State OKs Tough New Regulations to Reduce Runoff

State officials Friday unanimously approved tough new regulations on storm-water runoff in northern and central Orange County, a plan that local leaders say will cost $14 million a year.

“It’s going to cost all of us more money,” said Vicki Wilson, director of the county’s Public Facilities and Resources Department. “We want to make sure we’re spending it wisely and getting improvements.”

Runoff--the car oil, pet waste and other contaminants washed off streets and lawns into waterways and eventually the ocean--is the No. 1 cause of coastal pollution, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

New requirements include strict inspections of construction sites, carwashes and other businesses that often are the sources of runoff; requirements that discharges from storm drains will not pollute water beyond state limits; and the adoption of civil and criminal penalties for violations.

The Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board, an arm of the state that is charged with enforcing state and federal water-quality laws in northern and central Orange County, is trying to make a dent in the local runoff problem with new rules under a five-year permit issued to the county and cities in its jurisdiction.

No one--not environmentalists, builders or municipalities--truly likes the new permit, required under the federal Clean Water Act.

Environmentalists say the rules offer too many concessions to developers and are vaguer than storm-water permits adopted for Los Angeles and San Diego counties.

“This permit is a salute to the building industry at the expense of citizens who recreate on the beach,” said Bob Caustin, founder of Newport Beach-based Defend the Bay.

David Beckman, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, added, “It’s the water-quality weakling along the coast.”

Other permits in the region require developers to plan most new construction with built-in mechanisms to slow and cleanse the “first flush” of runoff. The first flush, typically a little less than an inch of water to fall on an area in Southern California, is the dirtiest, picking up car oil, pet waste, fertilizer and other pollutants that have been accumulating on streets and lawns for weeks or months, and sending it into waterways and eventually the ocean.

The permit approved Friday gives local officials until March 2003 to come up with a regionwide approach for the first flush of runoff, such as diverting runoff to artificial wetlands that would naturally clean the water, for example. If a broad plan is not devised, a first-flush standard similar to those in Los Angeles and San Diego counties will be imposed. But developments that have tract maps in place by that date will be exempt, which environmentalists call a loophole in a county that approves 7,932 building permits annually.