opposed to direct transport to the waterway by a storm drain. Mr. John Muller ~ ~ ~~ San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page 7 of 9 It is not appropriate that Permit compliance is dependent upon a municipalities' correction of a problem over which it does not have full control. The added cost of the reporting requirements for abating trash "hot spots" is estimated at $2,000 per year. The cost of developing the Long Term Trash Management Plan is estimated at over $8,000. Section C.13, Copper The Permit requires additional copper-reduction measures, including specific changes to the municipal code regarding washing of buildings with copper architectural features. This is in spite of the San Francisco Estuary Institutes' 2007 Regional Monitoring Report indicating that copper levels in the Bay are below allowable health standard levels, and that copper was removed as a contributing pollutant to the Bay's status as an impaired water body under Section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act. This was further substantiated by the 2008 Regional Monitoring Report, which did not even mention copper as a pollutant of current concern. Copper removal from storm runoff will continue under existing local agency activities; in fact, copper removal may be enhanced as a result of other required activities for mercury, PCB's, etc. The Permit requires continued participation by local agencies in the Brake Pad Partnership, which is developing means of reducing copper content in brake pads. This is a current cost and may achieve measurable statewide benefits. However, the Permit also requires copper- specific activities along with specific record keeping and reporting requirements, none of which contribute to copper or other pollutant removal or overall water quality improvements. Some of the requirements (such as an ordinance prohibiting washing of buildings with exterior copper) would impact a very limited source of copper and would be impractical to enforce. The added cost of copper reduction is estimated at $16,000 per year. Section C.15, Exempted Discharges The Permit prohibits discharge of any runoff other than rainwater through storm drain systems, but allows exemptions for certain discharges which are typically "clean" water. This includes groundwater pumping, flow from broken water mains, chlorination tests for new water mains, and runoff from firefighting activities. While these exemptions are reasonable, the permit puts new requirements on local agencies for monitoring and record keeping of these activities, many of which are beyond the control of local agencies (the Permit includes a requirement that fire departments consider storm inlet protection prior to conducting firefighting activities). Failure to monitor and control activities by other agencies could put local agencies in noncompliance with the Permit. The added cost of monitoring and recording discharges is estimated at $8,000. Mr. John Muller ~ ~~ San Franci sco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page 8 of 9 Fiscal Impacts The City of Dublin has completed an analysis of the fiscal and staffing impacts of the Permit. The City of Dublin currently spends approximately $179,000 per year on activities directly related to its water-quality program, including staff time, materials, and the contribution to the Alameda County Clean Water Program. This amount does not include an additional $203,000 per year for maintenance activities such as street sweeping, storm drain inlet cleaning, spill cleanup, and trash removal from City parks, nor does it include costs associated with review of land development which are reimbursed by developers. Based on new or enhanced activities required under the new permit, it is estimated that the annual cost of clean water activities will increase to $403,000, an annual increase of $224,000 or 125%. Again, this cost does not include likely proportionate cost increases in maintenance and development review. The City of Dublin is dependent upon its General Fund to provide funding for stormwater activities. The General Fund is used to fund numerous other municipal services, including public safety. There is no "surplus" of funds available for increased stormwater costs under the new Permit. In order to achieve compliance with the requirements of the Permit, the City will need to transfer funds currently used for other services, which will result in a cutback of those services. Modifying the Permit to address the items discussed above would reduce the increased annual costs to the City of Dublin by up to $89,000, without significantly reducing the effectiveness of water quality programs provided by the City. We hope that this cost comparison gives you some appreciation of the fiscal impacts from the current permit requirements to the City of Dublin and other municipalities, and that these fiscal impacts are not insignificant. Local agencies must work with a finite amount of funding; permit requirements for reporting, monitoring, or "nice to have" items that have no actual benefit to water quality improvements do not serve the public and should be eliminated. We support the remainder of the Board and its' staff on your ongoing efforts to improve water quality in the Bay Area. We look forward to further discussion on how we can achieve those goals while working within current funding constraints. Please note that most of these issues have been raised in previous letters from .the City of Dublin to Regional Board staff on November 30, 2006, July 13, 2007, and February 6, 2008. Copies of these letters are attached, none of which has received a reply. We appreciate your attention to these comments, and look forward to a renewed dialogue with the Board as we work through the remaining permit issues. Please contact Joni Pattillo, City Manager, at (925)-833-6650 for further discussion of these comments. ~~ Mr. John Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (February 13, 2009 Release) Page 9 of 9 Sincerely, Tim Sbranti Mayor TS/ml Attach. cc: Dr. Terry Young, Vice-Chair, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Shalom Eliahu, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board William Peacock, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Terry Moore, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Jim McGrath, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Raneshwar Singh, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Bruce Wolfe, Executive Director, Regional Board Thomas Mumley, Assistant Executive Director, Regional Board Jim Scanlin, Alameda County Clean Water Program Joni Pattillo, City Manager Chris Foss, Assistant City Manager John Bakker, City Attorney Melissa Morton, Public Works Director Mark Lander, City Engineer Jeri Ram, Community Development Director G:\NPDES\MRP -NPDES Permit\MRP Comments to Board 3-18-09.doc ~a ~7 ~1f€~~ ~- ~~14 -- ia`~l ~ ~`' _ _r~.. . __t a.,, ~~ -_ -___-- _-_____-_ __ ~, .. "Cel~~rafir~g 25 Years t7f Cityhc~ad 19II2-2t?0~" February 6, 2008 Mr. John Muller Chair San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board 1515 Clay Street, Ste. 1400 Oakland, CA 94612 Subject: Tentative Order for Municipal Regional .Permit Dear Mr. Muller: The City of Dublin appreciates the opportunity to review the Tentative Order f®r the Municipal Regional Permit (MRP) which was released for by the San Francisca Bad Regional Water Quality Control Board on December 4, 2.007. The City of Dubiin recognizes the effort by Board staff into the preparation of the new permit, which includes aggressive measures to deal with pollutants of concern, including trash. The City of Dublin is committed to performing its' share of the effort needed for continued reduction of pollutants and improvements to water quality within the Bay Area. The City has taken a progressive approach to addressing environmental quality issues through its Green Building Program for Cify facilities, Green Building requirements for new development, and development of two transit centers at the West and East Dublin BART Stations. The City has dedicated the necessary resources to ensure that it remains in compliance with both the letter and the spirit of .its current. Municipal Storm Water Permit, and .recently worked with both Caltrans and the. Regional Board in developing. the first cooperative stormwater treatment project under these agencies alternate treatment measures program. Following detailed review of the permit, we remain concerned that many requirements of the permit will result in questionable or marginal improvements to actual water quality, and may in fact detract from local agencies' ability to carry out existing or improved focal clean water programs due to demands on funding, staff, and. other resources. Specific concerns are as follows: l r ~ Mr. John Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (December 4, 2007 Release). Page2of7 1) Additional Monitoring Requirements The proposed. permit requires extensive new monitoring, testing, and reporting efforts by local agencies on local watersheds. This in spite of the current efforts by the San Francisco Bay Estuary Institute (SFEI) to maintain an ongoing Regional Monitoring Program (RMP) for San Francisco Bay, a program which is well respected by the scientific and environmental. communities. SFEI recently published its 2007 report, based on hundreds of samples taken in bay water. and sediment over the last five years. The report provides tremendous insight on watershed-specific sources of pollutants in the bay and trends for .improvement or degradation due to specific pollutants. Given this background knowledge, it is questionable that additional monitoring data will influence pollution reduction efforts that are required by the permit regardless of the monitoring results. Elimination or reduction of the required new monitoring would not impact pollution reduction efforts and .would allow available resources to be put into actual water quality improvement efforts. The added cost of new. monitoring efforts. to the City of Dublin is estimated at over $9,000 per year. 2) increasers 4 reatment Reciuirement~ for l~iew 17evei®prnent: The threshold for requiring installation and monitoring of water quality measures for .new development has been reduced from 1 acre to 10,000 sf, dropping to 5,000 sf in two years. The City of Dublin does not take issue with the 1 Q,000 sf threshold. However, we do not believe that reduction to the 5,000 sf threshold will capture new development with significant. pollutant loadings, and that the result will be nominal improvement to water quality, increased staff time needed for plan processing and ongoing