Should the city of Chattanooga relax regulations for stormwater runoff into South Chickamauga Creek?
It’ll be up to the city council to decide in about a month, because no guidance was forthcoming Friday from the the Chattanooga Stormwater Regulations Board.
The board, which meets quarterly, couldn’t muster the five votes required to recommend that city council keep the current requirement – one of the strictest in the state – that the first 1.6 inches of rain be retained on some new residential building lots in the South Chickamauga Creek watershed.
Nor could the stormwater board produce five votes to ask the council to ease the regulation and give city staff the option to let new development only retain 1 inch of water, which matches a statewide mandate.
The board stalemated after about 90 minutes of public comment and board member discussion.
Those who favored the rollback argued that the city staff should be trusted to have flexibility and that overly strict rules might shift development – and tax revenue – to other communities in the watershed that aren’t as strict. South Chickamauga Creek runs through Ringgold, Fort Oglethorpe and East Ridge en route to the Tennessee River.
“We have development that’s encroaching all along South Chickamauga,” not just Chattanooga, said board member Jamie Blanton, who favored the rollback.
Arguments for the 1.6-inch retention included that it’s a progressive regulation, the creek has more sediment than it should and, in a time of storms such as Hurricane Harvey that devastated Houston, it’s a reasonable measure for a flood-prone city such as Chattanooga.
“To roll this thing back would just be a travesty in my opinion,” Peter Yakimowich, a consulting engineer with the firm Vaughn & Melton.
Sandy Kurtz, chair of the South Chickamauga Creek Greenway Alliance, said the homebuilders had been to the city council four times to get the regulations reduced.
Terry Greene, executive director for the Home Builders Association of Greater Chattanooga, said criticism stings because the builders he represents are largely self-made people who were born and raised here and love the area. Chattanooga’s expensive stormwater regulations, he said, have driven affordable housing to Red Bank, Bradley County and northwest Georgia.
“And they’re taking their tax dollars with them,” Greene said.
City Engineer Bill Payne posed a question that he asked in 2000 when he interviewed to work for the city.
“Which is more important? Fish or jobs?” Payne asked. “How do you find the balance?”
Contact staff writer Tim Omarzu at tomarzu@timesfreepress.com or www.facebook.com/MeetsForBusiness or on Twitter @meetforbusiness or 423-757-6651.