Storm water from our roads and drainage ditches

Stormwater runoff is water that runs off or flows over the ground after a rainstorm. This water picks up debris, chemicals, soil, yard waste, fertilizer, motor oil and other pollutants.

A common misconception is that storm water travels to a water treatment plant like sewage from our homes and businesses. However, this is not the case.

Storm water, which is a veritable "chemical soup" of waste and pollutants, is carried into local retention ponds or directly into local waterways through storm drains that eventually reach the St. Johns River and other water bodies. Motor oil, gasoline, trash, dirt, and fertilizers are just some of the contaminants that flow into storm drains from rainfall runoff.

About 90 percent of the water quality impact from stormwater runoff comes from the first inch of rainfall. Pollutants ultimately end up in surface waters or in underground aquifers unless the water is adequately treated in stormwater facilities, often called stormwater ponds. Stormwater ponds are treatment systems that trap pollutants from the neighborhood watershed.

Stormwater ponds provide temporary storage of stormwater runoff and capture a variety of pollutants that would otherwise work their ways downhill to waterways and wetlands. Pollutants — such as fertilizers, pesticides, motor oil and heavy metals that wash off lawns, roads and parking lots — are trapped in these ponds. The amount of pollutants entering natural waterways is reduced as these substances settle out or are broken down by biological means in the ponds.

Restoration projects have demonstrated that with proper treatment the negative effects of stormwater pollution can be reversed. Yet, despite successes in cleaning up some surface water pollution, many modern pollutants are difficult to remove — it is obviously less detrimental to the environment and less expensive not to pollute in the first place.

In 1982 the Florida Legislature recognized the pollution potential of stormwater runoff and passed legislation requiring treatment of storm water and reducing stormwater runoff. Since then, all new developments have been required to use best management practices (BMPs) to minimize runoff during construction and to treat storm water after construction. These BMPs include requiring stormwater treatment facilities, such as retention or detention ponds, detention ponds with filtration, and swales. Today the responsibility for permitting stormwater management systems rests with water management districts and, in some cases, the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. In the northern and east-central areas of Florida, the responsibility belongs primarily to the St. Johns River Water Management District.

After developers complete construction of permitted systems in residential areas, the permit and the legal responsibility for maintaining these systems are typically passed on to a homeowners association. It is then the homeowners association, not the developer or the water management district, that is responsible for the upkeep and maintenance of the stormwater system.

The homeowners association is responsible for keeping the system functional. This responsibility applies to every homeowner in the neighborhood, whether or not they live adjacent to a detention or retention basin, as everyone’s storm water flows into the basin.

Copies of your homeowners association’s operation and maintenance permit, plans and maintenance guidelines were provided at the time of the transfer to your association’s representative. For specific information about your pond, you may call the St. Johns River Water Management District’s permitting staff.

Tips

• To function properly, your stormwater system must be maintained. Some maintenance efforts should include clearing or cleaning inflow/outflow structures, removing nuisance and excess vegetation, repairing eroded slopes, and cleaning up trash and yard waste in your yard and gutters and around storm drains.
• As a homeowner, there are numerous things you can do to ensure that your neighborhood stormwater system functions properly. For instance, if your stormwater system has a pond, plant trees around its perimeter. Trees help shade the area, absorb nutrients and lower the water table.
• Shoreline vegetation can reduce erosion and trap pollutants in stormwater runoff before the runoff reaches water bodies. Use appropriate plants to create a buffer zone between your yard and any water body.
• Avoid the unwise or excessive use of pesticides and herbicides, which can harm people, pets, beneficial organisms and the environment. Use nontoxic alternatives whenever possible, and pull weeds by hand. Also, avoid overuse of fertilizers, which can wash into ponds and water bodies and cause harmful algal blooms.
• An education program has been developed to provide neighborhood groups with information about proper landscape and pond maintenance practices that will save them money and help ensure protection of Florida’s natural waterways. This watershed and ponds education program is available through the District’s Watershed Action Volunteer (WAV) program. Call the WAV Program at (386) 329-4345, or visit the WAV Web page at www.sjrwmd.com/wav/.