The Watershed Plan describes the approach that will be used to evaluate conditions in the City's urban watersheds and implement projects to improve watershed health. This will be achieved through the work of the Watershed Services Group, River Renaissance, other City bureaus, agencies, and citizens' groups, all of which share a common goal to protect Portland's natural resources, restore critical ecosystems, and implement stormwater solutions that integrate the urban area with the natural environment.

 

An overarching theme of the Plan is to achieve improved watershed health through watershed friendly development, installation of new stormwater infrastructure and the City repair and maintenance of existing infrastructure in new ways that will improve watershed health. The Plan presents the science behind the need for these approaches and a management system to track City progress toward well-defined watershed health goals. The management system will also help the Bureau adapt their strategies as needed to maximize effectiveness. The success of this plan will depend on the ability of all City Bureaus to integrate a "Watershed Approach" into their routine work.

 

Another major component of the Plan is an integrated City response to local, state and federal environmental requirements. City-wide implementation of the watershed plan will provide Portland with the flexibility to respond to regulations differently and more effectively. Instead of the traditional mandate-by-mandate approach, our regulatory responses will be based on the root causes of problems and not just symptoms. This will provide Portland with the means to solve current environmental problems without creating future ones.

 

 

The Plan references and was based on other technical documents. Documents available to download are listed in the box on the left of this page.