MA Statewide Municipal Stormwater Coalition Agenda

MA Statewide Municipal Stormwater Coalition Agenda

February 1, 2018

1pm

DEP Central Regional Office

8 New Bond Street | Worcester, MA

1. Welcome and Introductions

In attendance: Steven Tyler, Andrea Briggs, Beverly Woods, Jeff Howland, Brad Stone, Joe Cosgrove, Kerry Snyder, Patty Gambarini, Kerry Reed, Mark StFleur, Kristan Farr, Todd Girard, Christina Papadopoulos, George Saraceno, Ian Cooke, Lori Watson, Hillary Waite, Jack Moriarty, Robin Craver, Trish Settles, Eli Goldman, Trea Schumacher

Robin Craver begins with introductions and announces that there are materials in the back. Notes that there have been previous meetings here at DEP this morning and thanks those who were able to attend.

1. Approval of Meeting Minutes from November 2 , 2017 | Robin Craver

Steven Tyler makes motion to approve minutes

Seconded by Patty Gambarini

Vote to approve minutes is unanimous

1. Mass DEP Stormwater Updates | Andrea Briggs

Andrea Briggs and PattyGambarini give updates on the WPI WROC project. There are two groups starting in March. One will be working with MSMSC to develop a repository for public education and outreach materials that is currently available. Andrea notes that she sees the group working very closely with any contractor or consultant who is eventually hired. The second group and one will be working with CMSWC to develop a 5th grade curriculum in Holden and Shrewsbury that meets the Department of Education’s Next Generation Science Standards. Curriculum will focus on watersheds to educate, teachers, parents, and students. Andrea notes that if anyone would like to meet, participate, or mentor the WPI students to reach out. Kerry Reed asks for anyone with access to previously mentioned 5th grade curriculums to send them to her.

Andrea Briggs mentions that thereare 9 communities subject to the new MS4 permit that were not included in the last Permit and that outreach is being done to assess their needs and how to best help those communities. Andrea mentions that knowledge of stormwater coalitions will be included as part of outreach materials.

Patty Gambarini offers to help Andrea coordinatewith towns in western Massachusetts. Andrea is doing outreach to MMA and will get help from Robin Craver to target Town Managers to educate them on what is coming with the new permit and what they can expect to hear from their DPW workers as a result. Asks for suggestions.

Beverly Woods asks if trainings specifically for new communities previously mentioned by Fred Civian are still being offered. Andrea comments that these trainings will still be made available. Patty asks if the work in the Shrewsbury and Holden Schools will produce materials that can be transferable to other Massachusetts schools. Andrea says that materials created will be transferable and that projects will be able to be transferable between any 5th grade classroom. She also notes that the work in schools willincorporate the branding campaign from the MS4 grant.

A.Discussion on grants/coalition needs

B.Update on work with Towns

C.Update on wetlands program work

D.Update on “MS4 Primer” training

1. EPA Updates

No representative present.

1. Administrative Updates | CMRPC

A.Quarterly Report

Trish Settles notes that CMRPC recently sent in the last quarterly report and that she has had several recent conversations with Gary Gonyea. Trish comments that there are four main goals under the current 604b grant: to set up and coordinate the statewide coalition, to provide administration, to conduct a needs assessment, and to create shareable materials. Trish notes that at the last MSMSC quarterly meeting the group decided that it would like to pursue holding a MSMSC conference. Trish notes that after several conversations with Gary Gonyea it became apparent that holding a conference may not be an ideal use of funds from the current 604b grant and that the group should focus on creating shareable and trasnferable materials. Rather than pushing a conference through under the existing grant, Gary suggested applying for a new round of 604b grant funding that could be used for a conference. Applying for a second round of grant funding would allow the current 604b funds to be used to create materials that could then be used at a conference.

B.Website management and New 604B Funding Opportunity

Trish comments that the Conference Subcommittee met several times via conference call and has since pulled in members from various other subcommittees to discuss how to approach creating materials and potentially a new round of 604b grant funding. The group decided that it would not like to become a subcommittee and would rather remain as a working group. Trish mentions that CMRPC has updated its website to host the most recent meeting minutes from various subcommittees and that CMRPC has considered creating a new Wix website that could be used to distribute these materials rather than CMRPC’s website. Trish mentions that this could also be a good jumping off point for the ongoing WPI WROC project. Trish asks the statewide group if this website is something that they would like to pursue using existing 604b grant funds.

