Stormwater washes pollutants into aquatic ecosystems that have the potential to kill fish, degrade stream water quality and habitat, carry excess nutrients into marine environment, and create expensive pollution clean- up and management, the costs of that are often passed onto residents. Stormwater also poses public health risks from swimming, otherwise recreating or eating from polluted water. Preventing stormwater pollution protects the assets we care about, including recreation, food and sustainability, which earmarks our lives in the Puget Sound area.
Our Shared Goals - Implementation Strategies
The Stormwater Team funds diverse projects—research, green infrastructure, decision support tools, and collaborative approach pilots, among others, and uses its water quality Implementation Strategies - the Benthic Index of Biotic Integrity, Toxics in Fish and Marine Water Quality - to identify opportunities, strategic intervention points and communities of practice for implementation.
The mainstay of our work are strategies that we will be operationalizing in the coming years. You can find out more about these strategies below:
Taking Action - Funded Projects
Photo Credit: WA Dept. of Ecology
But we can’t do this work alone. We work with our partners to act to achieve our shared goals for Puget Sound recovery. We use EPA Geographic Funds to support strategies and grants to carry out priority recovery work across Puget Sound.
About Us
We are a diverse interdisciplinary group which includes land use planners, fish biologists, entomologists, communicators and ex-lawyers who are committed to knitting together an integrated vision to protect the assets and communities affected by stormwater pollution.
Our Stormwater Team is guided by a standing advisory committee, the Stormwater Strategic Initiative Advisory Team, or SIAT. This group has advised the SIL since 2016, providing expertise and direction on investment priorities, policy direction, important stormwater questions to address, and adaptively managing Implementation Strategies. Since 2023, the Stormwater SIAT has been supported by workgroups called Pods, composed of SIAT members along with other experts, stakeholders, and rights holders, to provide more opportunities for input and deeper dives on cross-cutting topics. The current Pods include Land Use, Stormwater, Wastewater, and Toxics. An Agriculture Pod is expected to begin meeting in late 2024. To learn more about Pods and request to join a Pod workgroup, please contact the Stormwater SIL.