A while back I was involved in a study to determine the sources of high bacterial counts at a coastal beach. One of our field crews out investigating the local storm drains to make sure that there were no sewer cross-connections was approached by a woman who was curious about what they were doing and commended them for their efforts to clean up the beach. She then proceeded to tell them quite proudly how she had actually trained her dog to squat and do its business over the catchbasin, thus avoiding having to pick up after it. She, like much of the public, had no idea that the storm drains simply transport water (and whatever gets dumped into it) and discharge it untreated to the nearest water body. To me, that’s the main message we need to get across in our stormwater public education efforts.

Her conclusion reminds me of a musing I’ve been having: that in some cases, it’s not true anymore that RUNOFF doesn’t get treated. Stormdrains don’t get treated, but that’s not accurate either: it’s their CONTENTS that don’t get treated, but we still call that RUNOFF. I’ve not seen any discussions on this nuance yet… our vocabulary needs to evolve some, but can it evolve in a way that ENHANCES public understanding of the issues instead of obscuring it further?

I do understand that the second post was not aimed at the little old lady. The point of the post is simply to highlight how differently professionals and lay people can understand and talk about the same set of circumstances.

No criticism of the second post was intended.

I found the technical email useful, as it enables me to answer a greater range of questions with confidence. If a person retorts, “but it can’t get into the water when the water is 200 feet away,” I can say with confidence “Yes, it can.” If they further ask me how/why, I could again respond knowledgably. The poster of this email did not intend it to be an outreach message.