Virginia Regulatory Town Hall
Agency
Department of Environmental Quality
Board
State Water Control Board

General Notice
Public Comment Period and Public Meeting - FY 2017 Virginia Clean Water Revolving Loan Fund Intended Use Plan and Project Priority List
Date Posted: 9/27/2016
Expiration Date: 10/24/2016
Submitted to Registrar for publication: YES
No comment forum defined for this notice.

Introduction:  Section 606(c) of the Water Quality Act of 1987 requires the State to develop an Intended Use Plan (IUP) that identifies the uses of its Clean Water Revolving Loan Fund and to prepare a list of projects targeted for financial assistance with those funds.  Following public comment and final Board action, the list of targeted projects for financial assistance becomes the State's yearly clean water revolving loan Project Priority List (PPL) in the IUP.

FY 2017 Program Development:  On June 1, 2016 the staff solicited applications from the Commonwealth’s localities and wastewater authorities as well as potential stormwater management, living shoreline projects, land conservation and Brownfield remediation clientele.  July 15, 2016 was established as the deadline for receiving applications. Based on this solicitation, DEQ received twenty-four (24) wastewater improvement applications requesting $126,677, 274, one (1) application for a stormwater management project ($4,307,361), and one (1) living shorelines application for an additional $250,000, bringing the total amount requested to $131,234,635.

All 24 wastewater applications were evaluated in accordance with the program's Funding Distribution Criteria.  In keeping with the program objectives and funding prioritization criteria, the staff reviewed project type and impact on state waters, the locality's compliance history and fiscal stress, and the project's readiness-to-proceed.  The one stormwater application was reviewed in accordance with the Board’s Priority Ranking Criteria for Stormwater projects.  Living Shoreline projects are not ranked.  All wastewater/ stormwater applications are considered to be of good quality and should provide significant water quality and environmental improvement.

The list of applications in Attachment A is shown by project type in priority funding order based on the Board’s prioritization criteria.  Note that each project type (wastewater and stormwater) has separate priority ranking point systems that are not intended to be numerically compared from one type to the other.  All applications are considered to be of good quality and should provide significant water quality and environmental improvement.  Based on these considerations, on September 22nd the Board approved the staff recommendation to target funding for $131,234,635 for all 26 projects as shown on Attachment B and present the proposed PPL and IUP for public comment.

The list of Applications and the Target Funding List are available at: http://www.deq.virginia.gov/Programs/Water/CleanWaterFinancingAssistance/FY2017AnnualSolicitation.aspx.

Public Participation:  The Board is presenting its draft list of targeted FY 2017 loan recipients and Intended Use Plan for public review and comment.  A public meeting will be held at 2:00 p.m. on Monday, October 24th in the Department of Environmental Quality's 11th Floor Conference Room, 629 East Main Street, Richmond, Virginia 23219. The public review and comment period will end immediately following the public meeting. Comments or questions should be directed to the DEQ contact person listed below. Written comments should include the name, address and telephone number of the presenter.


Contact Information
Name / Title: Walter Gills  / Clean Water Financing and Assistance Program
Address: Department of Environmental Quality
P.O. Box 1105
Richmond, 23218
Email Address: walter.gills@deq.virginia.gov
Telephone: (804)698-4133    FAX: ()-    TDD: ()-