Philadelphia Water Department seeks better management of city storm water

September 5, 5:25 PMSouth Philly Community ExaminerMaria Verlengia

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A Spruce Creek Rainsaver barrel

The Lower Moyamensing Civic Association (LoMo) in South Philly has been helping to raise awareness of the Philadelphia Water Department’s efforts to handle storm water. On August 20th, LoMo participated in a rain barrel workshop in South Philly along with the East Passyunk Crossing Association (EPX).

During the workshop, Kim Massare, president of LoMo, and Joe Marino, co-chair of the EPX Board of Directors, welcomed Laura Rozumalski from the Water Department who provided an overview of Philadelphia’s storm water challenge.

“Philadelphia is a very wet climate. We’re looking for better ways to manage storm water,” Rozumalski said. She explained that the city has a network of sewers with a combined and separate sewage system. The storm water handled by the dual systems contains pollutants, erodes stream banks, and can overwhelm the sewage pipes. The Water Department is attempting to take some strain off the pipes.

Rain barrels are part of the solution, Rozumalski said, since they collect storm water, keeping it from entering the sewage system. She noted that the Water Department has held 30 workshops and distributed about 1500 barrels. Participants in the South Philly workshop received a free Spruce Creek Rainsaver barrel.

If you use a rain barrel, Rozumalski emphasized that you should not drink the water or give it to your pets. However, it can be used for tasks such as gardening and cleaning.

In addition, in their most recent meeting, LoMo welcomed Joanne Dahme, another water department representative. She discussed the Green City, Clean Waters Plan, an initiative of the department’s Office of Watersheds. Because of its downstream location, Philadelphia has a greater challenge when managing its watersheds.

“We’re pretty much downstream in every one of our watersheds,” said Dahme.

Again, as with rain barrels, the goal is to capture water before it hits the ground and treat it as a natural resource. Dahme described more ideas for using the city surface to capture storm water. One example is sidewalk rain gardens that would be maintained by the water department since they would be part of the infrastructure.

“We’re really changing the landscape of the city,” Dahme said of the initiative.