Resources
Municipal Permits & Forms
Here you will find a variety of forms and permits relating to stormwater and other related materials. If you don’t see what you are looking for, the website of the relevant municipality may contain those forms. If you would like to request a permit or form not otherwise listed, please contact Belle Ryder, BASWG Chair and we will do our best to find what you need.
Minimum Control Measures (MCM) for MS4 Communities
MS4 permits have 6 Minimum Control Measures (MCMs) for compliance. MS4 permitted communities usually base their Stormwater Management Plans on these MCMs.
MCM 1 Public Outreach and Education
Public education is an opportunity to prevent pollution before it happens. Many people see no harm in fertilizing their lawns, washing their car, or a small oil leak from their car. Stormwater managers want to get the message out that these small issues can add up to be big problems for streams, rivers and lakes. It is our hope that educating the public will modify their behaviors so they don’t pollute our waters. MS4 communities educate the public through their own programs as well as through regional collaborations such as the BASWG.
MCM2 Public Involvement and Participation
Public involvement and participation is a strategy to make stormwater an important issue in the community. We want the public to embrace the idea of clean water by taking action to clean up their own community. The MS4 communities of the BASWG all organize events in their towns such as stream clean-up days. Check out our calendar to find an event.
MCM3 Illicit Discharge Detection and Elimination
This is a very important part of the MS4 program which can lead to major improvements in water quality. In the simplest terms, this means stopping sources of pollution that are entering the stormwater system. MS4 permit holders must systematically search for and eliminate sources of pollution. Inputs of pollution can be continuous, intermittent, or single occurrence.
MCM4 Construction Site Stormwater Runoff Control
Construction sites have a high potential for erosion and sedimentation pollution because they tend to have lots of exposed soils. These tiny soil particles easily wash away and often pick up other forms of pollution along the way. MS4 permit holders inspect construction sites periodically to ensure that they are using proper erosion and sediment controls.
MCM5 Post Construction Stormwater Management
Stormwater treatment structures serve two main purposes: control the volume of stormwater released and reducing pollution in stormwater. MS4 permit holders are tasked with ensuring that these structures function as they were designed. These structures are most vulnerable to failure immediately after construction but also need periodic maintenance to prevent failure and to function correctly.
MCM6 Pollution Prevention and Good Housekeeping for Municipal Operations
Part of this MCM is similar to MCMs 1 and 2, except it is designed to be administered to municipal employees. MS4 municipalities want their employees to be properly educated on stormwater pollution so they can set good examples, detect and stop pollution by others, and most importantly prevent pollution in the course of their own work. Good housekeeping includes maintaining streets by sweeping, and cleaning out stormwater infrastructure as necessary to prevent pollution, as well as maintaining orderly facilities.
Regional Stormwater Programs
Bangor’s Stormwater Program
The City of Bangor is located in Penobscot County, Maine. With a population of around 32,000, it is a small city. However, it is a hub of employment, services, and access to goods for a much larger population spread out over many counties. This means that the City has to accommodate a lot of vehicle traffic and parking area for access to the buildings that house these goods and services. These man-made impervious surfaces produce a lot of runoff from rain and snowmelt, known as stormwater, and the City is tasked with managing it.
Bangor is a regulated small MS4 (Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System) community. This means that the city is regulated by the Maine Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), which requires the city to closely monitor its stormwater discharges. Administered by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) nationwide. Maine DEP administers and enforces this EPA program within the state.
In order to comply with the DEP permit to discharge stormwater to “waters of the state,” the city has many responsibilities. The goal of the program is to minimize the pollution that can directly enter streams and rivers by way of stormwater. There are 6 “urban impaired streams” in Bangor which have degraded water quality because of stormwater runoff. The city is in the process of creating plans to improve these streams to the point where they are no longer impaired by pollution from stormwater.
The fact is that most stormwater does not receive treatment. The City and DEP both require stormwater treatment for new construction, but that is a small portion of the development in the city. One of the City’s goals is to install stormwater treatment structures at older development sites which originally had no treatment for stormwater.
Stormwater treatment is simply defined as removing pollutants and reducing peak flows. This is what happens in nature, and engineered stormwater treatment structures mimic these processes. Stormwater treatment structures are often referred to as Best Management Practices, or BMPs. BMPs are different from wastewater treatment plants because they are designed to function with minimal monitoring and maintenance over long periods of time. Water treatment plants on the other hand, require constant monitoring and maintenance.
All of these efforts are expensive. The City of Bangor created a stormwater utility to raise money to pay for stormwater projects. The utility assesses a fee to every property owner in the city based on their contribution to stormwater runoff. The City makes this determination based on the amount impervious surface on a property. Impervious surfaces include: roofs, driveways, patios, decks, and compacted gravel surfaces. The money collected through the utility can be used only for stormwater related issues within the city.