monitoring, and the installation of privately maintained site-specific water quality measures that will be redundant to publicly-maintained community-wide controls. The permit also requires treatment of reconstructed pavement,. even though impervious surfaces are not increased and no new activities are occurring that would-generate additional pollution. The added cost of this requirement will dilute the limited funds already available for pavement rehabilitation and further hinder local agencies' ability to maintain .their street systems. The added cost for staff to review and monitor new development is estimated at over $7,.000 per year. The cost added to the City's pavement, maintenance. program for storm runoff treatment is estimated at $30,000 per-year. 3) Development of Additional and Spil6 Response b~rocedures The permit requires development of a formalized Emergency Response Plan (ERP') for use with business inspections. and spill response, among other processes, record .keeping,. and ~zl ~7 Mr. John Muller l~ San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit. (December 4, 2007 Release). Page 3 of 7 reporting. Included in the ERP are requirements. to adopt, by ordinance, escalating penalties for noncompliance. The City of Dublin, during .the 2006-07 Fiscal Year, responded to a total of 21 spills or discharges. In addition,-the City completed 23 business inspections and identified 7 items requiring attention. Each of these situations was either corrected or in the process of being corrected. by the end of the fiscal year.. In summary, the City of Dublin's current spill response and business inspection practices are effective, and adoption of additional formal measures would provide no incremental benefit to water quality. The added cost of adopting additional. business and spill response measures is estimated at $13,000 per year. 4) Increased Record Keeping and Reporting The permit requires additional record .keeping and reporting in almost every category of activities. The permit includes a new annual report farm, significantly longer than the existing report format. This is despite lack of comment or response to annual reports submitted to the board for the last several years, and comments by board staff that they are unable to find the time to review existing reports.. Record keeping and reporting utilizes staff time that could otherwise be used for activities that result in actual water quality improvements. The added cost of completing the annual report is estimated at $13,000 .per year. 5) Public Outreach The City of Dublin is required to complete additional local public outreach events (six events compared to four under the current permit). In past years, the City has met or exceeded this minimum requirement. However, the permit also requires additional region-level outreach and education, including measurement of effectiveness. We question the practicality of measuring items such as "awareness" or "behavioral changes". Furthermore, given the major new. efforts required to deal with trash and other pollutants. of concern, the City of Dublin suggests that this is not the year to add additional required .public outreach work and to impose additional record keeping and reporting requirements for this activity. Added costs for public outreach are estimatedat over $8,000 per year 6) Copper The permit requires. additional copper-reduction measures, including specific changes to the municipal code regarding 1,~J2Shing of buildings vtiflth Copper architectural features. This is in ~~ Mr. John Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (December 4, 2007 Release) Page 4 of 7 spite of the San Francisco Estuary Institutes' 2007 Regional Monitoring Report indicating that copper levels in the Bay are below allowable health .standard levels, and that copper was removed as a contributing pollutant to the Bay's status as an impaired water body under Section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act. Copper removal from storm runoff will continue under existing local agency activities; in fact, copper removal may be enhanced as a result of other required activities for mercury, PCB's, etc. The permit requires continued participation by local agencies in the Brake Pad Partnership, which is developing means of reducing copper content in brake pads. This is a current cost and may achieve measurable statewide benefits. However; the permit requires copper- specific activities along with specific record keeping and reporting requirements, none of which contribute to copper or other pollutant. removal or overall water quality improvements. Some of the requirements .(such as an ordinance _prohibiting washing of buildings with exterior copper) would impact a very Limited source of copper and` would be impractical to enforce.. The added cost of copper reduction is estimated. at $24,000 per year. 7) Trash Reducti®r~ The permit requires that agencies develop an enhanced trash control program for at Ieasf 10% of the land within their jurisdiction. Half of the targeted area. must be treated with structural trash controls. The City of Dublin would need to provide structural .controls treating approximately 300 acres in order to comply with this permit requirement. The cost of installing these structures is estimated at $2 Million, or $400,000 per year for the duration of the five-year permit. The City of Dublin's 10% .trash target area would. encompass most of the Downtown commercial areas, the West Dubliri Transit Center, the .East Dublin Transit Center, and both local high schools. The City's staff has reviewed existing trash. control measures in these areas and believes that operation and maintenance activities such as placing additional trash receptacles and enhanced litter pickup could accomplish the trash reduction goals, and that the 5% requirement for structural retrofits could be reduced to 2-3%. The City of Dublin requests, that the permit requirement of 5% structural retrofit by 2012 be modified to reduce this to the 2-3%° range, allowing the use of non-structural controls to achieve trash reduction within the 10% targeted area. This would allow local agencies an opportunity to assess the effectiveness of these methods and determine if additional structural controls are warranted under the Long Term 15-Year Trash Reduction Plan due in 2012. Reducing that structural retrofit requirement from 5% to 2-3% would reduce the added cost of permit compliance by $200,000 per year. . . ~~ Mr. John- Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control. Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (December 4, 2007 Release) Page 5 of 7 8) Delegation of State and Federa! Duties to Loca! Government The permit requires that local agencies take on duties currently assigned to State and Federal agencies with regards to abatement or monitoring of .certain pollutants of concern. Specifically, the permit requires that: 1) Local agencies monitor and participate in the regulatory process for pesticides and assume responsibilities for development and enforcement of regulations currently handled by Federal and State agencies. This activity is beyond the technical and legal scope of local government, and is .and should continue to be handled at the State and Federal level. Further, if the Regional Board (a State agency) already has reason to believe that certain pesticides should not be used because of water quality impacts, it should take. its' case directly to the State agencies responsible for pesticide control and .not rely on .local government to perform its' duties. 2) The permit requires that local agencies identify PCB's on private property. as part of ongoing clean water business inspections, and coordination with State/ Federal .regulatory agencies to facilitate removal of PCB's. Local agency action should be limited to reporting knowledge of potential PCB releases or contamination on private property to the appropriate State and Federal agencies, with abatement of the problem by those agencies. 3} The permit requires that local agencies develop ar participate in PCB and mercury health risk reduction program for fish consumed from San Francisco Bay. Again, this is an activity that is the responsibility of County, State, and Federal public health agencies, and should -not be delegated to the local level. While the cost for these additional. duties is indeterminate at this time, we believe that the delegation by the. State to local government of duties that rightfully should be performed at the State and Federal level should not occur without compensation to local government for this additional mandated work. 9) Parking Restrictions The Permit. includes language that could potentially require that local streets be posted for no parking on street sweeping days. This would require installation of approximately ,5,000 signs at a cost of $100 each, or $500,000 over the five-year permits ($100,000 annually). The City's street sweeping program currently provides for weekly sweeping of major streets and twice-monthly sweeping of local streets.. Street sweeping on local streets is scheduled to occur the day after trash pickup, to allow cleaning of any spilled trash. Response to residents' concerns regarding unswept areas is handled by sending the sweeper out to the areas of concern. We do not believe. that. parking restrictions on local .streets would result in an .increase in the volume of pollutants removed from the streets. ~ ~ ,~ Mr. John Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (December 4, 2007 Release) Page 6 of 7 The City of Dublin has completed an analysis of the fiscal and staffing impacts of the new permit. The City of Dublin currently spends approximately. $172,000 per year on activities directly related to its water-quality program, including staff time, materials, and the contribution to the Alameda County Clean Water Program. This amount does not- include maintenance activities such as street sweeping, storm drain inlet cleaning, and trash removal from City parks, nor does it include costs associated with review of land development which are reimbursed by developers. Based on new or enhanced activities required under the new permit, it is .estimated that the annual cost of clean water activities will increase to $925,000, an annual increase of $753,000 or 430%. Again, this cost does not include likely proportionate cost increases in maintenance and development review. Modifying the permit to address the nine items discussed above would reduce the increased annual costs to the City of Dublin by $364,000-$444,000, without significantly reducing the effectiveness of water quality programs provided by the City. We hope