What is stormwater? It’s rain. It’s not storm surge from a hurricane, just good old fashion precipitation. Which is where the confusion seems to start when discussing stormwater in Tampa. After the historic, once in 500 (1000?) year rain event from Hurricane Milton, the city lost its collective mind. “I live in zone X and I flooded!” Zone X has no relation to stormwater. Evacuation zones are related to storm surge. Salt water flooding. It’s quite possible to live in a bowl that’s a filled in swamp and flood even if nary a drop of saltwater rises above the high tide mark.

But let’s back up. The city of Tampa didn’t have a Stormwater Department until 2003 when Mayor Pam Iorio came into office and created one as part of the initial plan for the stormwater assessment fee. Prior to that, it was a division within Wastewater Department funded through general fund dollars. Additional Utilities Tax funds were used for capital improvements. In 2016. The city created the Stormwater Assessment Fee to fund the new department and begin to comply with federal and state laws regarding water runoff. Mayor Buckhorn with the approval of council implemented a second stormwater fee, the “improvement” fee. A 30 year fee to fund capital improvements. Large scale projects that have been funded through bonds issued against the fee. At the same time, the Stormwater Department was folded back into the newly created Mobility Department as the Stormwater Engineering Division. The arguments for doing such was efficiency. Which if well planned and executed most likely is true. The reality is all it has done is blur lines. Especially when the assessment pulls in $15.5 million a year and the division has a payroll of $12 million. It opens up the question, what and how much of that work was truly for stormwater when there was deferred maintenance across the board—failed pumps, uncleared outlets, ditches in need of grading.

Expectation vs Reality

Another misconception is that the city’s stormwater system should have handled the 15+ inches of rain Milton dumped in 24 hours. The city’s service level is based on 5 year rain events. Roughly 5.5 inches in a 24 hour period. When the assessment was created, the city defined 3 levels of service:

• A – This is the most advanced level of stormwater protection available and comprises the complete removal of stormwater from street surfaces during the design rainfall event.
• B – the prevention of significant levels of yard flooding but includes some flooding of street and yard areas. The impacts on residents in Level B service areas are primarily nuisance flooding problems related to temporary impassability of streets. There is no flooding of structures.
• C – minimum level of stormwater protection that can be provided and comprises the prevention of flooding in structures or appurtenant components of residential, commercial or institutional structures. This level of service allows for temporary ponding in streets and yards, but precludes the flooding of structures.

They estimated at the time 94% of the city was at level C with the goal of being at 98% by 2015. Minimum protection for a 5 year rain event. Even if the city achieved 100% Level A service city wide, that’s for a third of the rain Milton produced. The system was never designed for the level of rain and has never been represented as such. Same goes for construction that’s exempt from stormwater fees. They weren’t designed to hold that much rain either. So it has to go somewhere. All of a sudden a neighborhood—a block—that’s a few feet lower than surrounding neighborhoods becomes a lake.

That’s not to say there aren’t legitimate questions about the Mobility/Stormwater plan. Could the city be further along if Stormwater had continued along as a separate department simply empowered to coordinate with other departments? Were transportation projects that only had cursory stormwater implications prioritized over the unglamorous work of replacing the stormwater lines? Does the level of service need to be increased and if so, how will it be paid for?

Or will modern building codes catch up over time as old construction is cycled out, accounting for the difference between the level of service the city provides and what a specific location may require for 1-in-500 year rain events?