Letter to the Editor

Storm water management

EDITOR: It is important to understand that storm water is simply water from rain or melting snow that does not soak into the ground but runs off into waterways.

Ridgebury Township and the Bentley Creek stream is a good illustration of what can happen when we fail to address storm water run off. A hundred years or so ago the Bentley Creek stream was a placid stream that ran year round from pool to pool under a shaded canopy. Suckers used to come up from the Chemung River to spawn in the Spring of the year. That is no longer possible.

So what has happened? Early on the rains fell on field and forest, soaked in, and eventually the water made its way to the main stream over a period of days. This allowed the stream to maintain a more even flow. Then people came in and built homes, barns, driveways and other similar things that covered the ground where the rain used to soak in. Thus, we eventually ended up with the equivalent of three or four Wal-Mart parking lots with no defined catch basins. The stepped-up run off from rooftops and driveways runs straight into roadways and tributaries of Bentley Creek.

All of this stepped-up run off caused the main stream and many of its tributaries to expand their banks to accommodate a larger flow of water during rain events. Interpretation: Roads washed out, fields (topsoil) washed away at a loss to the township and the downstream landowners. What is left is wider streams, no cooling tree canopy, a lot of larger rocks and gravel domes and unstable banks just waiting to wash out with the next major rain event. Now we have high flows after a rain event and then dry streambeds for lack of enough of the slower yielding water coming in through springs.

So do we continue to let people build and destroy our roads and do damage to their downstream neighbors or do we take steps to make sure we realize our past mistakes with regards to storm water. Our county commissioners and township supervisors take an oath to protect the health and safety of their constituents. I submit that they have stuck their heads in the sand and are not carrying out their responsibilities in refusing to address storm water run off.

It is interesting to note that in our neighboring Chemung County that the earth movers are required to attend training in storm water run off at the county level and receive a card to certify that they have taken the training. Building permits in that county have to include how the builder is going to deal with storm water run off and they have to have a card-carrying excavator to do the work.

People need to realize that keeping their storm water on their land is often beneficial in keeping their water table healthy enough that their wells will have water during droughts. They need to realize that dealing with their run off in a responsible manner does not have to be costly. Often just directing said water into a low cost French Drain could do the trick. Just realizing that not dealing with this run off is not being a good neighbor to those down stream of them should be reason enough to change the way they treat their run off.

I trust this letter clarifies the need for responsible treatment of storm water run off. If we continue to ignore this issue we will repeat the mistakes of the past and in the case of Bentley Creek destroy millions of dollars of stream protection that has been put in place.

County wide we stand to destroy valuable property and cause millions of dollars in damage.

Ken Cooke

Gillett

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