that this cost comparison. gives you some appreciation of the impacts from the current permit requirements to the. City of Dublin and. other municipalities. We concur that water quality goals should not be driven by cost. However, please understand that local agencies must work with a finite amount of funding and that, anytime an}~ public agency spends funds on an}! task, it must spend. these funds in a manner that maximises the return on those funds for the public. Permit requirements for reporting, monitoring, or "nice to have" items that have no actual benefit to water quality improvements do not serve the public and should be eliminated. Please note that mast of these issues have been raised in previous letters from the City of Dublin to Regional Board staff. on November 30, 2006 and July 13, 2007. Copies of these letters are attached. We appreciate your attention to these comments, and look forward. to a renewed dialogue with the Board as we work through the. remaining permit issues. Please contact Joni Pattillo, Assistant City Manager, at (925)-833-6650 for further discussion of these comments. Sincerely, :'~~ ;,Janet Lockhart Mayor JL/ml Attach. cc: Shalom Eliahu, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board r ~t Mr. John Muller San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Tentative Order for Draft Municipal Regional Permit (December 4, 2007 Release} Page 7 of 7 William Peacock, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Terry Young, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Jim McGrath, San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board Bruce Wolfe, Executive Director, Regional Board Thomas Mumley, Assistant Executive Director, Regional Board Jim Scanlin, Alameda County Clean Water Program Richard Ambrose, City Manager Joni Pattillo, Assistant City Manager Libby Silver, City Attorney Melissa Morton, Public Works Director Mark Lander, City Engineer , Jeri Ram, Community Development Director G:\NPDES\MRP -NPDES Permit\MRP, Comments to Board, 2-06-08.doc r 6 0~ 41 C~~~ ~~ D~~~ j fl! 19 -~- ,82 CITY ~~ U~LI1~ "Celebrating 25 Years flt Cityhoad 1982-2007" ~~~ ~- ~/~ 100 Civic Plaza, Dublin, California 94568 Website: http:J/www.ci.dublin.ca.us ~~LIFO~?~~~ July 13, 2007 Mr. Bruce Wolfe Executive Officer San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board 1515 Clay Street, Ste. 1400 Oakland, CA 94612 Subject: Draft Municipal Regional Permit Dear Mr. Wolfe: The City of Dublin appreciates the opportunity to review the draft Municipal Regional Permit (MRP) for local agencies which'was distributed by Board staff on May 1, 2007. The City of Dublin is committed to a good-faith effort to continue reduction of pollutants and improvements to water quality within the Bay Area. We recognize the effort put by Board staff into the preparation of the draft MRP. We also recognize that Board staff has made numerous revisions to the permit since_it was first released in draft form last October. Following detailed review of the current version of the permit, we remain concerned that many requirements of the permit will not result. in improved water quality and may detract from Permittees' ability to carry out existing or improved local clean water programs due to demands on funding, staff, and other resources.. The permit continues to require an extraordinary amount of record .keeping and reporting. The permit requires. a greatly increased monitoring effort under Section C.8, as well as numerous other redundant monitoring requirements in other sections of the permit. Section C.3 contains several new requirements of concern to local agencies. The new permit would lower the threshold for the requirement of water-quality measures for new development from the current limit of 10,000 square feet down to 5,000 square feet, with an accompanying increase in local agency staff time. to review, inspect, and monitor these sites. We believe that the time and effort (including reporting requirements) spent on what are largely in-fill projects would be better spent. an area-wide measures associated with larger developments, or enhancements to local agency maintenance programs that .would benefit the entire community. Area Code (925) City Manager 833-6650 • City Council 833-6654. ^ Personnel 833-6605 Economic Development 833-6650 Finance 833-6640 • Public Warts/Engineering 833-6630 Parks & Community Services 833-6645 • ,Police 833-6670 Planning/Code Enforcement 833-u670 • Building. inspection 833-6620 Fire Prevention Bureau 833-6606 Printed on Recycled Paper Mr. Bruce Wolfe ~~ ~~ .San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board ~l Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 2 of 15 Section C.3 also contains a .provision .that-local agencies :install treatment measures in conjunction with reconstruction of pavement on arterial streets. This is .regardless of whether or not the pavement reconstruction results in .increased impervious surface area. The. additional. cost of treatment measures will severely dilute the availability of funds. to address the current backlog of pavement maintenance needed throughout the Bay Area.. We believe that the current permit conditions may lead .agencies to address the added costs by simply deferring needed reconstruction, which will result in none of the intended water quality improvements as well as continued deferral of pavement repairs. We believe that there are other permit requirements (such as copper reduction under Section C.13) that address runoff from arterial streets, and that the specific requirements regarding street reconstruction can be removed without adversely impacting water quality goals... Section C.10 requires an entirely new effort to reduce or abate accumulation of trash in drainage systems. V1/e believe that this is a worthwhile effort, and have no issues with the overall goals of this section, but find.the permit to be overly restrictive in terms of process. We have suggested changes thaf we believe would reduce cost and result in a more flexible. process for Permittees to meet the permit goals. Similarly, Sections C.9, C.10, C.11, C.12, and C.13 include requirements for reduction of metals and other pollutants. of concern. We concur with the pollutant reduction. goals but are concerned with monitoring requirements that are overlapping and redundant with the requirements of .Section C.8. Further, these sections contain requirements that we believe are outside the jurisdiction of municipalities to perform, and that some of these tasks are better handled at the State and Federal level. Specific comments on each section of the permit are as follows: C.1 (Water Quality Standards Exceedances) 1) Sections C.1 b .and C.1 c: it is suggested that the 30 day period for a Permittee to respond to notifications from the Board and/ or to implement revised control measures be extended as mutually agreed upon by the Permittee anal the Board, dependent on the nature of the issue. For Permittees, 30 days is an extremely short and potentially unrealistic time period in which. to develop and implement changes. to the Permittees' clean. water program, since these measures may require budget revisions and additional staff, training, or other resources. C.2 (Maintenance) 1) Section C.2c(i): It should be permissible. for sweeper operator training to be conducted at the county or regional- level, as the smaller individual Permittees would not. have. the resources to provide. training in acost-effective manner. t Mr. Bruce Walfe San Francisco BayRegional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 3 of 15 iq ~ ~~ 2) Section C.2e.(i): The requirement that Permittees shall mark and maintain. all storm inlets with an awareness message should be revised to require that Permittees have an ongoing program for marking and maintaining markings on inlets. The City of Dublin has and continues to use volunteer work parties (schools, Boy and Girl Scouts, Dublin Pride Week,. etc.) for installation of storm drain markers as a public outreach and education effort. The value of these events is not so much the installation of additional markers but the understanding that participants (particular{y students) come away with regarding water-quality issues and things that they can do to prevent pollution. Requiring that agencies immediately mark inlets would. eliminate this opportunity for ongoing outreach and education. C.3 (New Development and Redevelopment) 1 } Section C.3.a(i)(3): Pollutant loadings for 303(d) water bodies needs to be .allocated to individual Permittees in order for post-project runoff requirements to be set. It is unclear where Permittees will receive this information in order to set conditions. 2) Section C.3.a(i)(9.): Connection of swimming pool drains to sanitary sewers may not be possible in all locations due to sanitary .sewer capacity, and will require approval of the sewage agencies. The section should be revised to add the language "subject to approval of the appropriate sewage agency". 3) Section C.3.a(i)(10): This paragraph. should be deleted. The requirement for LID is vague, redundant with other new development water quality .measures, discounts the effectiveness of treatment or other source control or design measures in achieving water quality goals, and maybe in conflict with Permittees' adopted General Plans; Specific Plans, or individual project entitlements. 4) Section C.3.a(i}(11): This paragraph should be deleted for the same reasons. 5) Section C.3.b(i)(3): Modify this paragraph to eliminate the requirement that trails be subject to the treatment provisions. This is a departure from the prior permit draft that excluded trails not constructed as part of a larger project. It should be noted that, under these conditions, a trail infill or gap closure only 500 long (less than. a City block),: costing approximately $50,000, would require treatment measures of perhaps equal value. These cost increases would discourage completion of non-vehicle "transportation improvements that provide indirect water-quality improvements by reduction of vehicle travel (as well as public safety in some. cases). It is also unclear what pollutants are to be treated, since trails are closed to vehicle traffic and accommodate only pedestrians or bicycles. Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 4 of 15 6) Section C.3.b(i)(4): This paragraph should be eliminated. Reconstruction of pavement does not generate additional impervious surface, and may actually help water quality be eliminating failed and broken pavement that will continue to be washed into storm systems unless repaired. Municipalities are generally facing a backlog of pavement repair and the additional cost of water quality treatment will only further delay needed repairs. This provision may encourage agencies to defer. reconstruction in lieu of other repair methods, with the result that no water quality improvements are. achieved and the public does not receive the benefit of a properly repaired road. 7) Section C.3.b(ii): This requirement should be eliminated. The inclusion in the. permit of ali new development (including single family-homes) creating over 5,000 square feet of impervious surface will be time-consuming and cumbersome, and is not acost-effective- use of Permittees' resources.. Projects of this size are typically infill projects located in developed areas, where the Permittee is already implementing water-quality measures through its' maintenance efforts. The time and resources spent in achieving limited .water-quality improvements for infill projects could be better spent on projects providing. agency- or program-wide. benefits. It should also be noted that these projects. are already subject to plan review, grading, site and building permits and inspection by the municipality, which will preempt most of the water-quality problems associated with these projects. 8) Section C.3.b(iv): It is out understanding that the word "approved" would apply to projects for which construction permits have been issued, as approved project entitlements are do not necessarily lead to construction. 9) Section C.3.c: This section should be eliminated. See comments under Section C.3.b(i)(4) above. 10) Section C.3.c(vi): The requirement to generate a report for lot-scale treatment BMP's is redundant, as numerous existing BNIP's are available to Permittees for use on individual lots. 11) Section C.3.e(iii): The O&M reporting process should be simplified. The permit requires. reporting on individual O&M inspections, AND reporting on overall percentage. compliance of sites inspected, AND reporting on overall percentage of compliance by type of water-quality measure, AND a comparison of the above .percentages to prior year reports. .This is redundant, unnecessary reporting. 12} Section C.3.j: This section. should be eliminated. The requirement for collection of data on new impervious surfaces down to 1,000 sf with the level of detail required in the report is cumbersome and time consuming, and without any apparent contribution. to water quality. - Permittees are already required under Section C.3.b report the impervious surfaces area of new projects subject to the permit (10;fl6Q sf or more) and to document how these projects will be treated. This requirement, if implemented,. will utilize Permittee resources that could be better spent on other issues. Mr. Bruce Wolfe 1 San Francisco Bay Regional Water ControC Board Comments on draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 5 of 15 C.4 (Industrial and Commercial Lnspections) 1) Section C.4.a(i)(a): It is suggested that the timeframe for cleanup or abatement be increased beyond 48 hours if, in the judgment of the Permittee, the situation does not create an eminent danger of discharge to drainage systems. 2) Section C.4.c: The creation of a formal Emergency. Response Plan. (ERP) as described in this section is not necessary for agencies to adequately address pollution or discharge issues at sites. The City of Dublin currently has the staff and the resources to provide the required inspections on an annual basis and to follow up on situations .requiring correction.. Formalizing-the practice would be unproductive because the nature of situations varies and response is adopted to fit the situation. Further, the ERP requirements focus heavily on progressive enforcement; the City of Dublin gas found that the majority of business owners are responsive to education and will modify their operations voluntarily. Permittees are required to note unresolved inspection issues in the annual report, which is motivation to complete followup action as necessary to address problems; the ERP is redundant. Section C.5 (Illicit Discharge) and Section C.6 (Construction Inspection) also include requirements for an ERP. This will result in either three different versions of an agency ERP, or a single ERP with multiple sections, either of which will be difficulty and unwieldy for Permittee staff to implement. 3) Section C.4d(iii}; The requirement that Permittees provide copies of training evaluation results to the Board is of minuscule benefit to water quality and should be .removed. Evaluation of training results is an internal concern of Permittees. C.5 (Illicit Discharge) 1) Section C.S.b: The creation of a formal Emergency Response Plan (ERP) as described in this- section is not necessary for agencies to adequately handle discharge response and cleanup. The City of Dublin currently has the staff and the resources to respond to incidents; formalizing the practice would be unproductive because the nature of incidents varies and response is adopted to fit the. incident. Further, the ERP requirements focus heavily on progressive enforcement; the City of Dublin gas found that the majority of incidents can be resolved with the initial response and rarely involve repeat offenses. Section C.4 (Business Inspections) and Section C.6 (Construction Inspection) also include requirements for an ERP. This will. result in either three different versions of an agency ERP, or a single ERP with multiple sections, either of which will be difficulty and. unwieldy for Permittee staff to implement. ~Mr. Bruce Wolfe ~~' San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2Q07 Revision) Page 6 of 15 Section C.5.c, Spill and .Dumping Response, should be retained as written and should serve as the ERP, since it contains adequate requirements for Permittees to respond to incidents, 2) Section C.S.b(i)(2}: It is suggested that Board notification not be required for situations not remedied within 48 hours if, in the judgment of the Permittee, that the situation is under control and that eminent danger of discharge to drainage systems is no longer an issue, in order to reduce numerous notifications to the Board. 3) Section C.S.b(i)(6): Reporting of discharges in the Annual Report is already covered by the completion of the Illicit Discharge Inspection Quarterly Summary Reports. 4) Section C.5.d: The requirement for collection system screening is redundant with the requirements for system inspection and cleaning under Section C.2 as well as trash assessments under Section C.1 Q. 4) Section C.Sf: This section is unnecessarily detailed. The section should be simplified to require only a brief summary of past and future plans, based (if needed) on the past year's activity. Presumably, Permittees will need to discuss how any outstanding incidents will be treated in the following year. Furthermore, Permittees would address problems or make improvement to their procedures on an ongoing basis, and formal reporting on a year-by-year. basis is an unnecessary administrative burden. 5) C.5.g: The reporting of training events is unnecessarily detailed. C.6 (Construction Inspection) 1) Section C.6.b: See prior comments on the requirement for an Enforcement Response Pfan. Construction work. within the City of Dublin is completed under either a construction or encroachment permit issued by the City, or under a contract with the City. Work .is performed under the ongoing review of inspectors, who have adequate tools (such as stop work orders) to generally create an immediate response to problems and to ensure cleanup or mitigation as needed. Work is completed under a bond or direct contract with the City, which gives the City adequate financial leverage to ensure that problems are addressed. 2) Section C.6.d: The reporting requirements are redundant with reporting .requirements under new development. This will result in reporting of two lists, one for development projects and a second for many of .those same projects that are now under construction. 3) Section C.6.f(ii): The requirement for screening level. inspections is redundant with the requirement that Permittees send out September. 1St notices followed by October 15t" inspections. Under the above requirement (which the City of Dublin is currentlyfollowing), all construction sites will be inspected prior to the wet season. • ~ Mr, Sruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 7 of 15 23~'~ The Alameda County Clean Water Program has developed an erosion control checklist for use by inspectors. This checklist will provide the needed inspection effort. required- under this section and.. the detailed description of inspections in this section is not needed. 4) Section C.6.f(ii)(3): The reporting required under this section appears to be redundant with the reporting required under Section C.6.e (iii). 4 It is suggested that Sections C.6.e and C.6. be streamlined and merged into a single section,. with one set of requirements for inspections and reporting. C.7 (Public Information and Outreach) 1) Section C.7a: The requirement that Permittees shall mark and maintain at least 90% of all storm inlets with an awareness message should be revised to require that Permittees have an .ongoing program for marking and maintaining markings on inlets. The City of .Dublin .has and continues to use volunteer work parties (schools, Boy and Girl Scouts, Dublin Pride Week, etc.) for installation of storm drain markers as a public outreach and education effort. The value of these events is not so much the installation of additional markers but the understanding that participants (particularly students) come away with regarding water-quality issues and things that they can do to prevent pollution. Requiring that agencies immediately mark inlets would eliminate this opportunity for ongoing outreach and education. 2) Section C.7.g: Under this section the City of Dublin will be required to~ participate in two Community .Involvement Events. This is in addition to the City. participate in at least four public outreach events during the year, for a total of at feast six events. This is an increase of 50% over the level of public outreach the City is required. to participate in under. the current permit. Given that, under .the new permit, Permittees will need to deal with the cost and staffing issues of numerous other additional. requirements (increased monitoring, reporting, TMDL's, trash reduction, etc.), the cost and effort associated with the additional public outreach effort is arbitrary and punitive. The additional public outreach requirements should be eliminated from the requirement, unless other requirements of the permit of equal cost and effort are removed. 