DuPage Stormwater Managment

On Monday January 13 the Director and Chief Engineer of Dupage County Stormwater Management made a presentation during the Wheaton City Council Planning Session. I attended that session.

The presentation was for about 55 minutes and included these topics:

1. Overview of Activities
2. Brief History: Cause of Formation – Floods of August 1987

       Development of County wide Stormwater Management Plan – 1989

       DCC Stormwater and Flood Plan Ordinance - adapted 1991

3. Mission – responsible for providing regional flood protection during extreme rain events. The goal of this protection is to alleviate overbank flooding.
4. During extreme rain events Stormwater Management provides operation of flood control facilities, real-time rain and stream gages, flood forecast computer modeling, video surveillance via 12 cameras on  streams. The video is available at the Sttormwater Management website.
5. Funding – via DuPage County tax byukt general fund
6. Program areas – Watershed planning through floodplain mapping.
7. Description of Jurisdiction – Overbank Flooding
8. Watershed Plans – identify watershed flooding, restoration projects
9. Regional source for education, identifying illicit discharge, provide seminars for municipalities, ordinance- post construction, best management practices, stream maintenance.
10. Grants for green infrastructure matching
11. Floodplain mapping via a cooperative technical agreement with FEMA
12. Working with municipalities to identify changes in the flood plain.
13. The FEMA CRS (Community Rating System) helps lower NFIP flood insurance premiums.
14. Operations and Maintenance – flood control facilities which operate during flood events. Can be seen at the http://ec.dupageco.org website.
15. There is a blog available on the site.
16. Information on the website is based on National Weather Service forecasts and includes live video via cameras at various locations.
17. The State and Federal programs are a funding partnership
18. At present the system is tax based. Moving to a fee based system would provide an incentive to put in rain gardens and green roofs.

 Operational status can be viewed at:

Clicking will open a  New Window> Stormwater Operational Status



Council Planning Session video can be viewed at:

Clicking will open a  New Window> January 13 Council Planning Session>



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