STORET:
CBA has uploaded almost 50,000 records to STORET, which is a national water quality database maintained by the EPA. It is utilized in creating water quality standards for the TMDL program (see below) along with other state and national water quality standards. You can easily download data yourself from STORET, simply by using their website: http://epa.gov/storet/. Do beware that Station IDs in STORET may not be the same as the station names/numbers that our volunteers use when they’re monitoring. If you’d like to know the Station IDs used in STORET for the CBA sites you monitor, please contact Sarah Kalinoski (kalinoss@owc.edu; 850-974-0093). The EPA is planning to release a new and improved version of their STORET website within the next few months. CBA will notify all of its volunteers when this happens.

Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) Program:
The Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) Program is administered by the EPA. It was established by section 303 of the Clean Water Act. According to the EPA’s website (http://www.epa.gov/owow/tmdl/), a TMDL or Total Maximum Daily Load is a calculation of the maximum amount of a pollutant that a waterbody can receive and still meet water quality standards, and an allocation of that amount to the pollutant's sources. Water quality standards are set by States, Territories, and Tribes. They identify the uses for each waterbody, for example, drinking water supply, contact recreation (swimming), and aquatic life support (fishing), and the scientific criteria to support that use. A TMDL is the sum of the allowable loads of a single pollutant from all contributing point and nonpoint sources. The calculation must include a margin of safety to ensure that the waterbody can be used for the purposes the State has designated. The calculation must also account for seasonal variation in water quality. Eventually TMDL levels must be determined for every waterbody in the state. This work is done in basin rotations, and over the course of five phases. Our area is included in the Northwest District, Group 3. Right now we’re in the end of Phase 4 of our first rotation. CBA and LAKEWATCH data is used informally by the EPA to determine which waterbodies in our area should be considered first in case they may be determined as impaired waterbodies.

National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Partnerships:
The National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Permitting Program is another EPA program authorized by the Clean Water Act. NPDES describes a required 5-year stormwater permit for each of the larger municipalities (with an “MS4” designation) in our local watershed. CBA has recently entered into partnerships with Walton County and the City of Fort Walton Beach to address particularly the Public Involvement and Participation control measure of their NPDES permits. CBA continues to collect monthly water quality data with the help of its many dedicated volunteers and to provide public education in order to completely fulfill this component of the City’s and County’s NPDES permits. We have added some monitoring stations in Fort Walton Beach at the city’s request to help further define and increase illicit discharge detection. You can learn more about the NPDES permit program at this EPA website: http://cfpub.epa.gov/npdes/.

Management Plans:
As CBA and its cadre of volunteers continue collecting water quality data throughout Okaloosa and Walton counties, we work according to Breaking New Ground, published at the inception of the Choctawhatchee Basin Alliance. As recommended by this document, we’re collecting data to identify problem areas and develop further studies on those problem areas accordingly. In this light, CBA water quality data is currently being used to create individual management plans for the waterbodies we monitor. Phillip Ellis, CBA Project Coordinator, and Scott Jackson, from the Walton-Okaloosa County – University of Florida IFAS Extension Service, recently hosted a series of community discussions in South Walton County, which initiated a process that will result in management plans for each of Walton County’s rare coastal dune lakes. Joy Brown, CBA Project Specialist, is using data collected by CBA volunteers in her own work on a Hogtown Bayou Management Plan. CBA data also allows us to study the progress of projects underway (i.e., changes in water quality due to stormwater remediation).

Water Quality Master Plans:
Every city and county develops its own stormwater master plan. Local contractors called on CBA for information and water quality data in creating these plans for our communities.

National Estuarine Eutrophication Assessment:
The National Estuarine Eutrophication Assessment is a joint initiative between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) and the Integration and Application Network (IAN). CBA is participating in a survey currently being conducted to update the original National Estuarine Eutrophication Assessment, which was released in 1999. We are providing data and contributing the additional knowledge and expertise of our staff who are actively involved in studying the conditions and changes in condition of the Choctawhatchee Bay. Data and supplementary information submitted to NOAA will help them answer the question “Have conditions worsened or improved in the past decade? And if so why?” regarding the Choctawhatchee Bay. This will further inform their study of this question, as it is applied on a national scale. This analysis is intended to highlight successful management measures and apply stronger protections to places where conditions have worsened. You can visit this website for more information about the National Estuarine Eutrophication Assessment: http://ian.umces.edu/neea/index.php.