3) Section C.7.h: The requirements to asses and quantify awareness and behavioral change: are difficult to achieve, are. of .questionable accuracy, and not acost-effective use of resources. It is suggested that Sections C.7.h(ii) and (iii) be eliminated. 4) Section C.7.1: This section should be eliminated. Public officials -will become fully aware of the new permit requirements trough the Permittee budget revisions that will be necessary to implement the new. permit. 'Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 8 of 15 5) Section C.7m: This section should be eliminated. The research required under this section is of questionable value and .accuracy, and, given the resources that Permittees will need to devote to other requirements of the permit, not acost-effective use of resources. C.8 (Monitoring) 1) ,General: Permittees within Alameda County will be responsible #or, in addition to ongoing contribution to the Regional Monitoring Plan, new monitoring efforts that include Status and Trends Monitoring for. over a dozen creeks, at least one long-term monitoring effort at a fixed site, five monitoring projects (one per year), and. TMDL monitoring, preparation of reports meeting SWAMP. and other specific formats, and public outreach. This is a monitoring effort that appears to be double to triple the monitoring effort under the current permit. The proposed monitoring program will be time-intensive and costly. The proposed monitoring program (including the sediment study and TMDL study) requires monitoring on a .very broad front as opposed to being focused on specific locations or types of pollutants. The proposal appears to give no credence to past monitoring efforts performed over the last two decades which, presumably, have resulted in the collection of valuable data and would allow development of a more focused monitoring program of trouble areas or tracking of specific pollutants of concern. Focused monitoring of trouble areas and/or specific pollutants, followed by development of'response plans would be a-better use of_agency resources. 2) Section C.8.c(iv): Permittees are required to submit an Electronic. Status. and Trends Report not later than May 1 of each year, based on the foregoing `July 1 -June 30 period. Does this refer to the PRIOR fiscal year data collection,. allowing the period July 1 through May 1 to be available for preparation of the report. This implies that the report will take the better part of a year to prepare, in turn implying that the report will be time-intensive and expensive to prepare. Also, data will be unavailable for a year and always a year out of date. C.9 (Pesticides Toxicity Prevention) 1) Section C.9.e(i): The permit. requires that Permittees track and .participate in regulatory decisions by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the State of .California Department of Pesticide related to pesticides. This requirement should be eliminated. Tracking of Federal and State legislation .and regulations is beyond the scope of municipalities. This is a -task better performed at the State level. Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1,.2007 Revision) Page 9 of 15 If the Regional Board has determined that certain pesticides pose a hazard to water quality, Permittees, through the program, could provide. support to the .Board's. effort to eliminate these products through action at the State and Federal level. 2) Section C.9.f(i): The permit requires that Permittees work with County Agricultural Commissioners to enforce pesticide laws regarding over-the-counter products. This requirement should be stricken. Enforcement of pesticide regulations is .prohibited at the local and county level, and is reserved for State and Federal agencies.. 3) Section C.9.h(i): Permittees are required to conduct public outreach at the point of purchase. This should be revised to require outreach on pesticides to be completed in conjunction with other public outreach efforts. Permittees have no authority to enter private property and distribute information advising customers not to purchase- products that are legally on sale. 4) Section C9.h(ii): The reporting requirements include documentation of "increased level of awareness and behavior changes resulting from outreach". This requirement is vague and subjective. Reasonably accurate results could be obtained only through extensive surveys of public awareness, bringing further cost to a program already heavy in reporting, surveys, and monitoring. C.10 (Trash Reduction) 1) Section C.10.a: It is unclear if activities required apply to individual Permittees, or if "Permittees" refers to the Alameda .County Clean Water Program as a whole. It is noted that the nature of the tasks lend themselves to a group county-wide effort. 2) Section C.10.a(ii): The requirement to use the SCURTA, Version 1 method for the trash. assessment sites should be modified to allow modification of .the assessment method as determined to be appropriate by the Permittees. 3) Section C.10.a(ii~:The requirements for .site sampling are once after Apri! 15th and once prior to October 15t .These samples will actually occur in reverse order, since the sampling requirement will not kick in until the second year of the permit, presumably the 2008-09 Fiscal Year. The Fall sampling wilF occur prior to October 15, 2008 and the Spring sampling prior to April 15, 2009. It is suggested that the permit be revised to note the actual dates that the work will occur. 4) Section C.10.a(ii): The requirement for Permittees to develop ,pilot. wet weather trash transport assessment methods is vague and of. unclear value. Basically, trash caught by runoff will .flow downstream. Analysis of specific assessment sites will be needed in any case Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 10 of 15 to determine site-specific mitigation methods, the .requirement for generic analysis is unnecessary. 5) Section C.40.c: The term "by Year 4" is unclear as to whether this task needs to be completed in the 3rd Year (by start of the 4th Year) or during the 4t" Year. 6) Section C.10.d~v}: The term "by Year 5" is unclear as to whether this task needs to be completed in the 4 h Year (by start of the 5th Year) or during. the .5th Year. 7) .Section C.10.e: This section requires a minimum of 20 new pilot trash capture measures within. Alameda County. The prior section (Section C.10.d) requires that Permittees implement. enhanced trash reduction measures needed to meet the trash standards in Section C.10.c. It is unclear if the 20 new pilot programs are a minimum needed in addition to measures implemented-under Section C.10.d, or if measures installed under Section. C.10.d can be applied to the 20 minimum sites under Section C.10.e. Implementation of measures under Section C.10.d is perFormance-based, while the requirements under Section C.1O.e are statutory. It is not clear how or if the requirements are related. The time frame for completion of the Section C.10.e measures .(within the lifespan of the five- year permit) is not clear. The term "pilot" suggests that the 20 measures required under this permit will be the initial phase of a larger program to follow. It is unclear as to what the criteria will be for requiring additional measures in the future, and .how or if this will be based on the results if the assessment site monitoring. C.11 (Mercury Load Reductian) 1) Section C.11.c: The mercury fate, transport, and uptake studies appear redundant with the monitoring required in Section C.8. The requirement for separate mercury studies under this section should be eliminated, or the monitoring under Section C.8 should be scaled back in favor of pollutant-specific monitoring. The purpose of the studies required under this section is unclear. Reduction of mercury would be seem to be a better use of -available resources as opposed to further studies. The permit language gives no credence to prior studies that may provide the data useful in developing better reduction measures. Mr. Bruce W ~~ Y ~ ~~ olfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 11 of 15 2) Section C.11.d: The 18-month period to develop aCounty-wide mercury allocation program with Caltrans appears short, given that the studies and monitoring needed to evaluate existing mercury loads will not be completed until Year 4 (if the intent is to use existing data, that may work; however, if existing data is adequate for that purpose, there appears to be no need for the studies required under Section C.11.c). In addition to Caltrans, there are numerous other land areas under the jurisdiction of other government agencies over- which the Permittees have no jurisdiction. For example, Camp Parks, the. Santa Rita Jail and other Alameda County buildings, and the BARTD Station and right-of-way are located .within Dubin. Other sites that come to mind are UC Berkeley, Cal State East Bay, and the .Oakland Army Base. Pollutant loading and reduction from these sites should also be included within the allocation. 3) Section C.11.e: As stated under. Section C.11.c, the specific monitoring requirements for mercury are redundant with the overall monitoring requirements under Section C.8. Either these or the Section C.8 requirements should be scaled. back. 4) Section C.11.e(ii)(1 }: The requirement that the benefits of efforts to reduce mercury-related risk. to wildlife and human health be quantified should be eliminated. The Permittees can report on quantities of mercury removed. Judging the impact of this effort on human or wildlife health requires biological and medical knowledge that are beyond the scope of a stormwater permit. Presumably, the standards- set in the Basin Plan are based on past scientific study of mercury health risks. 5) Section C.11.e(ii): Specific mercury load limits and load reductions are specified in these sections. This being the case, the studies required under Section C.11. c appear redundant. 6) Section C.11.f: The. ,requirement for construction. site mercury monitoring appears. redundant with the studies required under Section C.11.c and with construction site pollution control measures required under Section C.6. 7) Section C.11.h: The site-specific sampling requirements would appear to have some value in locating mercury "hot. spots" and developing reduction or cleanup measures. It is suggested that these requirements be left as is, in lieu of the studies and monitoring required under Section C.11.c and Section C.B. 8) Section C.11.j: This section should be deleted as a specific requirement and should 'be allowed as an option under Section C.1'1.i. It is questionable that POTW's wilt ever allow diversion of storm flows to sanitary sewer systems on awide-spread basis, and that diversions will remain the exception rather than becoming a standard treatment measure. The resources spent on what. at best may become an isolated demonstration project-would Mr: Bruce'Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board ..Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) • Page 12 of I S be better spent on other, more standard measures that can be implemented on a wider basis. 9) Section C.11.k: The pollutant-specific sampling requirements would appear to have. some value in locating mercury "hot spots" .and developing reduction or cleanup measures. It is suggested that these requirements be left as is, in lieu of the studies and monitoring required under Section C.11.c and Section C.8. C.12 (PCB's) 1) Section C.12.a(i): This section should be modified to limit evaluation of PCB removal programs to only those sites under the control of Permittees. 2) Section C.12.a(ii): This section should be eliminated. Regulation of PCB's. is not within the scope of actions performed by municipalities. 3) Section C.12.a(iii): Permittees can agree to incorporate identification of PCB equipment into stormwater business and industrial .inspections, and forward the findings to the appropriate State or Federal agency, provided that funding for such training is provided. by a State or Federal agency. Identification of PCB's or PCB equipment would be limited to that which would be apparent in the course of a normal stormwater inspection. Removal of PCB's or PCB equipment, beyond that which may be located on a Permittee facility, is beyond the jurisdiction of Permittees. 4) Section C.12b: ft is suggested that this section be modified to allow use of existing data regarding presence of PCB's in commonly used construction materials, Permittees can comply with reduction measures by modifying existing .permitting procedures to require screening for PCB-containing .materials and documentation of PCB removal and disposal during construction. Demolition permits within the Bay Area currently require a signoff from the Bay Area Air Quality Management District. with regards to the presence, removal, and disposal of hazardous materials. The City of Dublin, in the course of closing out demolition .permits, requires documentation that any materials noted in the BAAQMD review have been dealt with appropriately. 5) Section C.12.c: See response to Section C:12.a(iii) above. 6) Section C:12.d: This section requires major revisions. The .underlying premise of this section seems to be that PCB's are widely present within Permittees' drainage systems. This section should provide greater flexibility for Permittees to determine the extent of PCB's within the drainage system. Mr. 6ruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 13 of 15 The section should also be revised to eliminate abatement of PCB's on private property. Permittees can be responsible for removal of pollutants., including PCB's, which are present in the Permittees's drainage system, or which are actively being discharged into the system. Permittees should not be responsible for PCB's that are present and are not in eminent danger of discharge from the site. The responsibility for abating pollutants on private property is the responsibility of various State and Federal agencies. Permittees can assist these agencies with identifying pollutants that. may become obvious in the course of Permittees conducfing their own stormwater programs, but Permittees should not be responsible for abatement. 7) Section C.12.g: See comments above for Section C.11.j regarding POTW diversion. 8) Section C.12.h: See comments above for Section C.11.h and Section C.11.k regarding sampling and monitoring. 9) Section C.12..i: See comments above for Section C.11.e(ii)(1). Evaluation of health risk reduction is a public health issue beyond the scope of a stormwater permit. 10) Section C.12.j: See comments above for Section C.11.a regarding transport assessment. C.13 (Copper) 1) Section C.13.a: This requirement should be eliminated or revised. Adoption. and enforcement of an ordinance .prohibiting discharge of washwater from copper architectural features is both impractical and redundant. Enforcement is not practical; since powerwashing or other washing of private buildings does not require a permit or other action from the municipality. The.. provisions of this section are already covered by the prohibition of washwater under the City of Dublin Municipal Code, as well as other portions of the MRP that require construction and post-construction BMP's for runoff from development. Further, it is unclear what significance washwater from copper architectural features has in terms of total copper pollutant loading. Resources spent on compliance with this section could potentially be better used in dealing with the brake pad issue, a universal concern to all Permittees. 2) Section C.13.b: it is suggested that the. provisions regarding discharge be moved to Section C.3. The remainder of the section should be eliminated.. As a more general comment, there are numerous requirements in the permit for Permittees to adopt ordinances dealing with specific, somewhat narrow topics of pollution. The City of Dublin Municipal Code refers to the adopted storm rater permit by reference and prohibits Mr. Bruce-Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board' Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2007 Revision) Page 14 of 15 30,E v1 discharges that are in violation of the permit. It is suggested that the implementation of the new MRP requirements could be streamlined by allowing Permittees to refer to the MRP by reference in their .municipal codes, instead of requiring .the adoption of numerous ordinances to cover individual topics. C.14 (PDBE, Legacy Pesticides and Selenium) Comments on this section are similar to fihose for Section 12 (PCB's) above. The section provisions are based on the premise that the above pollutants are present in Permittees' drainage systems, but then requires that extensive testing and reporting to determine if there is a problem. As stated above in Sections C.11 and C.12, specific testing for these specific pollutants may have value, but the general monitoring and testing required under Section C.8 should be eliminated. C.15 (Exempted and Conditionally-Exempted Discharges) This section places an inordinate burden on Permittees for reporting of what are essentially third-party actions which may be beyond the control of the Permittees. The City of Dublin has completed an analysis of the fiscal and staffing impacts of the new permit. The City of Dublin currently spends approximately $173,607 per year on activities directly related to its water-quality program, including staff time, materials, and the contribution to the Alameda County Clean Water Program.. This amount does. not include maintenance activities such as street sweeping, storm drain inlet cleaning, and trash removal from City parks, nor does it include costs associated with review of land development which are reimbursed. by developers. Based on new or enhanced activities required under the new permit, it is estimated that the annual cost of clean water activities will -increase to $376,351, an annual increase of $202,745 or 117%. Again, this cost does not include likely proportionate cost. increases in maintenance and development .review. A .copy of the comparison is attached.. We hope that this cost comparison gives .you some appreciation of the impacts from .the current permit requirements to the City of Dublin and other municipalities. We recognize that improvements to water quality will not come without cost,. but at the same time these costs need to be managed in order to avoid impacts to other municipal services. Moreover, we would hope that costs for reporting, monitoring, or "nice to have" items could be eliminated and that funds spent will for activities thatresult in actual improvements to water quality. Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay RegionaF Water Control Board Comments on Draft Municipal Regional Permit (May 1, 2Q07 Revision) Page 15 of 15 3i~'~ We appreciate your attention to these comments and the ongoing dialogue with the Board as we work through the remaining permit issues. Please call Mark Lander, City Engineer, at (925)-833-6635 if you have any questions regarding our comments. Sincerely, Melissa Morton Public Works Director ML/tma cc: Shin-Roei Lee, Water Board ` Janet O'Hara, Water Board Jim Scanlin, ACCWP Richard Ambrose, City Manager Joni Pattillo, Assistant City Manager Mark Lander, City Engineer Jeri Ram, Community Development Director Libby Silver, City Attorney G:INPDES\MRP - NPDES Permit\MRP, Comments to Board, 7-13-07.doc 0 rn d a Q. 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U O ~ D c aS E v u ~ ~ d ~ ~ co i O ~ ~ Ep pv y Q o r c ~ d U '., a ~ E U m c '~ ~ x. ° U a ~ ~ y E u o ~ m c o E - N ~ p ~ ~° m ' U ~ c ~ v 7 ~ ~ ~ ... E •°'' ~ ~ i u ~ ` m S ° C a ~ ~ m ~ p E Z a co m ~ y ~ o ~ w ~ m ~ . v U a 'S II 19 ~ z S - U a ~ a r- ~ a . N u - j N f7 V IO (D I~ N ~ o <n a ln m O U O U U U U U I ~. a UUU U U U UUU ' H ~y ~IT`~' OF ~}UBLIN 100 Civic Plaza, Dublin, California 94568 Website: http://www.ci.dublin.ca.us November 8, 2006 Mr. Bruce Wolfe Executive Officer San Francisco Bay Regional. Water Quality Control Board 1515 Clay Street, Ste. 1400 Oakland, CA 94612 Subject: Draft Municipal Regional Permit Dear Mr. Wolfe: The City of Dublin appreciates the opportunity to review the draft Municipal Regional Permit (MRP) for local agencies which was distributed by Board staff on October 14. We recognize the effort put by Board staff into the preparation of the draft MRP. As an agency permitted under the MRP we share the staff's intent that the new permit should facilitate continued improvements to water quality in the San Francisco Bay and its'. tributaries. Unfortunately, based on our review of the. draft document, we do not believe that the new permit will lend itself to improved water quality and may, in fact, detract from local agencies' ability to carry out either existing. or improved programs. The permit requires an extraordinary amount of record keeping and reporting, which will reduce the time available for agencies to develop new programs, perform inspections, or other measures that will have an .actual impact on water quality: The permit contains arbitrary, cost-intensive measures such as a requirement that all agencies replace 50% of their street sweeper fleet over afive-year period, regardless of the existing condition of the fleet or any potential increases in sweeper effectiveness as a result of the replacement, The new. permit wauld lower the threshold for the requirement of water-quality measures for new development from the current limit of 10,OOQ square feet down to 5,000 square feet. We believe that the time and effort (including reporting requirements) spent on what are largely in-fill. projects would be better spent on area-wide measures associated with larger developments, or enhancements to local agency maintenance programs that would benefit the entire community. Area Code (925) 9 City Manager 833-6650 a City Council 833-6650 Personnel 833-6605 -Economic Development 833-6650 Finance 833-66~~0 ~ Public ~Norks/Engineering 833-6630 ~ Parks & Community Services. 