Stormwater Funding Program Evaluation: Always Room for Improvement

Every user-fee-funded stormwater program evolves and is subject to changing needs and requirements. Funding program changes can occur reactively or proactively. Many user-fee funded stormwater programs are initially established to fund a driving purpose such as compliance with regulatory requirements, the need for better maintenance of best management practices (BMPs) that are not being maintained by private entities, or the need to finance significant capital facilities. Changing needs and demands require periodic evaluation of a stormwater program to address additional activities and increased stakeholder expectations. With nearly 1,500 user-fee-funded programs in North America, a structured method of program evaluation and improvement is very much needed.Program evaluation can be accomplished in a variety of ways and to a varying degree of detail. The question and issue becomes: How is this best accomplished? The Water Environment Federation (WEF) recently published “User-Fee Funded Stormwater Programs” (WEF 2013). This publication not only updates information on the state of the art for these programs, but has added an important chapter specifically addressing the evaluation and improvement of existing stormwater funded programs.This paper presents the rationale and method developed to address program review and enhancement as described in this important Chapter of the aforementioned publication. More specifically the paper provides a structured method and “score card” tool designed to assess an existing user-fee funded stormwater program and to develop a proactive plan of action for overall stormwater management program improvement. The methodology will provide the practitioner with an assessment of an existing program sufficient to identify functions and program components that may need to be changed, adjusted, or otherwise improved. Application and use of the score card to assess and determine specific action plans to enhance and improve the existing program will be demonstrated. A simple but highly useful scoring methodology developed for assessment and determination of actionable improvements are discussed. The assessment is organized into three primary program areas:Functional elementsRevenue elementsManagement elementsThe separate scoring of these three program areas avoids strength in one area to distort or cover potential weaknesses in another. The reviewer is able to assess these three significant program components to provide a focused assessment. You will learn:Why program evaluation is needed;What elements of the program should be assessed;What elements of the program need attention;What specific improvements should be made;Who should conduct the assessment;How the assessment is to be made;When the assessment is to be made; andHow to use the results of the assessment.