April 2024 Update: Residual Designation Authority (RDA) Activities Underway for the Charles, Neponset, and Mystic River Watersheds
Permit Update
EPA continues to make presentations to stakeholders to provide background information on the regulatory and technical basis for the RDA permit and opportunities for future stakeholder involvement, including ways to provide feedback on solutions to permit implementation challenges. To conduct this stakeholder outreach, the RDA team is again working with the Consensus Building Institute, which was involved in the initial stages of RDA stakeholder outreach which began in 2020.
The RDA team met with the Long Creek Watershed Management District which is implementing the Long Creek RDA permit in Maine. The LCWD’s website https://www.restorelongcreek.org outlines the steps the organization has taken in advancing stormwater management in the watershed.
Recent and upcoming presentations include:
- Association of Independent Colleges and Universities Massachusetts and Massachusetts Health and Hospital Association RDA Presentation (pdf) : April 1st, 2024
- Congressional Staff RDA Presentation (pdf) : April 24th, 2024
- Metropolitan Area Planning Council/Massachusetts Municipal Association RDA Presentation: May 15th, 2024
Technical Assistance and Tools
In March 2024 EPA posted a RDA Permit Frequently Asked Questions (pdf) document that answers questions it has been receiving about this new RDA permitting program from stakeholders.
In its ongoing technical assistance designed to look at streamlined operations and management of stormwater controls on April 23, 2024, EPA met with municipal officials from Milford, Stoughton, and Somerville for the fourth of five meetings. At this meeting municipalities heard about a self-certification program that the City of Lowell has developed to track regular maintenance of stormwater controls on private properties. The group workshopped through a set of questions to evaluate how this kind of program could be implemented in their municipalities in breakout rooms. The fifth and final meeting will be hosted at EPA office in Boston where municipalities will report out on their final project deliverables that were developed in partnership with the UNH Stormwater Center.