Thanks for sharing your expertise and urging a scientific approach to addressing water quality and protection of environmentally-sensitive land.
I see at least three ways to measure impervious cover for the purposes of taxing or imposing fees on it:
- Square footage of impervious cover per acre (or percentage of impervious cover on a lot).
- Square footage of impervious cover (the amount of impervious cover on a lot, regardless of the total lot square footage).
- Square footage of impervious cover per person.
The initial proposal in this discussion thread was for (2), simply the amount of impervious cover, no matter what the lot size. Several participants noted that this measure, taxed at a high enough rate, would discourage sprawl development, perhaps to a severe degree. Perhaps going even further with (3) is not necessary to encourage desirable development patterns?
Several people have brought up flooding as an issue, which has ramifications beyond water quality but also on safety and risk of property damage. Do you have any thoughts to share on that issue?
Finally, should the revenue from any tax or fee on run-off be dedicated to water quality and detention infrastructure of the type suggested in one of the other proposed resolutions on CodeNEXT?