Green Infrastructure Initial Meeting 9/29/2021 9:00 am

Present: Brent Lewis, Betsy Liggett, Stacy Gloss

ABOUT

• 8.2 [F&S w/Extension] Coordinate rainwater management plans for the entire urbanized areas of Champaign, Urbana, Savoy, and the university. Starting in FY21, share the total number of green infrastructure locations on the iCAP Portal on an annual basis.
  • Initiate discussions about development of rainwater plan
  • Compile green infrastructure locations in Champaign, Urbana and Savoy.
    • Deliverable: iCAP Portal map of known green infrastructure locations by 3/15/22
  • Propose a process and scope for developing the coordinated rainwater plan
    • Deliverable: white paper describing process and scope

NOTES

Introductions: Betsy works for F&S in safety and compliance, manages stormwater permit MS4. Brent is campus Landscape Architect

Topics discussed: Campus MS4 water permit, EPA compliance. Sustainability items are built into MS4 permit now.  Compliance & Sustainability are coinciding.   Regarding Campus Green Infrastructure – challenges to adopting green projects, especially when they are viewed in terms of costs but not benefits

Existing resources: 

• University has mapped watersheds;
• A Landscape Master Plan in progress, will contain some elements of green infrastructure, but is not a utilities plan for Stormwater;
• Champaign County Stormwater Partnership for MS4 permit (includes leaders from the County, Urbana, Savoy, Champaign, Champaign Township, EPA, Soil & Water Conservation District, Prairie Rivers sometimes)
• Extension has been involved in previous discussions about rainwater plans, Eliana Brown and Lisa Merrifield
• Urbana is working on a Stormwater Master Plan (Tim Cowan, public works director is the contact)

Green Infrastructure Maps on Portal currently:

• https://icap.sustainability.illinois.edu/project/green-roofs-campus
• https://icap.sustainability.illinois.edu/project/rain-gardens-campus
• https://icap.sustainability.illinois.edu/project/increase-pollinator-friendly-areas
• https://www.opengreenmap.org/greenmap/champaign-urbana-green-map

Next Steps

• Stacy attend Oct 20 green infrastructure & erosion control conference   
• Follow up with meeting Oct 25
• Garner support for Campus Stormwater Master Plan
• Contact Julie Cidell about GreenMap