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EPA Water Quality Scorecard
by: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
Many communities across the United States face the challenge of balancing water quality protection with the desire to accommodate new growth and development. These cities and counties are finding that a review of local ordinances beyond just stormwater regulations is necessary to remove barriers and ensure coordination across all development codes for better stormwater management and watershed protection. Local policies, such as landscaping and parking requirements or street design criteria, should complement strong stormwater standards and make it easier for developers to meet multiple requirements simultaneously.
EPA’s Water Quality Scorecard was developed to help local governments identify opportunities to remove barriers, and revise and create codes, ordinances, and incentives for better water quality protection. It guides municipal staff through a review of relevant local codes and ordinances, across multiple municipal departments and at the three scales within the jurisdiction of a local government (municipality, neighborhood, and site), to ensure that these codes work together to protect water quality goals. The two main goals of this tool are to: (1) help communities protect water quality by identifying ways to reduce the amount of stormwater flows in a community; and (2) educate stakeholders on the wide range of policies and regulations that have water quality implications.
The scorecard is for municipalities of various sizes in rural, suburban, and urban settings, including those that have combined sewers, municipal separate storm sewers, and those with limited or no existing stormwater infrastructure. It can help municipal staff, stormwater managers, planners, and other stakeholders to understand better where a municipality’s2 land development regulations and other ordinances may present barriers or opportunities to implementing a comprehensive water quality protection approach. The scorecard provides policy options, resources, and case studies to help communities develop a comprehensive water quality program.
Resource: http://www.epa.gov/dced/pdf/2009_1208_wq_scorecard.pdf
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