Abstract
From the 1940s until the 1980s the federal government gradually extended its authority over the structure of the American stormwater management system. The goal was to improve the water quality of the nation’s waterways by regulating the pollution loads entering the system, primarily through the use of gray infrastructure. However during the1980s the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) began to explore new approaches toward the regulation of stormwater pollution. Instead of focusing only on gray mechanisms, the EPA began developing and promoting the use of low impact development (LID) techniques as an element municipal governments could use to achieve their total maxim daily load of pollutants allowable under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System permit system. In light of the incentive offered by the EPA for the use of LID in the management of stormwater, it should be expected to provide a perfect area to observe policy transfer between federal, state and local governments; but it does not. This article will establish why the EPA began promoting a green approach to stormwater management and why this has not led to a widespread transfer of best management practices in the ways the literatures associated with federalism and policy transfer would suggest.
Highlights
Prior to 1948 water management in the US tended to be confined to the realm of state oversight and decision-making
This article will establish why the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) began promoting a green approach to stormwater management and why this has not led to a widespread transfer of best management practices in the ways the literatures associated with federalism and policy transfer would suggest
To comply with the Phase II permit all regulated areas are required to submit a Notice of Intent (NOI) as to how they propose to comply with the appropriate EPA Minimum Control Measures (MCMs)
Summary
Prior to 1948 water management in the US tended to be confined to the realm of state oversight and decision-making. By the mid-1990s the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) required local governments to integrate LID projects into their stormwater management plans, if they were to obtain a storm water discharge permit. Based on the observed expansion of LID, it can be hypothesized that local governments should have been engaging in the transfer of green ideas, technologies and policies, as a way to jump start their own efforts to integrate LID into their stormwater management plans. This hypothesis is formed on the bases of several observations. The remainder of this article will examine what is occurring relation to the movement (or otherwise) of stomwater management techniques
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