833-6645. a Police 533-6670 Planning/code Enforcement 833-6690.® Building hispeciion 833-6620 Fire Preveritien Bureau.833-6606 Prinfed on Recycled Paper Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Draft Municipal Regional Permit Page 2 of 8 3q ~ Y1 Of particular concern is that the revised permit does not focus on specific concerns such as pollutants of concern or trash, but is instead a broad approach to all categories of the program. In fact, the permit rewrites virtually every provision of the previous .permit in-all categories. The draft permit suggests that the Board has been unable to evaluate the extensive reporting submitted annually by local .agencies on their local programs, and yet the. Board has determined that local agency efforts to date are largely inadequate. We understand that the Board has scheduled public workshops to discuss. the new permit on November 15-16. This date provides only four weeks for review, and we have not had time to accurately assess its impacts to our municipal. operations and budget. In the time available,. we have been able to provide the following list of specific comments on the .permit, but it should not be considered complete: 1) General: The permit, while numbered by pages, appears to be a compilation of multiple efforts by Board staff and is not consistent in its formatting or organization. An outline would be valuable in following the organization of the report (note that the page numbering could. be obsolete with the next draft, making it difficult to follow up on comments). The document as issued is difficult to fallow. 2) General: The permit requires that numerous activities be completed at various times throughout the five-year permit. Many of these activities appear to be concentrated in the first years. It is difficult to access the impact on agency. resources to accomplish these goals, but the possibility of overloading resources in the first years appears probable. The. permit should include an easily read timeline showing the schedule for completing each of the activities listed in the permit. 3) Page 3: There is a requirement that. permittees replace 50% of their street sweeper fleet over afive-year period. This requirement, in addition to being capital intensive, does not appear to be based on any evidence that existing sweeping practices are inadequate or that. replacement of equipment would result in .measurable improvements to water quality, nor. does it take into account the condition of an individual agency's existing fleet. 4) Page 6-9: Reporting requirements include annua{ certification by permittees that tasks have been completed in compliance with- this section. The range of tasks included in this section is broad and subjective, and includes many activities for which the person signing the report could not have first-hand knowledge of its completion. Certification is not the appropriate term. 5) Page 10: There are requirements that permittees remove or otherwise abate trash in ' creeks and waterways under their maintenance programs. This appears again on Page 92 under Section 10, Pollutants of Concern. The parallel requirements in the two sections will make it difficult for agencies to track compliance and will double the annual reporting efforts in future years. It is suggested that these two sections be streamlined so that actual permit. requirements are listed in one section. `Mr. Bruce Wolfe. San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Draft Municipal Regional Permit Page 3 of 8 yo ~ ~~ 6) Page 10 and 92: The requirements for "trash abatement" and reduction in "trash accumulation" need to be clarified. Trash present in a creek can be reduced by removing the trash on an ongoing basis, by installing floatable booms to restrict trash migration, by trapping the trash upstream of storm drain outfalls into the creek, by reducing removing litter from the ground before it enters the storm drain, or by reducing littering in the place of origin. The latter, while the most ideal, is unfortunately the least likely to achieve the. perceived goal as the act of littering is a bad habit beyond the ability of municipalities to stop. The intent of the goals needs further discussion. The Board is aware that most creeks in Alameda County are owned by the local flood control agency (or in some cases, may be privately owned}. Municipalities can, to an extent, control trash which may reach creeks from municipal storm drain systems, but cannot control trash that may be thrown directly into creeks. Also, municipalities cannot enter creeks for cleanup activities without the cooperation of the owner. These requirements should be rewritten to reflect the above. 7) Page 11: We question the effectiveness of additional enforcement of anti-littering codes. Littering is a random act that is difficult to catch.. Iricreased enforcement will put. additional strain on existing law enforcement and code enforcement staff, with little or no increase in results. 8) Page 12: Record keeping for maintenance activities includes records of inspection, cleaning, and maintenance of each inlet on an annual basis. In the case of the City of Dublin, this would include individual records for thousands of inlets, which is not practical nor cost- effective. Current City practice is to inspect and clean each inlet as needed; activities are tracked. using base maps which are :.upgraded on a regular basis to reflect changes to the system. We can continue to report on the number of inlets inspected and cleaned, but believe that record keeping for individual inlets is nova productive use of resources. 9) Page 22: There is a requirement that new swimming pool drains. be•connected to the sanitary sewer system (This requirement also. appears on Page 105 Control Measure 2.1.1 for copper). We are not aware that the sewage agencies are in concurrence with this. requirement. We suggest this requirement be eliminated until the Board has received approval from sewage agencies for this method of treatment. Wo also. suggest that alternate treatment measures such as directing pool runoff through landscaping or other filtering devices be allowed. ' Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Draft Municipal Regional Permit Page 4 of 8 Yi ~! v1 10) Page 22- 31: Reporting requirements for new development require extensive data (including impervious surface calculations) on each new project within the municipality. Presumably, if the municipality has the requirements in .place which are listed on Page 22, the municipality will be implementing these requirements for each new development .project and obtaining the water quality goals of these requirements. The City of Dublin can demonstrate that it has or will adopt and implement the new development requirements in the permit. As stated previously, it is not clear how this data will be used to improve water quality, and the extensive reporting requirements will impact time and resources that could be used more effectively. 11) Page 24-26: The inclusion in the permit of all. new development (including single family- homes) creating over 5,000 square feet of impervious surface, will be time-consuming and cumbersome, and is not acost-effective use of municipality resources. Projects of this size are typically infill projects located in developed areas, where the municipality is already implementing water-quality measures through its maintenance efforts. The time and resources spent in achieving limited water-quality improvements for infill projects could be better spent on projects providing. agency- or program-wide benefits. It should also be noted that these projects are already subject to plan review, grading, site and building permits and inspection by the municipality, which will-preempt most of the water-quality problems associated with these projects. 12) Page 27-29: The O&M reporting process should be simplified. The permit requires reporting on individual Q&M inspections, AND reporting on overall. percentage compliance of sites inspected, AND reporting on overall percentage of compliance by type of water-quality measure, AND a comparison of the above percentages to prior year reports. This is redundant, unnecessary reporting. Further, the requirement that the 0&M plan include the condition of approval for the water-quality measure is irrelevant to the O&M process and should be eliminated from the O&M process. 13) Page 33: The requirement for lot-scale stormwater treatment measures would appear to be unnecessary in light of the extensive prior vvork done to develop water-quality measures.. 14) Pages 39-41 and 47: The requirement for an enforcement response plan .(including the Tracking-Self Evaluation) is redundant with reporting requirements already required under the quarterly spill/ discharge requirements. Agencies are already required to report spills and follow up action; it is unclear what is gained. by formalizing the process. 15) Page 41: The staff training for business inspections and: illicit discharge control contains references to requirements for what are essentially construction inspection methods (specifically,1tems V, VI, and Vllf). The permit provisions are confusing business inspection/ illicit discharge inspections with construction inspection, which are two totally unrelated Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Draft Municipal Regional Permit Page 5 of 8 ~ a ~ 4'1 activities performed by different staff with different training. Also, the requirement to report results of training evaluations should be struck. 16) Page 41: The requirement for one dry-weather screening and .one wet-weather screening for each screening point should be combined into a single pre-winter screening, in order to reduce impacts to staff needed for flood-protection and other health/ safety work during wet weather. In addition, .the screening requirements are redundant with the monitoring requirements elsewhere in the permit. 17) Page 47: The requirement for Citations and Fines in the Enforcement Response Plan should be optional. The goal of the municipality is correction of the problem; the methods should be left up to the agency. 