A new statewide coalition is aiming for a particular set of New Year’s resolutions that will make positive changes locally.
The coalition is called STORM, for Stormwater Outreach to Regional Municipalities — but before your eyes glaze over, consider its healthy intentions.
STORM is bent on cleaning up Puget Sound and the Strait of Juan de Fuca, and nourishing the region’s high quality of life, human and otherwise.
What you do in your home, yard and driveway affects the whales, seals and salmon in local waters, said Dave Ward, co-chairman of STORM.
The group has embarked on a public education drive called Puget Sound Starts Here, designed to show the people across the Sound region relatively simple pollution-prevention measures.
Ward said that if you spray toxic chemicals on your lawn, leave pet waste to decompose or let your car drip oil, those substances end up in runoff, which can contaminate local streams and the strait.
So the STORM campaign includes these tips:
• Take cars to a commercial car wash, where wash water is properly handled. Car wash water can be as potentially toxic to marine life as some industrial wastewater discharges.
• Fix car leaks, or place cardboard under the car in the short term to catch leaking oil and other fluids.
• Use compost — instead of fertilizers or pesticides — to grow a healthy lawn and garden.
• Pick up pet waste with a bag — both in the yard and in public places — and place it in the trash.
Dozens of Western Washington cities are joining the education effort, Ward said.
PA, Sequim, PT
On the North Olympic Peninsula, Port Angeles and Sequim are the two cities participating.
Port Townsend isn’t officially connected with the campaign, but Public Works Director Ken Clow said his city is well aware of the storm-water-pollution problem — and tackling it with two major projects.
“We’re renovating Water and Monroe streets,” Clow said, to collect storm water in rain gardens that are part of the streetscape.
Work will start on more rain gardens in 2010, he added.
The north Peninsula’s other municipality, Forks, isn’t part of the Puget Sound Starts Here campaign. It’s not considered part of the Sound’s watershed, said Kristen Cooley, education and outreach coordinator for the Puget Sound Partnership.
In the case of Port Angeles, the idea of asking residents to stop polluting storm-water runoff may seem strange, in the wake of the 32 million gallons of untreated sewage the city’s wastewater system dumps into Port Angeles Harbor each year.
This happens because the city’s elderly sewer tends to overflow, Port Angeles Engineering Manager Kathryn Neal has said.
A rainstorm that lasts more than 30 minutes can overburden the system and flush sewage and storm water into the Strait.
While the city seeks solutions to that ongoing problem, the STORM coalition, along with its umbrella entity, the Puget Sound Partnership, is homing in on what individuals can do.
Individual efforts
“We’re focusing on simple, everyday activities people may not know can be a problem,” Ward said.
“We’re not a political network,” Cooley added. “We’re trying to raise awareness in general that we have a huge water quality problem in Puget Sound.”
Ward, for his part, acknowledged that “it doesn’t seem like one person can make an impact.”
But multiply the elimination of a few oil drips and chemical sprays by Puget Sound’s population of 4.3 million, and you can see the potential for enormous benefit.
When you talk about the Puget Sound, you’re referring to 12 counties, including Clallam and Jefferson, as well as 14 rivers, including the Dosewallips, Dungeness and Elwha.
The region also includes, of course, a lot of children. These children can sign up to become “Drain Rangers,” on the STORM Web site, www.PugetSoundStartsHere.org.
They then act as neighborhood educators, letting adults know how they can take better care of the environment.
Young people can be quite effective at this, Ward said.
“In the early days of recycling, a lot of kids learned about it in school. They went home and told their parents, ‘You have to put the glass in separate containers,'” and so forth.
Thanks to such enthusiasm, recycling is now second nature in countless households.
The Puget Sound Starts Here Web site also offers information and children’s activities — such as a “where’s the poop” maze — and a “fun fact” quiz for all ages.
All of this is part of the Puget Sound Partnership’s giant effort to clean up the Sound by 2020.
The benefits of a restored Sound watershed include sustenance for the region’s $147 million annual commercial and recreational fishing industry. That industry is endangered: Though Washington state is the nation’s largest shellfish producer, contaminants have closed some water bodies to clam, mussel and oyster harvests.
Finally, according to the STORM campaign, taking care of local waters will help keep the yearly flow of $9.5 billion in tourism revenue coming in.
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.