Gloucester County is now the only Middle Peninsula municipality that will implement its own local stormwater management program.
According to county officials, that will allow them to maintain local control and to maintain better relationships with developers and contractors.
Legislation passed earlier this year allows localities that do not operate a separate storm sewer system to opt out of establishing a local program, in which case, the control would revert back to the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality.
The Gloucester Board of Supervisors unanimously approved an ordinance on June 3 that establishes Gloucester’s local program.
The General Assembly passed legislation in 2012 requiring localities to operate local programs by July 1 of this year.
Officials in counties like Mathews and Middlesex where concerned from the beginning about the implementation costs and the possibility of additional staff to run it, but according to county officials, Gloucester doesn’t share those same concerns. County officials say they are confident that the pro-gram can be run quite well with the staff already in place.
As for costs, they see no additional expense for the county. In fact, estimates now call for an average of 15 commercial applications and site plans submitted to the county annually, which is projected to bring in about $17,500 in revenue from fees.
The new stormwater requirements are designed to reduce pollution by controlling runoff and reduce the amount of stormwater that flows into streams, rivers and the Chesapeake Bay.
