St. Cloud Residents Are Getting Educated on Where Stormwater Goes, Adopt A Drain Program

(KNSI) – Officials educate St. Cloud residents about stormwater runoff and ask more people to join the adopt a drain program. St. Cloud Stormwater Compliance Specialist Noah Czech gave a presentation on Monday morning and said contrary to popular belief, stormwater isn’t treated like the water you flush down the toilet or rinse down the drain.

“Oftentimes in my education, what I can tell folks is think about stormwater runoff in St Cloud going to our area waterways. Generally, untreated or sometimes with minimal treatment. It’s not going to a facility. It’s not going to a building. It’s not going to a treatment plant.”

In the 1960s, cities began separating their wastewater from stormwater instead of dumping all its water into nearby waterways.

He says St. Cloud uses other practices to clean pollution from stormwater coming off cars and in sediment before it flows into local lakes, rivers, streams and wetlands. The filtration systems include holding ponds and rain gardens. Czech says the best way to keep our waters clean is to keep junk out of it.

“The real stormwater treatment training is education of the public and city folks. And don’t let that pollute find its way into our landscape to then wash off into our stormdrain system.”

Czech says St. Cloud residents can join the city’s adopt a storm drain program to do their part to help keep the Mississippi River healthy.

“Clean your nearest storm drain. The river starts here. Throw away trash rake up debris for disposal. Help us out. Help keep the neighborhood clean. Help keep your area clean. I tell people you have riverfront property and they’re like, I live in the middle of St. Cloud, Are you guys crazy? Well, your stormwater goes to the river. So we like to try and use that as our education theme in St. Cloud.”

Stearns County

Czech says more than 12,000 pounds of sediment was kept out of the drains thanks to the program. City officails say St. Cloud has more than 8,000 drains, 216 outlets, more than 200 miles of underground piping, 185 surface installations or rain gardens and 148 stormwater ponds.

Last year, four murals were painted around St. Cloud to remind people that what goes into the storm drain goes into the river. Four more murals are planned for this year too.

Because of the improvements in stormwater runoff into Lake George, the body of water is on the shortlist of lakes to be removed from the state’s impaired waters list.

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