L.A. Passes Stormwater Rules

New stormwater management rules for the building community have been passed without objection by the Los Angeles City Council. City officials hope to decrease pollution and recharge the aquifers by emphasizing building techniques that direct runoff into the ground.

The Los Angeles City Council recently passed new storm water management rules for the building community, gaining backing, or at least no objections, from some development groups that have fretted over possible cost increases.

The ordinance, which sailed through council on a unanimous vote, represents a shift toward managing storm water onsite through landscaping that mimics the natural environment. Currently, runoff full of pollutants typically flows off Los Angeles’ urban landscape into the ocean. City officials hope to decrease pollution and recharge the aquifers by emphasizing building techniques that direct runoff into the ground.

During a two-year legislative slog, the building community won significant concessions, including the scrapping of a mitigation fee, a grandfather clause, a delay in enforcement and increased options to comply.

Anh Nguyen of the Central City Association said the rules “will not unduly disrupt the real estate industry and the city’s efforts to recover from the economic downturn.”

The new requirements would require many new developments and some redevelopments to capture, infiltrate or reuse all runoff from a 3/4-inch rain storm. Builders could install a variety of green landscaping such as infiltration basins or permeable pavement to manage that runoff. Some larger developments must currently meet those requirements, but the new ordinance would expand compliance to smaller projects.

Under the new rules, the smallest residential developments would simply have to install devices such as rain barrels, a less costly requirement.

“It makes very little sense for this city to be dependent upon expensive imported water at the very same time that we rush our storm water as quickly as we can out to the ocean,” City Councilman Paul Krekorian told the council. “It makes every bit of good sense to try to retain as much storm water as we can right here in the city so we can use it.”