County

regulations define a minimum number of parking

spaces each business must have, but that flies in

the face of other regulations that limit how much

impervious surface - pavement - the

business can have, say county commissioners.

It's

part of a difficult and potentially expensive

problem the county faces as new state and federal

laws focus more and more on keeping storm water

runoff from flooding and polluting area streams

and lakes, and on making sure rainwater can work

its way through the soil and replenish the water

table.

"We're

creating a problem we're going to have to fix

years down the road when it comes to storm water

runoff," said Commissioner Greg Dunn as

commissioners discussed the county's development

regulations last week.

Commissioners

approved changes to the regulations, which govern

things like the thickness of street pavement and

the types of materials that can be used in

developments. The Engineering Department and the

county Planning Commission have been working on

the changes for about a year with an eye to

tightening restrictions and requiring higher

quality.

But

Commissioner Glen Gosa said he wants the

department to look into changes to parking lot

requirements to allow porous types of paving.

"I'd

like something where a certain number of those

parking spaces can be filled with gravel or some

type of pervious surface," said Gosa.

"My

concern is that we have parking regulations that

say you have to have X number of parking spots

because that's what the regulations call

for," he said.

State

and federal regulators have been warning local

governments for years that eventually they're

going to be required to capture and treat storm

water runoff, a problem that increases as the

amount of pavement in the county grows.

<!--

-----------