Engineer outlines new NPDES stormwater requirements, Kimball Creek priority

Engineer Patrick Fry presented Snoqualmie’s obligations under the 2024–2029 stormwater permit and highlighted what the city must deliver in the coming years.

Fry said the city inspected 1,500 catch basins in 2025 and cleaned 366, inspected all 62 stormwater treatment facilities and maintains 51 of them, performed 25 business inspections (a new requirement), issued four corrective action letters, and received a $135,000 biannual grant to help administer permit obligations. “We have to inspect 100% of our catch basins biannually and clean when they reach a 40% fill,” Fry said, outlining the operational workload the permit requires.

The presentation flagged new deliverables: a social‑marketing outreach program already started, a 2027 Stormwater Management Action Plan (SMAP) and implementation of a street‑sweeping program, and in 2028 a focus on Stormwater Management for Existing Development (SMED). Fry identified the Kimball Creek Basin — largely in Old Snoqualmie and constructed before 1990 — as the highest priority basin for retrofits and restoration; Ecology requires the city to restore an equivalent of 2.3 acres in that basin during the permit cycle.

What’s next: staff said the Kimball Creek riparian restoration project is in the CIP and that future budget requests will include funds to carry out SMAP/SMED obligations and associated capital work.