During the downpour in Spokane yesterday - that picked up more inches of rain than the last 86 days combined - you could see the runoff on in the street, entering drains on the way to the river. It was a sad sight. Here's a solution, one you can spend a lot of time reading. It's Sightline's special report on cleaning up the northwest's toxic runoff, much of it relevant to Spokane. (See our list of where Spokane River pollution comes from.) Check their series HERE. 

Stormwater doesn't match the traditional image of pollution. There are no factory smokestacks belching waste. Yet polluted stormwater packs a punch. Runoff from streets and highways is the number one source for petroleum and other toxic chemicals that wash into the Northwest's rivers, lakes, and bays. Sightline's report, Curbing Stormwater Pollution, looks at the challenges we face and the opportunities we have to clean up our waterways.

Included in Curbing Stormwater Pollution:

• What we're up against: Ten bathtubs full of water pour off one average-size house during a storm. Cities like Seattle and Portland have hundreds of miles of storm-drain pipes and thousands of storm drains and catch basins. Sometimes the stormwater system simply backs up, flooding streets and basements.

• Stormwater's costly and toxic cocktail: In all, a typical year in Portland or Seattle, approximately 26,600 gallons of stormwater rush into gutters and streams from a single home--bringing a host of chemicals and pollutants with it. The toxic cocktail is a threat to our drinking water and marine wildlife alike.
• Smart, local solutions for polluted runoff: Cities throughout the Northwest are taking on the stormwater pollution problem by creating natural drainage systems--part of a movement called "low-impact development," or LID. By replicating nature's way of managing rainfall, cleaning up stormwater is both less expensive and more efficient than conventional sewer systems.
  
   

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