Robin Craver asks for clarification on the 604b working group, mentioning that it is the first time she has heard of the 604b working group. Robin says she would like decisions like this to come back to the whole MSMSC group rather than happening separately. By taking decisions like this to the whole group no one will be excluded from participating and providing input.

Trish recognizes that it is a new group that there will need to be buy in from the statewide group. Robin would like to come back to the larger group to determine how to move forward and that the discussion based on planning for the upcoming 604b grant should happen with more people than just the conference committee. Trish agrees and notes that this item was placed under subcommittee updates because there she assumed that this topic would require a significant amount of time. Patty Gambarini asks for an update on the previously discussed 604b grant extension. Trish notes that an extension is very likely. Robin Craver asks if there have been conversations with Gary Gonyea regarding the new grant round. Trish notes that there have been.

Beverly Woods comments that having a new website could be good, but that the costs may be higher than anticipated. She notes that she recently had a website redone and that the amount of work and costs associated with doing so exceeded what was anticipated. She also points out that there would need to be dedicated people available to update and maintain the website. Trish agrees, but says that the website she has in mind would be very simple and mainly serve as a resource for people to access and download materials as they are made available

Robin asks for clarification on how creating a new website will fit in with the WPI WROC project. Andrea notes that it could be a good nexus, but also comments that WPI has offered to host a website as well. Kerry comments that it might be best to have WPI create the website as part of their project and to have them maintain it. Trish says that CMRPC can hold off on creating a website. Beverly adds that it will be important to consider ADA accessibility requirements as the students build the website. Patty comments that it might be best for CMRPC to host the website given that they are subject to ADA requirements. Andrea agrees that ADA will need to be addressed but that WPI students can learn the requirements. Robin asks if CMRPC is willing to write the next 604b grant for the purpose of holding a conference. Trish says that CMRPC is willing and has already been speaking with Gary Gonyea. Robin asks if someone would like to make a motion or if others in the room have a separate idea for a 604b grant.

Joe Cosgrove asks about timing of the new 604b round and notes that holding a fall conference sounds overly ambitious. Trish agrees and comments that a spring 2018 conference is likely more realistic. Kerry Reed adds that it might be best to partner with a group who has coordinated “good” conferences in the past rather than trying to host one. Trish agrees and says that this is likely how the language would be written in the grant.

Robin asks if people in the room would like to host a conference and adds that there are already existing, reoccurring conferences that have proven successful.

Patty comments that there are different audiences that could benefit from attending a conference and recommends holding targeting sessions geared towards specific groups. Potential groups might include municipal employees, the development community, and boards responsible for reviewing projects. Robin Craver notes that this group is specifically tasked with assisting municipalities and that there are other groups who are focused on assisting non-municipal parties. Patty notes that the more knowledgeable DPW workers on the easier it will be for Town Administrators to move forward.

Robin asks if people in the room want to apply for new 604b grant. Asks for people to put their hands up [hands go up…]. Robin asks if people in the room would like hold a conference and work on the language for hold one by next spring. Asks for hands up [hands go up…].

JeffHowland notes that he likes the idea of hosting a number of small training sessions “small bits.”He suggests having groups go to events such as MACC and MMA conferences rather than trying to host a separate conference. Trish agrees that this would be helpful, but notes that it would be difficult to write a grant for this purpose.

Ian Cooke suggesting using funds to hire people to go to those conferences to talk to developers and other conferences to structure the delivery of materials. Kerry suggests skipping this year and applying for the following year given how difficult it has been to handle the money that the group has had.

Robin that CMRPC put a website on hold and will talk with WPI.

1. Sub-committee Updates

A.Education | Kerry Reed

• Kerry Reed reminds the group that MSMSC is sponsoring a WPI project and notes one of their first steps will be to review items that have been added to Dropbox. The group will start working in early March. The Education Subcommittee is currently working on the MS4 outreach campaign grant as well and is working with DEP to streamline the scope, reduce the budget, and fit the timeframe. Feedback from DEP had been to use materials that have already been created rather than try to create them entirely over again. The group decided to use and adapt Maine’s Think Blue Campaign for this purpose.

B.604B Work Group | Hillary Waite

C.Administration and Bylaw Creation | Ian Cooke

• Ian Cooke says the group has been inactive since last meeting and it is unclear how the subcommittee and the full statewide group would like to move forward on the issue.

A.Technical | Jeff Howland

• Group has not met recently. They are waiting for DEP to bring stormwater management guidelines into accordance with MS4 permit. Will meet on amore regular basis after that.

B.Advocacy | Robin Craver

• Trish notes this group has not been very active. Robin says she will take over as chair of Advocacy and give updates.

