Opponents aim to water down N.C. rules on storm runoff

Controversial new state storm-water rules that were due to be implemented in August have been swamped by objections from coastal counties and homebuilders.

Two bills filed recently in the General Assembly have "disapproved" the proposed regulations, which essentially suspends them. But if legislators don't act before the short session ends, the storm-water rules will go into effect.

Meanwhile, both sides have lined up lobbyists to pressure legislators, and a storm-water working group has been meeting to hash out rules that everyone can live with.

"The object of the game is to stop the bad rule and give us the opportunity to show that this is bad science," said Joe McClees, a lobbyist representing 12 counties from Beaufort to the Virginia line, excluding Dare County.

McClees said the way the rules are written now, lots would have to retain 13 times the amount of water than before. He said the unintended consequences of that requirement could be increased mold and mildew and more problems with mosquitoes and termites.

"We haven't thought through this thing," he said.

Coastal storm-water rules were first adopted in the state about 20 years ago. In 2005, the state Division of Water Quality determined that 90 percent of shellfish water closures were caused by storm-water runoff and that the rules needed to be updated to protect the coastal waters.

But the construction and real estate industries objected strongly to changes in the threshold for low and high density.

The rule would reduce from 25 percent to 12 percent the allowed impervious, or hardened, surfaces in development within a half-mile from draining into shellfish waters. But 90 percent of the state's 20 coastal counties fall outside of the half-mile. For those areas, the permitted impervious surface would fall from 30 percent to 24 percent.

The new rule, approved in March, also would increase the vegetated setback from

30 feet to 50 feet, prohibit the use of wetlands in impervious surface calculations and lower allowable land disturbance from 1 acre to 10,000 square feet.

Not only would the changes be unnecessary and unfair, McClees said, they would be costly, especially for the poorer counties he represents.

"The economy is at the edge of the recession and we don't need to stress them out any more," he said. "If you hamstring economic development more than you've done, you've set a bad cat loose."

Environmental groups said that storm-water runoff is a top pollutant of coastal waters and that the new rules would affect only new development.

"We're talking about protecting our coastal waters so that everybody can enjoy them," said Jan DeBlieu, the Cape Hatteras coastkeeper for the North Carolina Coastal Federation. "It's not necessary for development to bring polluted waters. If we're smart, we can do it better."

Major issues being considered by the Coastal Stormwater Rules Working Group include revisions to the low density threshold, the wetlands calculation for impervious surfaces, the 50-foot vegetated setback and low impact development within a half-mile of shellfish waters.

"I think there's been a lot of negotiations that have been done in good faith," DeBlieu said. "But I have to say that if the rules are watered down too much, the Coastal Federation will oppose them."

Nancy White, the director of the University of North Carolina Coastal Studies Institute in Manteo, said the new storm-water rules are an improvement, but the real solution would involve the entire watershed, the area that drains to a particular body of water.

Low density development may work for Dare County, which has localized hydrology, she said, but it would not protect water quality from runoff in areas upstream from Dare.

"The rules are focused on lot-by-lot controls, unless you are working on a planned development," she said. "You need to look at how to manage the hydrology for each watershed.

"That being said, it's not cheap. It's a long-term process, and we need to start working on it now."

 Catherine Kozak, (252) 441-1711, cate.kozak@pilotonline.com