Hurricane season hit Maryland hard this year, and even as it comes to a close, heavy rains continue to cause highway shutdowns and spread toxic floodwater. With the Maryland Department of the Environment (MDE) currently updating its rules and permits regarding stormwater, Marylanders have an opportunity to protect their communities against one of the most pernicious problems climate change poses for the region.
Stormwater pollution occurs when heavy rain or snow is not absorbed by the ground due to oversaturated soil or impervious surfaces. The runoff sometimes reaches dangerous volumes, turning roadways into rivers and causing flash floods.
It also pollutes our environment: When runoff flows over rooftops, streets, and storm sewers, it collects trash, chemicals, bacteria, sediment, and other toxic and harmful substances that are carried into our waterways. Along the way, the polluted water passes through communities, evaporating and coating the surrounding environment with toxins that find their way into our homes and our bodies.
In Maryland, stormwater is a source of sediment and other pollutants in the Potomac River and the streams and rivers that feed into the delicate Chesapeake Bay ecosystem.
Marginalized Communities at High Risk
As with most environmental hazards, low-income communities and communities of color face the highest exposure to danger. Stormwater is especially problematic in low-income, urban neighborhoods of color, which are paved with concrete and have few trees and green spaces. In Baltimore, for example, white residents have access to more acreage of parks than Black residents.
These same communities also struggle to obtain the necessary resources to address stormwater. In 2016 and 2018, massive storms caused flash flooding that devastated Ellicott City — a predominantly white, upper-class, and politically active area — and Baltimore, primarily in low-income communities of color. Since then, Ellicott City has received extensive news coverage and millions of dollars in federal, state, and local funding for flood mitigation efforts, while Baltimore residents are still struggling to recover.
Similarly, Prince George’s County, a predominantly Black county near Washington, D.C., has had to fight for government attention and infrastructure funding to address ongoing flooding. With a lack of funding for infrastructure and insufficient reimbursement programs, residents, often already struggling financially, are forced to pick up the bill.
Maryland’s low-income communities of color suffer from a disproportionately high concentration of nearby industrial facilities that pose higher risks of exposure to toxic stormwater pollution. Baltimore communities with fewer green spaces and more flooding also have the highest concentration of stormwater permit violations. From 2017 to 2020, MDE inspectors found approximately 75 percent of facilities with stormwater permits had committed rule violations, but the agency took only 14 formal enforcement actions.
Low-income communities of color are also more likely to have low-quality housing more vulnerable to stormwater-related flooding and bio-contaminants like mold. This summer, tenants from Latino communities in Langley Park, Prince George’s County, filed a complaint against their landlord to fight discriminatory housing practices that left their homes unsafe and mold-ridden.
Stormwater can be lethal, too. This summer, Melvin Daniel Cedillo, a 19-year-old from Honduras who lived in Rockville, Md., outside of Washington, D.C., died when heavy rains suddenly flooded his family’s basement apartment in the middle of the night. Melvin’s tragic death is not an isolated incident — a large number of the victims claimed by flash flooding during Hurricane Ida lived in basement apartments typically rented to lower-income tenants.
How to Move Forward
We must take stormwater seriously; otherwise, its victim count will only go up.
Climate change is bringing more frequent and heavier rainfall to the East Coast: Precipitation is intensifying more rapidly in the Chesapeake Bay region than anywhere else in the country. Maryland’s MDE must keep pace not only with climate change, but also with a growing suburban population, increasing development, and aging infrastructure.
Join the Center for Progressive Reform and the Chesapeake Accountability Project in urging the MDE to create and enforce strong stormwater permits that require effective water pollution control practices. To call for this critical step toward climate resiliency and protecting the health and safety of all Maryland residents, sign the petition here.
Image courtesy of Will Parson, Chesapeake Bay Program
Showing 2,825 results
Clarissa Libertelli | September 30, 2021
Stormwater is growing problem in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, creating toxic runoff and flash flooding. The Maryland Department of Environment has the opportunity to protect people, but it hasn't yet.
