Skagit County natural-resources staff outline watershed, farmland and stormwater work and warn of costly permit-driven retrofits

Jen Johnson, Natural Resources Division manager in Skagit County Public Works, told the Board of County Commissioners that her team of about 18 staff is organized into four groups — habitat, surface water (drainage), noxious-weed control and water resources (clean water and stormwater) — and that those programs together address a wide range of county environmental responsibilities.

Johnson said the drainage team is the county’s front-line responder for landowner drainage complaints and is funded through the county’s drainage utility assessment, a program the county established in 1997. "This is the team that responds to all the drainage concerns throughout the county and does many of our drainage projects and retrofits," she said.

She emphasized the county’s stormwater work is regulated under the National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Phase II permit administered by the Washington Department of Ecology. "Our current permit runs from 2024 to 2029," Johnson said, and the permit’s requirements — from street sweeping to operations-and-maintenance and public outreach — tend to grow with each permit cycle. She warned that Ecology-driven retrofit requirements are looming and will be expensive to implement.

Johnson highlighted the county’s water-quality monitoring and clean-water programs, including a shellfish-protection district and a monitoring network of roughly 40 sites with more than 20 years of data. She said the Pollution Identification and Correction (PIC) program works closely with public health to trace potential sources of contamination and, when feasible, take corrective action.

Commissioner Peter Browning pointed to Smoke Bay as a successful, long-term example of remediation where failing septic systems were addressed and shellfish-growing conditions improved. "It went from being basically a big septic system to a really, really clean bay," Browning said.

On habitat work, Johnson said the county continues efforts to remove fish-passage barriers and partners with tribes, nonprofits and state agencies; some years the county brings in "millions of dollars in grants" to support restoration. The county also staffs a volunteer-led Marine Resources Committee that runs forage-fish surveys, restoration work near Deception Pass and education events.

Johnson described two agriculture-focused programs: the Farmland Legacy program — funded by the county’s conservation-futures tax — which she said has protected about 15,000 acres as of 2024, and the Voluntary Stewardship Program (VSP), for which Skagit recently submitted a 10-year report to the State Technical Panel. She said the State Conservation Commission receives roughly $3,000,000 in biennial VSP funding statewide and counties often compete for that funding.

On noxious weeds, Johnson said Spartina and knotweed are high priorities; the county receives state Department of Agriculture grants to support control work and has seen increases in some grant funding. She also described county involvement with four self-taxing lake management districts and growing attention to harmful algae blooms.

Board members and staff discussed where drainage utility funding can be applied and the intersection of small-scale maintenance work with larger infrastructure retrofits. Johnson and Public Works representatives said many projects involve partnerships with engineering and operations staff, and that permitting requirements with the state can be complex and time-consuming.

The presentation concluded with Johnson asking for continued support to monitor county water quality, expand outreach, update priority watershed lists, continue noxious-weed control, assist lake-district reform and seek grant funds for salmon-barrier corrections. Commissioners thanked Johnson and Public Works for the briefing; no formal action was taken during the presentation.