Pueblo County is threatening to suspend a permit for the Southern Delivery System water pipeline unless Colorado Springs spends more money on stormwater improvements next year.

A condition of the so-called 1041 permit requires Colorado Springs to have an adequate stormwater management plan, Pueblo County Attorney Dan Kogovsek said Thursday.

The storm that pounded Colorado Springs on Wednesday highlights the city’s need to invest in stormwater capital improvements, he said.

“Stormwater is not being captured and is going into Fountain Creek at an alarming rate,” he said.

Pueblo County is “very concerned” that Colorado Springs’ capital improvements to prevent stormwater damage have fallen by the wayside since the demise of the Stormwater Enterprise more than two years ago, Kogovsek said.

When the enterprise was in operation, the city was spending about $13.3 million annually on maintenance, capital improvement projects and required permits.

This year, the city budgeted $3.3 million for maintenance and permits but nothing for capital improvements.

Kogovsek said the county will keep a close eye on the city’s 2013 budget to see how much Colorado Springs plans to spend on stormwater.

“If present funding levels continue, this will have an impact on Colorado Springs Utilities’ permit from Pueblo County,” he said.

“We may hold a hearing to see if the permit should be suspended because of the failure to have adequate stormwater management as required by condition 23 of our SDS permit.”

SDS is a 62-mile underground pipeline that Springs Utilities is building between Colorado Springs and Pueblo. The pipeline is expected to be in operation by 2016.

The permit Utilities obtained from Pueblo requires Colorado Springs to “maintain stormwater controls and other regulations intended to ensure that Fountain Creek peak flows resulting from new development served by the SDS project within the Fountain Creek basin are no greater than existing conditions.”

SDS spokeswoman Janet Rummel said Utilities and Pueblo added the language to “address stormwater flows that may result from new development served by SDS.”

“It is important to note that the project mitigation objectives are based upon observed conditions and measureable standards and do not apply until SDS is in operation – since the permitted project’s impacts are the ones SDS has to mitigate, not existing conditions,” Rummel said in an email.

“Only if we experience increased storm flows associated with new development served by SDS, which are in excess of baseline conditions, would we need to act,” she said.

Kogovsek said peak flows on Fountain Creek have increased since the permit was approved.

“The SDS permit addressed not only the increased flows caused by SDS but …we were assured that the backlog of projects would be handled through the Stormwater Enterprise. Since 2010, that has not happened,” he said.

Mayor Steve Bach, who marked his first year in office Thursday, has sounded the alarm about the city’s stormwater needs. As part of his funding solution, he wants the City Council to direct Utilities to come up with $12 million to $15 million from its existing budget and rate base.

“Why should Colorado Springs Utilities be involved in this? In my view, because Utilities will be bringing Southern Delivery System water here from down at the Pueblo Dam and the Arkansas River,” Bach said during a news conference Thursday in the wake of Wednesday’s storm.

“Utilities will thereby be, frankly, exacerbating our stormwater challenges because after that water is used locally — whether it’s domestic consumption or irrigation or other purposes – it will be returned. It’s called return flow and that water will be additive to Fountain Creek flow going back down south. At least that’s a pragmatic reason that I see that Utilities should partner with us,” he said.

When asked whether he was encouraged by Bach’s call to fund stormwater, Kogovsek said Pueblo was in a “show-me” mode.

“We appreciate the kind words, but we are going to look at the stormwater capital improvements budget for 2013,” he said.

“We have a saying in Pueblo, ‘Put your money where your mouth is.’”

—

Contact Daniel Chacón: 476-1623

Twitter @danieljchacon

Facebook Daniel Chacon

Jon Bowman, left, and his brother Matt Bowman from A-1 Barricade and Sign, Inc. install an erosion barrier along Fountain Creek Nov. 4, 2009, as part of the three million dollar Stormwater Enterprise project. Photo by CHRISTIAN MURDOCK, THE GAZETTE FILE