Lisa Heinzerling | September 30, 2021
President Biden has made climate change and racial justice central themes of his presidency. No doubt with these problems in mind, he has signaled a desire to rethink the process and substance of White House review of agencies' regulatory actions. On his very first day in office, Biden ordered administrative agencies to ensure that this review does not squelch regulatory initiatives nor brush aside "racial justice, environmental stewardship, human dignity, equity, and the interests of future generations." At the same time, however, Biden reaffirmed the "basic principles" of a Clinton-era executive order on White House regulatory review, subjecting agencies' major rules to a cost-benefit test. These twin inclinations -- toward acting boldly on climate change and racial justice, and toward judging regulation using cost-benefit analysis -- are trains racing toward each other on the same track. Two entrenched, perhaps even inherent, features of cost-benefit analysis practically ensure that the benefits of regulatory measures addressing climate change and racial injustice will be diminished and deformed in the process of "valuing" them.
Marcha Chaudry | September 29, 2021
A recent Maryland law requires the state's Commissioner of Labor and Industry, in consultation with its Occupational Safety and Health Advisory Board, to develop and adopt regulations that require employers to protect employees from heat-related illness caused by heat stress. Those standards are due by October 2022. The law also requires the state to hold four public meetings to collect input from residents. This month, the Maryland Occupational Safety and Health Division (MOSH) scheduled those meetings, and I testified at the September 20 session.
Joel A. Mintz | September 23, 2021
Addresses by national leaders to the United Nations General Assembly are often broad expressions of lofty ideals, and President Joe Biden's speech Tuesday fell squarely into that category. It covered an extraordinary panoply of global challenges and policy concerns, including controlling the COVID-19 pandemic, rebuilding and strengthening global alliances and regional initiatives, curbing terrorism, protecting human rights (including the rights of women and workers) and lifting up democracy. Biden also committed the United States to advancing human dignity, combating corruption and seeking peace in areas of conflict around the world.
Clarissa Libertelli | September 22, 2021
When voters’ voices are suppressed, lawmakers and agency officials may be less responsive to their needs — and more likely to favor those of corporations and other special interests. Fortunately, last week Senate Democrats unveiled new voting rights legislation. Historically, voters overwhelmingly favor protective regulations, therefore more voting means a stronger regulatory system.
Katlyn Schmitt, Natalia Cabrera | September 21, 2021
Maryland is home to more than 1,000 industrial facilities, including landfills, auto salvage yards, hazardous waste treatment, storage sites, and various types of manufacturing and processing plants. When it rains or snows, toxic pollution often runs off these facilities and enters nearby waterways and groundwater resources, negatively impacting aquatic life, nearby communities, and drinking water sources. The problem -- known as industrial stormwater pollution -- is dire in Maryland. More industrial facilities are being built in the state, and precipitation intensity is increasing more quickly in the Chesapeake Bay region than elsewhere in the United States, threatening public and environmental health. Low-income people and communities of color are at heightened risk.
Martha McCluskey | September 14, 2021
Assumptions about the human condition shape the legal rules and institutions that structure the economy and state. By re-centering law on a clearer understanding of the human subject, vulnerability theory can strengthen law and political economy (LPE) efforts to address accelerating threats to democracy, equality, and the environment.
Daniel Farber | September 10, 2021
The Biden administration is looking to make big regulatory changes, not least regarding climate change. Yet the White House office overseeing regulations is vacant. The obscurely named Office of Regulatory Affairs and Information (OIRA) has to sign off on all significant regulations. Even the dilatory Donald Trump had nominated a permanent administrator by July of his first year. Biden's delay in filling this important office is hard to defend.
Darya Minovi | September 9, 2021
On August 29, Hurricane Ida pummeled Louisiana’s coastline with winds as high as 150 miles per hour and a storm surge of up to nine feet, flooding communities and destroying homes. The Category 4 storm displaced thousands of people and left 1 million without power -- all as the coronavirus surge overwhelms hospitals across the state. Amid this chaos, Louisianans faced yet another hazard -- the risk of exposure to toxic pollutants from explosions, flares, and accidental releases at disabled, damaged, or flooded industrial facilities.