1. Regional Coalition Updates | Group Representatives

A.Cape Cod Stormwater Coalition

• Had their regional stormwater meeting last week. Completed a survey to towns on stormwater needs to address gaps. The coalition is almost done with draft RFP to assess those needs and how to move forward with MS4 compliance.

B.Charles River Stormwater Collaborative

• The group met recently, where they discussed green infrastructure projects. Big question for them – will MS4 permit come out on July 1. No major updates.

C.Central MA Regional Stormwater Coalition

• Have met and are working on updating their website to provide GIS resources to communities. Will update needs assessment survey. Working on forming a workshop to help members put together NOIS and stormwatermanagement plans. Working on keeping people updated with status of the appeal. Kerry Reed notes that MA and NH appeals got combined which slowed the process down. Mediation is being used for deliberations. The mediator did not have a technical background.

D.CT River Stormwater Committee (Pioneer Valley Planning Commission)

• Patty notes that this group, comprised of 17 municipalities and UMass meets every other month. Finished a grant recently with a couple components related to stormwater.
• Patty mentions that at the MSMSC meeting she had suggested putting training videos online for DPW workers. However, she received feedback that DPW Directors did not want workers to be off on their own watching training videos. Instead, they would want an annual meeting hosted where the videos could be shown and informed people would be available to address possible questions. The CT River Stormwater Committee would like to make these materials available to every region and to use this training product in coordination with other products. Beverly Woods suggests that training videos be posted on YouTube for easy access. Patty comments her group is also working on a separate grant to review code in nine communities and to integrate new MS4 requirements. She notes that Kerry Snyder has built a model bylaw which will help to inform this code review and ongoing projects. PVPC is also working on an MS4 grant on off site mitigation guidance to set standards to help developers understand transactions and to better explain transactions with code. PVPC is also working to do stormwater system mapping and data collection and have created a form for 7 communities. Forms will be available in combination with ESRI apps to perform field calculations and measure depth. Would like to share this with the MSMSC in May. The group also recently bought licensing rights to a video from Grand Rapids, Michigan and will be doing a voice over relevant to the CT River.

E.Merrimack Valley Planning Commission

• Joe Cosgrove says this group is meeting next week and that someone from EPA enforcement is coming to come to their next meeting. Many communities have been working with Greenscapes to do work with schools. The program has been very well received in terms of education and outreach. Had 4 of 15 communities participate.
• Lori Watson provides brief update from Greenscapes North Shore: The group represents 19 communities, but there are 50 potential communities within the north shore that they would eventually like to work with. The group is hoping to reach 2,000 students and is targeting 5thgrade classrooms with a Keeping Water Clean program. Have reached over 1,000 students this year and many more have shown interest. The focus is on pet waste this year on because that is the main issue that communities have brought up. The group has also made storm drain stencils and has been acting on a case by casebasis based on what communities want. Have one community where they are doing door hangers. Also have developed a mailer. Some communities are providing outreach info with dog licensees, some with water bills, some with census.
• Robin asks if MSMSC coalitions cold see some of the materials that have been created from Greenscapes. Lori notes that she is working on updating Dropbox

F.Minuteman Advisory Group on Interlocal Coordination (MAGIC)

• No representative present

G.Neponset Stormwater Partnership

• Ian Cooke provides update. Neponset Stormwater group met this pastMonday and talked primarily about the MVP program. Had a presentation and one of their communities talked about their process with the program. Have been working with communities to finalize scope. Will have 9 or 10 communities participate in the program Ian notes that there has been a lack of communication between some MAPC communities, consultants, and the Neponset Stormwater Partnership. Notes his group has been working to develop a GIS tool that can be used in connection with an IDDE tool. However, transitions between towns working with MAPC and then private consultants have led to changes in the tool as consultants have removed some of the attributes imbedded in the tool. Ian notes that communication efforts are being increased to make this no longer be an issue.

H.Northern Middlesex Stormwater Collaborative

• Beverly Woods provides update and says that the group is meeting next week. Will be talking about scheduling training sessions for municipal staff on good housekeeping and IDDE. Similar to Patty, have had a field component tied to trainings. Have a consultant who has provided trainings at no cost. Helped to show how to use test kits and perform other types of field work. Will brief them on Patty’s offsite mitigation project. Have a GIS vendor who would like to present on a field data collection. Have become difficult from a budgeting perspective how to deal with the MS4 permit.

I.Southeast Regional Services Group- Stormwater Group