Water Cooler Talk: Eliminating Barriers to Green Stormwater Infrastructure Implementation (webinar)

Municipal land development regulations can present barriers to the widespread use of green stormwater infrastructure (GSI), such as rain gardens, bioswales, naturalized stormwater basins, and tree trenches. GSI practices can improve water quality by incorporating nature-based practices that slow and infiltrate stormwater where it falls. This Pennsylvania Environmental Council (PEC) presentation will summarize an auditing tool used to evaluate local development regulations to identify and overcome barriers to implementing GSI. Working closely with municipal officials, PEC conducted audits of land development ordinances in the southeast Pennsylvania area and identified barriers to using GSI in stormwater, zoning, subdivision, and land development ordinances. Recommendations were provided to participating municipalities on updating ordinances to enable “by right” applications of GSI practices. PEC will summarize this GSI audit work, including an approach under development to conduct streamlined audits that focus on the more commonly identified GSI barriers.

1 CBLP CEU