It is often said: Water doesn’t respect municipal boundaries, but the solutions we create for flood mitigation and pollution reduction must.

Regional collaboration saves money and produces better results, but every local government has different needs and political borders can easily become impenetrable walls. The Water Resources Enhancement Program (or WREP) breaks down those walls with a 3-tiered structure of participation levels. The program is 100% voluntary, and municipalities who choose to participate can select the level of collaboration that makes the most sense for their budget and their community’s needs:

• The lowest-cost tier is focused on flood protection.
• The middle tier addresses flood protection and MS4 BMPs, and
• The highest level of support combines these two with additional public outreach, public works training, mock MS4 audits, and administrative assistance.

It is designed to enhance, not replace existing municipal programs. Municipalities can focus on their local issues while the county addresses administrative tasks and funds regional projects benefitting multiple communities at once. Municipalities continue to perform local stormwater ordinance enforcement and implement their MS4 MCMs, while the county focuses on large programmatic stormwater needs that can be efficiently addressed through partnerships.

The program was born from a commitment in the county’s comprehensive plan to protect local rivers and streams. This had been a top priority for residents during the public outreach phase of plan development, but counties have little authority over water resources in Pennsylvania. Regulation comes from state and federal agencies and is largely implemented at the municipal level. Dauphin County knew many of their municipalities were struggling to comply with their MS4 permit and associated pollutant reduction plan requirements, so they wanted a way to simultaneously support their municipalities and coordinate efforts for larger, regional goals.

HRG completed a feasibility study to determine if a county-wide stormwater utility was feasible and beneficial for the county’s 40 municipalities. We determined that a regional stormwater program would provide opportunities for streamlined regulations, economies of scale, strategic partnerships, and an overall cost reduction of 45-95% per municipality.

We also conducted extensive outreach with the municipalities to determine what services they wanted from the county and what concerns they had about a regional partnership. Then we designed a program that balances the county’s and the municipality’s goals with maximum flexibility.

The program brings together many partners: The Tri-County Regional Planning Commission, Dauphin County Conservation District, and Dauphin County Office of Community and Economic Development deliver various services and make it easier to leverage funding for stormwater issues.

One of the municipalities’ biggest concerns is the sediment reduction requirements in their MS4 permit, so WREP coordinated cooperation on a floodplain restoration project that reduces sediment pollution by more than 1 million pounds per year – enough to provide MS4 PRP credits to five program participants who contributed funds: Highspire, Middletown, Steelton, Lower Swatara and Swatara Townships.

Success like this (and the creative program structure) earned the program the Governor’s Award for Local Government Excellence in 2023.

Learn more about the program and track the latest updates on the Tri-County Regional Planning Commission website (Link opens in new tab.)

SOURCE: Dauphin County GIS View the full map on their website (Link opens in new tab.)