The City of Bangor has had a long history of dealing with stormwater. The new focus of stormwater is on reducing the impacts of stormwater on our environment. The city is still committed to protecting property from flood damage by maintaining and improving our stormwater system. The City will also continue to improve stormwater quality until its environmental improvement goals are met.
For more information about Bangor’s Stormwater Program, please visithttp://www.bangormaine.gov/content/2037/1885/default.aspx
Hampden’s Stormwater Program
Hampden is a town on the Penobscot River estuary in Penobscot County, Maine, United States. The population was 7,257 at the 2010 census. Under state and federal laws, there is a designated section of Hampden that has stricter stormwater mitigation requirements. This area is called our Urban Area. This area is bounded on the west by Route 202 and Mayo Road, and is bounded to the east by the Penobscot River. North to south it is bounded by Reeds Brook and the Pleasant Street neighborhood up to the Maine Central Railroad and the Bangor Line.
The urbanized area in Hampden consists of 3.6 square miles which is 8.3% of the municipality. Within this urbanized area are protected watersheds Sucker Brook and Shaw Brook. The state stormwater program has asked us to determine our most at-risk watershed, and that is the watershed of Sucker Brook. This stream has been assessed by the DEP as not meeting water quality requirements and may become a fully designated urban impaired stream in the near future.
Urban impaired watersheds in Hampden include Patten Pond, Hermon Pond, and Shaw Brook. The two ponds are lakes most at risk of impairment from development, while Shaw Brook is a fully designated urban impaired watershed. When bodies of water become designated as urban impaired, there are even stricter requirements for what can and cannot occur in that watershed. However, stormwater is everywhere in Hampden.
To manage stormwater, Hampden has a stormwater team that is a collaboration of various departments such as public works, code enforcement, public safety, recreation, GIS, administration, and planning. Through the utilization of technology such as GIS, mobile devices, and cloud based data management, the stormwater team can access all their documentation such as inspections and spill reports anywhere they get cellular service.
The partnership with the Bangor Area Stormwater Group (BASWG) has given Hampden an advantage when it comes to broadening education and outreach throughout the community. Each year Hampden steps up its engagement by leveraging social media, adopting BMPs, and collaborating with other municipalities. Hampden consistently maintains its commitment to protecting the environment.
For more information, please visit www.hampdenmaine.gov/stormwater.
Orono’s Stormwater Program
Orono is one of the youngest towns in Maine (median age just under 22 years compared to the state median age of just over 45 years). As the home of the flagship campus of the University of Maine, Orono has a built-in advantage on the median age but the town of Orono maintains its own young, vibrant, and healthy culture. The town contains approximately 1,200 acres of bicycle and pedestrian trails maintained by the Orono Land Trust, a year-round Saturday farmer’s market, a swimming pool, playgrounds, parks, public gardens, and a busy, modern public library. The downtown boasts a wide variety of shopping and dining options and easy access to the museums, planetariums, and recreational opportunities on the UMaine campus.
Orono was founded in 1774 at the confluence of the Stillwater and Penobscot Rivers. Later incorporated in 1806 and named after Chief Joseph Orono of the Penobscot Nation (now headquartered on nearby Indian Island). Chief Orono was not the first member of his family to leave a town name as a legacy. Castine, Maine, at the mouth of the Penobscot River, was named for his grandfather, Baron Jean-Vincent de St. Castin.
Before the University of Maine was founded in 1862 (with 12 students and 2 faculty members), Orono was known for its numerous lumber and grist mills taking advantage of the ample power provided by the two rivers. The lumber and cash that flowed through the Penobscot and Stillwater lumber mills during her frontier times built many of the 19th century homes that line Main Street today.
The Town of Orono operates under a General Permit for the Discharge of Stormwater from Small Municipal Separate Storm Sewer Systems (MS4 Permit). The Town of Orono is dedicated to clean and safe surface waters in our community and has committed to the following goals to ensure minimal impact to the receiving waters:
- Public Education and Outreach on Stormwater Impacts
- Public Involvement and Participation
- Illicit Discharge Detection and Elimination
- Construction Site Stormwater Runoff Control
- Post Construction Stormwater Management in Development and Redevelopment
- Pollution Prevention/Good Housekeeping for Municipal Operations
Public involvement and participation is a vital part of the Stormwater Phase II Program. The town encourages members of the community to participate in stormwater related programs.
If you would like to participate, please feel free to contact the Town of Orono at stormwater@orono.org.