The Flood of 2000, or Why Madison Needs a Storm Water Utility
After the Great Flood of 1996, when much of the Williamson-Marquette Neighborhood and many other areas of Madison experienced flooding and sanitary sewer back-ups, the City Engineering Department launched a study of the City's storm water infrastructure (manholes, inlets, storm boxes, greenways, shoreline protection). Low lying areas of the Isthmus where flooding problems have been persistent were closely studied. Results of the study showed need for $5.75 million to modernize Isthmus storm water infrastructure. The City applied to the Federal Government for funding to support this work. The request was turned down.
In the intervening years, Madison has completed some targeted work to prevent a recurrence of the 1996 flood damage. To stay within a $1 million annual city-wide storm water management budget, however, this work has been incremental, and a great deal remains to be done. At the same time, land within the watershed is under constant development, removing it from the area available for natural drainage.
According to City Engineering's storm water expert, Mike Dailey, we are losing ground. When I spoke with him recently, Dailey said that our ability to manage storm water within the urban area and to maintain good quality ground water is slipping. "The $1 million we spend annually is about a third of what we need," he said. Dailey pointed out that during this year's protracted rain events, Madison experienced flooding problems where we never have seen them before. "We are only keeping up with the 'worst of the worst' problems," he said.
Proposed Storm Water Utility: This is where the proposed Storm Water Utility comes in. At present, funds for storm water management are collected through the property tax, and are part of the General Fund. This means that owners pay for storm water management according to the value of their property, and not according to usage. It also means that tax exempt properties, which make up 30% of the property of Madison, do not pay for storm water management at all. However, the City has proposed to begin collecting a storm water management fee based on usage. This "Storm Water Utility" would operate in a manner similar to the Water Utility which charges a fee based on usage.
Where the Water Utility measures usage via a meter, the Storm Water Utility would measure usage according to the amount of paved (or roofed) area on a lot. For the average residential property, a standard formula would be applied to calculate the fee. For commercial properties, the amount of paved or impervious surface would be mea-
sured by reference to digitalized aerial photographs. The City Comptroller estimates that the average homeowner would experience about a $20 drop in costs related to storm water management. (The Mayor, for instance, current ly pays $55 a year for storm water management on her residential property tax bill. This amount would be reduced to approximately $35 under the new proposal.) Tax-exempt properties would begin to pick up their share of costs, an commercial properties would pay according to amount of impervious surface. This means that the East Towne's of Madison would pay for the amount of water shed by their vast sea of surface parking lots and single-story, flat roofed buildings. Charges would be included o the six-month water bill.
Would this change result in a permanent $20 decrease in money charged to homeowners for storm water management? If what Mike Dailey says is true, and we are collecting far less for storm water management than we need, then I believe the answer to this question is "no." To protect public and private property from flood damage, in the future we will need to collect more for storm water management than we have been collecting. However, I also believe that if property owners see that the storm water fee is charged in a fair manner, according to usage, and if we see that the antiquated storm water infrastructure of the Isthmus is being updated to manage flood water effectively, citizens of our central neighborhoods, and hopefully the peripheral areas as well, will support modest increases.
If you have questions or concerns on this or other matters, please contact me. My phone number is 245-0557 and my e-mail address is district6@council .ci.madison.wi.us m
Judy Olson,
District 6 Alder