18) Page 48-50: The reporting of construction site inspections will be cumbersome and redundant with existing inspection activities performed by municipalities. Construction inspection, unlike routine business inspections, is an ongoing, dynamic process. Site conditions may change daily, and inspectors typically inspect sites on a daily basis and address issues as needed. The goal should be to implement winterization .measures at each site prior to wet weather. How this is accomplished should be left up to the agency. If the Board is interested in monitoring sites, information on open projects. is already available in the list of projects in the new development section. 19) Page 52:. The requirement for 95% of all municipal storm drain inlets to be labeled should be eliminated if the municipality can show progress in meeting this goal through volunteer public participation (which the City of Dublin is doing}. There is tremendous public outreach/ education value in having the public install the storm drain markers, and participants leave the event with anew. under-standing and.-appreciationfor stormwater pollution prevention.: 20) Page 54: The combined number of public outreach and citizen support events has increased from six to seven for municipalities with a population of 40,000-100,000. Furthermore, the lower threshold has dropped from 50,000 under the existing permit. The public outreach efforts required under the new permit should `be held to existing levels in order to allow permittees to focus on efforts addressing trash and other pollutants of concern. 21) Page 55-56: The extensive reporting on the. types of public outreach-materials is excessive. Further, the required public outreach for commercial and industrial uses is .redundant to the business inspection program, which already includes an outreach effort. 22) Page 57-66: The proposed monitoring program will be time-intensive and costly.. The proposed monitoring program (including the sediment study) requires monitoring. on a very broad front as opposed tobeing focused on specific locations or types of pollutants. The proposal appears to give no credence to past monitoring efforts performed over-the last two ~1 Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Draft Municipal Regional Permit Page 6 of 8 decades which, presumably, have resulted in the collection of valuable data and would allow development of a more focused monitoring program of trouble areas (as described in: Page 64 of the draft permit) or tracking of specific pollutants of concern (Control Measure 2.1 for mercury on Page 95). The focused monitoring of trouble areas and development of response plans would be a better. use of agency resources. 23)Page 58: The schedule for the development of the plan should be revised to strike the words "beginning in the second year of the permit term" and substitute "within twelve months of approval of the plan by the Board". Under the current language the requirement for. implementation of the monitoring is fixed- regardless of the time taken by the Board to review the document. 24) Page 64: The permit should specifically indicate that monitoring efforts (including the website posting of results} can be performed at the program or regional level, and: are not the responsibility of individual permittees. 25) Page 66: The pilot studies to determine the mercury load removed by permittees' efforts will be costly and time-intensive, and at best may yield estimates ofquestionable-accuracy. The goal of the requirement is not clear. Please clarify if the study includes only mercury removed from the stormwater system., or if it includes mercury. removed at the source through. diversion of batteries, fluorescentbulbs, and other products. 26) Page 68: The requirement for citizen monitoring and participation is beyond permittees' ability to control and should be stricken or softened. 27) Page 72: The follow-up procedures are cumbersome and should be streamlined or simplified to allow permittees to perform follow-up as needed, 28) Page 90: The permit requires that permittees track and participate in regulatory decisions by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency related to pesticides. This requirement should be eliminated. Tracking of Federal legislation and regulations is beyond the scope of municipalities. This is a task better performed at the State level. 29) Page 91: The permit requires that permittees work with County Agricultural Commissioners to enforce pesticide laws regarding .over-the-counter products. This requirement should be stricken. Enforcement of pesticide regulations is prohibited at the local and county level, and is reserved for State and Federal agencies. 30) Page 92: The requirement for two each wet and dry weather baseline trash assessments should be reduced. ~Mr. Bruce Wolfe ~~ San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board -Draft Municipal Regional Permit Page 7 of 8 31) Page 94 and 98: Control Measures 1.2.2 for mercury and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB's) require that site erosion control programs are implemented. This is redundant to the requirements for construction inspection elsewhere in the permit. 32) Page 96: Control Measure 7.1 for mercury requires reporting of the estimated mercury load removed by permittees. It is'not clear if this refers to removed from the storm drain system or mercury from the waste stream through collection of batteries, bulbs, and other products. The focus .should be spent not on how much mercury was removed;. but how much is remaining and whether it meets TMDL standards. Resources spent on reporting could be better spent on removal. It is also of what significance the 20kg/ year removal .rate has in terms of water quality. 33) Page 98: Control Measure 1.1.2 for PCB's requires development of a PCB removal program. Identification and removal of PCB's on private property is beyond the jurisdiction of municipalities. 34) Page 102: Control Measure 5.2 is redundant to the monitoring requirements of the draft permit. 35) Page 104: Control Measure 1.1.1 for copper requires inspection of sifies containing copper roofs to ensure compliance with cleaning and washing requirements. Cleaning, washing, and other routine maintenance of private buildings does not require a permit from municipalities, and it is unreasonable to expect that municipalities conduct these inspections.. 36) Page 105: Control Measure 1.2 requires that agencies adopt an ordinance prohibiting discharge of washwater from capper architectural features. The City of Dublin (along with most other municipalities) already includes language in the municipal code prohibiting the discharge of ANY washwater into the storm drain system. Development of a separate ordinance. is not a productive use of permittee resources. 37) Page 107: Control Measure 4.1 for copper is redundant to business inspection requirements elsewhere in the permit. 38) Page 109: Requirement (a)(iv) seems to say that any subdrain installed anywhere and connected to a storm drain needs to be reported to the Board. Subdrains collect groundwater which has been filtered through .the soil or rock prior to discharge. Please explain the intent of this requirement. 39) Page 115: The annual reporting requirements should .include a requirement that the Board review reports and return comments to permittees within 180 days of the September 15 submittal date. This will allow-permittees adequate time to review Board comments and adjust their programs accordingly, and also provide feedback on reporting requirements for the next report as needed. In the event that Board response exceeds 180 days, -~ ~~ ~Mr. Bruce Wolfe San Francisco Bay Regional Water Control Board Draft Municipal RegionalPermit Page 8 of 8 municipalities should not be required to amend operating practices until the following permit period. We appreciate in advance your review of these comments. We are .hopeful that this letter will lead to further dialogue among the permit shareholders, resulting in an improved document that will truly facilitate improvements to water quality. Please call Mark Lander, City. Engineer, at (925)-833-6635 if you have any questions regarding our comments. Sincerely, ~, Melissa Morton Public Works Director ML/tma cc: Shin-Roei Lee, Water Board Janet O'Hara, Water Board Jim Scanlin, ACCWP .Richard Ambrose, City Manager Joni Pattillo, Assistant City Manager. Mark Lander, City Engineer Jeri Ram, Community Development Director Libby Silver, City Attorney G:\NPDES\MRP, Comments to Board, 11-08-06.doc v~~v~ RESOLUTION NO. - 09 A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF DUBLIN APPROVING A LETTER TO THE SAN FRANCISCO BAY REGIONAL WATER QUALITY CONTROL BOARD OUTLINING CONCERNS WITH THE PROPOSED MUNICIPAL REGIONAL PERMIT FOR STORMWATER AND REQUESTING MODIFICATIONS TO THE PERMIT WHEREAS, the San .Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board (Regional Board) issued a revised draft tentative order for the San Francisco Bay Region Municipal Regional Stormwater NPDES Permit (Permit) on February 11, 2009; and WHEREAS, the City of Dublin is listed a co-permittee within the Permit and will be subject to the requirements of the Permit upon its adoption; and and WHEREAS, the Regional Board will accept written comments on the Permit until April 3, 2009; WHEREAS, the Regional Board has scheduled a public hearing to accept testimony on the Permit on May 14, 2009; and WHEREAS, the City's Department of Public Works has completed a careful review of the permit; and WHEREAS, based upon this review, the City will incur additional annual costs in the estimated amount of $220,000 in order to comply with the Permit; and and WHEREAS, the City's General Fund is the source of funding for Permit compliance activities; WHEREAS, these additional costs to the General Fund will jeopardize the City's ability to maintain other municipal services, including those related to public safety; and WHEREAS, the review concludes that numerous requirements in the Permit could be modified or eliminated without adverse impacts to water quality; and WHEREAS, a letter has been prepared outlining these issues and requesting that the Regional Board modify the Permit to address these issues; NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED that the City Council of the City of Dublin does hereby authorize the Mayor to execute the letter to the Board. PASSED, APPROVED AND ADOPTED this 17th day of March, 2009. AYES: NOES: ATPAC~YT Z ~~~~~ ABSENT: ABSTAIN: Mayor ATTEST: City Clerk G:~NPDES~fRP - NPDES Pemrit~reso comrrmet letter 3-17-09.doc