Water Sector Law and Policy
This tab includes laws and policies for avoiding or reducing climate change impacts in the water sector, including best practices and legal and policy analysis. Apply additional filters to narrow the list by resource type, impact, jurisdictional focus, state, or region.
105 results are shown below.
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Resource
July 1, 2014
Connecticut Public Act 14-163 directs the Connecticut Water Planning Council to engage in a three year process for writing a comprehensive statewide water plan for the management of water resources in the state. This plan will identify quantities and qualities of water available, present and projected demands for water resources, appropriate regions in the state for comprehensive water planning, and will establish guidelines and incentives for consumer water conservation, taking into account energy efficiency.
Resource Category: Law and Governance
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June 2014
This report was developed by the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) to support the integration of community level climate resiliency solutions into State Revolving Fund (SRF) policies. NRDC describes how to incorporate water efficiency, green infrastructure, and flood risk reduction into SRFs, and provides examples of states and municipalities already experiencing successes with these approaches.
Resource Category: Solutions
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May 13, 2014
On May 13, 2014 the town of Oxford, Maryland adopted a pioneering ordinance to create a Stormwater Management and Shoreline Protection (SMSP) Fund. Oxford commissioners unanimously agreed to increase the town’s property tax rate in order to collect fees for the maintenance, enhancement, improvement and repair of the Town’s stormwater management and shoreline protection improvements, facilities and systems. The fund will raise approximately $100,000 per year to help mitigate ongoing and increasing impacts from flooding throughout the community.
Resource Category: Law and Governance
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April 17, 2014
Using Buffalo, New York as a primary case study, this report explores both the challenges and winning strategies for advocating for neighborhood-level green infrastructure solutions. It focuses on a project called “PUSH Blue,” supported by the non-profit People United for Sustainable Housing (PUSH) Buffalo, to implement stormwater management intervention in Buffalo’s West Side. Especially for low-income communities, such projects can yield strong intersecting benefits for sustainability, neighborhood redevelopment, and job creation.
Authors or Affiliated Users: Sam Magavern, Tina Meyers, Jen Kaminsky, Sarah Maurer
Resource Category: Solutions
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2014
Published by the National Association of Clean Water Agencies (NACWA), Navigating Litigation Floodwaters provides an overview of legal issues associated with user-fee funded municipal separate storm sewer systems (MS4s) stormwater programs, as well as a summary of selected legal decisions and pending cases. The report represents how different courts across the nation have addressed the issue of stormwater management, the types of legal analyses that have been used when evaluating MS4 fee programs and the kinds of factors that have been relevant in the courts’ deliberations.
Resource Category: Solutions
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January 2014
The University of Maryland Environmental Finance Center (EFC) developed this manual to provide information to local governments about progressive stormwater management practices, including green infrastructure, and to provide a model for creating policies and programs to finance these practices. The report’s introduction asserts that a paradigm shift is underway in stormwater finance, and local government staff have a critical role to play in leading that shift.
Resource Category: Planning
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December 14, 2013
The Robust Planning to Support Decision Making Webinar, created by the EPA in collaboration with the Water Utility Climate Alliance (WUCA), discusses the benefits of robust decision-making, an analytical framework meant to address decisions that are plagued with high-levels of uncertainty. This webinar is a part of the EPA’s Climate Ready Water Utilities (CRWU) Initiative. The webinar aims to demonstrate how drinking water, wastewater, and stormwater utilities can use robust decision-making for climate change related planning.
Resource Category: Education and Outreach
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2013
Pure Water San Diego, is the City of San Diego, California’s phased, multi-year sustainability program that intends to provide one-third of San Diego's water supply locally by 2035. The Pure Water Program will use proven water purification technology to clean recycled water to produce safe, high-quality drinking water. Environmental stressors and climate change impacts, such as ongoing drought in the Colorado River Basin, and reduced snowpack and runoff in Northern California have decreased the availability of local water supplies, and San Diego has turned to investing in adaptive alternatives.
Resource Category: Solutions
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August 8, 2013
In August 2013, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie authorized $1. 28 billion in state financing for critical improvements to drinking water and wastewater infrastructure projects across the state under S2815. The funding includes $355 million that will protect and provide resiliency to infrastructure directly impacted by Superstorm Sandy. The bipartisan supported legislation establishes a three year program that could allocate up to $5 billion, not only to repair the plants, but also to harden them against future extreme weather events.
Resource Category: Law and Governance
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August 2013
This guidebook, published by the Southeast Michigan Council of Governments (SEMCOG), provides examples of roadways projects within the Great Lakes Watershed that utilize green infrastructure methods to improve water quality and reduce stormwater runoff. Developed as a complement to the Low Impact Development Manual for Michigan, the guidebook offers support to municipalities interested in planning, designing, and constructing green streets.
Resource Category: Solutions
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