Menomonee River Watershed-Based Municipal Stormwater Permit Framework

In response to a request from the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (MMSD) and the Southeastern Wisconsin Watersheds Trust, Inc. (Sweet Water), SEWRPC is providing assistance in the development of a framework for a watershed-based municipal stormwater permit for the Menomonee River watershed. This project is being conducted in collaboration with the municipalities within the watershed, MMSD, Sweet Water, the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA), 1,000 Friends of Wisconsin, Midwest Environmental Advocates, and the Sixteenth Street Community Health Center. Funding is being provided through a USEPA grant obtained by Sweet Water and MMSD. This project is one of three watershed-based municipal stormwater permitting pilot projects in the nation.

In this approach, permits are developed based on watershed boundaries rather than jurisdictional boundaries. This approach should allow for greater tailoring of management measures to conditions in the watershed, promote collaboration and cooperation among copermittees, and provide for increased coordination and integration of management measures potentially resulting in water quality improvements and cost reductions.

This project will:

• Explore the feasibility of developing a watershed-based stormwater permit for the Menomonee River watershed,
• Investigate innovative approaches to improving the quality of stormwater discharges through a watershed-based permit while considering the regulatory and financial burdens on municipalities,
• Consider cost-effective permit conditions and stormwater management activities, particularly related to implementation of green infrastructure, that are tailored to the watershed and that would be expected to yield the greatest improvement in water quality,
• Consider more effective sampling requirements that are related to needs identified under recent subregional water quality management plans, and
• Recognize that a third-party total maximum daily load (TMDL) study for the watershed is being conducted by MMSD and that TMDL load allocations would eventually be incorporated into a watershed-based stormwater permit, or any individual municipality stormwater permits.

SEWRPC, in collaboration with the other partners, will develop two work products as part of this project: a permit framework consisting of an annotation of the current Menomonee River Group stormwater discharge permit and a staff memorandum documenting the framework development process. The framework will describe how a watershed-based municipal stormwater permit would be structured and how implementation would be managed. It will be used as a basis for writing the permit application and permit, should the participating municipalities choose to pursue a watershed-based permit. The staff memorandum will document the process, presenting the lessons learned and allowing the framework to be applied to other watersheds.
 

Meeting Materials for the Menomonee River Watershed-Based Framework Group

• December 14, 2011
  • Agenda

• October 12, 2011
  • Agenda
  • Summary Notes
• August 24, 2011
  • Agenda
  • Summary Notes
     

If you have any questions, please contact:

Michael Hahn
SEWRPC Chief Environmental Engineer
262-547-6722, Ext. 243