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Santa Barbara joins Southern California stormwater monitoring coalition; coalition outlines regional research priorities
Summary
The City of Santa Barbara has joined the Southern California Stormwater Monitoring Coalition. Coalition executive director Gerhard Huebner presented ongoing regional research, including HF183 health-risk work, a BMP performance network and microplastics studies, and said the city will contribute $37,000 this coming year toward regional projects.
The City of Santa Barbara has joined the Southern California Stormwater Monitoring Coalition and will begin contributing funds this coming year as part of a regional research program, a coalition official told the Creek Citizen Advisory Committee on May 21.
The coalition’s executive director, Gerhard Huebner, outlined a five-year research portfolio that now includes the Central Coast and the City of Santa Barbara. Huebner said the coalition operates a regional stream survey and a best-management-practice (BMP) monitoring network and partners with more than 47 outside organizations on studies that would be difficult for individual jurisdictions to conduct alone.
Why it matters: Coalition work aggregates sampling and analysis across jurisdictions, letting smaller cities tap into larger-scale monitoring and technical expertise. Committee members said pooled data could help the city evaluate restoration opportunities, BMP performance and emerging contaminants more effectively than isolated local sampling.
Huebner described several active or planned projects. The regional stream survey samples up to 90 sites annually for physical, chemical and biological indicators; a BMP monitoring network assesses the performance and maintenance needs of structural stormwater treatment measures; a health-risk project links detections of the human-associated genetic marker HF183 to quantitative microbial risk assessment (QMRA) thresholds; and pilots are evaluating microplastic measurement methods and the water-quality effect of street sweeping. Huebner said some projects in the coalition’s current portfolio represent roughly $1 million in regional research funded by member contributions.
Jill, a creeks division staff member who introduced the presenter, told the committee, “we are going to contribute funds for the first time this coming year when the budget’s approved.” The coalition’s presentation noted the city’s planned contribution of $37,000 for the coming year.
On HF183, Huebner said the coalition used QMRA to develop threshold values that could be used to prioritize management actions at sites where human sources appear to drive microbial contamination. “You definitely wanna have a tool like HF183 to help you,” Huebner said, explaining the marker is useful for targeting limited resources to likely human-source pollution.
The BMP monitoring work responds to large regional investments in structural stormwater controls. Huebner cited annual investments of as much as $280 million in Los Angeles County alone for structural controls driven by permit requirements and TMDL deadlines, and said the coalition seeks to answer whether those measures perform as intended and how maintenance affects performance.
Heller, Committee Member Lee Heller, asked whether Santa Barbara would participate beyond street sweeping data. Huebner said the coalition could sample local sites and that some coalition studies already accept sampling contributions from new members, but that Santa Barbara had not yet been added to certain winter monitoring runs because of timing and staff capacity.
Huebner also highlighted a Long Beach street-sweeping pilot that compared runoff from swept and unswept pavement, and noted microplastics method development now accepted by state labs. He encouraged committee members to review the coalition’s annual report and publications on its website.
The item was for discussion only; no committee vote was required.
