Stormwater rules mean higher costs

Local stormwater managers said Tuesday that proposed tighter statewide stormwater regulations would place tighter controls on water quality and quantity standards, while placing higher costs on developers.

A new-construction activity fee under the proposed regulations could run up to $16,000. State estimates show that the new regulations could add up to $6,200 to the cost of some new homes, and up to $70,000 in the construction cost of a “big box” store.

Barrett Hardiman, vice president of regulatory affairs for the Home Builders Association of Virginia, said the new regulations could add thousands to millions of dollars to construction costs of subdivisions and commercial projects. Buyers, he said, would absorb the additional costs.

“The benefit to the environment for the cost that’s being asked to be paid here is really not comparable,” Hardiman said.

Mike Crocker, Waynesboro stormwater manager, however, said the increased costs to developers would be minimal.

“The cost for developers – they’re screaming and hollering because they think it’s going to be astronomical,” Crocker said. “I don’t see them being blown out of proportion.”

He said the costs to developers would vary from project to project depending on water sources near the site and its overall size.

“I think the regulations have kind of been, I won’t say lax, but they’re being made more firm now,” Crocker said. “They’re being set in stone, if you will.”

The increased costs most likely would be paid to the localities, according to George Staber, Staunton’s stormwater engineer. Staunton, like most localities that have a stormwater management program, is likely to administer it locally, Staber said. If a locality chooses to have it administered by the state, the state would get all the fees developers are required to pay. The plans would still be submitted through the city’s stormwater office. Currently, the state Department of Conservation and Recreation administers the stormwater management program.

“This program involves a much higher fee charge to the developer when he submits his plans for review,” Staber said. “If a locality chooses to administer the program ... the locality would get up to 70 percent of that fee. The state would still get 30 percent of that fee.”

The rules also would require 38 percent less phosphorus to run off a site into rivers and streams, and could force developers to add increased detention methods – larger or more stormwater ponds, mini-storage areas – and then treat stormwater through bioretention methods to remove phosphorus.

“What it’s going to amount to is more treatment, more water quality and quantity control treatment on the plans they submit for the development, whether it’s a subdivision, or a commercial site plan, or whatever it could be,” Staber said.

The engineers who put together the plans would “have to show these facilities on the plan physically and they’d have to submit calculations ... on how much treatment would be provided,” Staber said. “All of that is going on now. The criteria is becoming more stringent.”

In Staunton, developers have to obtain a land disturbing permit review – not technically a stormwater fee, Staber said – at a cost of $2,000 for up to one acre, with that cost prorated as the size of the development increases. Crocker said the city has a fee structure in place for new development applications, but “they’re based on different parameters besides stormwater.”

Though it could be adopted by July 2010, Staber said, the new rules would not likely be implemented until July 2013. Localities would have to get state approval to administer the new program locally.

Rex Springston of the Richmond Times-Dispatch contributed to this report.