What will Freshwater Management Reform Mean for Stormwater Management?

Freshwater management in New Zealand is undergoing a fundamental change. Reforms to the management of freshwater bodies, which includes freshwater bodies in urban areas, are set out in the National Policy Statement for Freshwater Management (NPSFM), the Freshwater Reform 2013 and Beyond draft document which gives guidance on how the reforms could be implemented, and proposed amendments to the NPS-FM released late last year (Ministry for the Environment, 2011; 2013a, b). The NPS-FM requires councils to set freshwater objectives and limits, MfE (2013a) proposes three action points to achieve these which are adopted in MfE (2013b):

• Planning as a community to include a diverse range of stakeholders in freshwater management.
• Development of a National Objectives Framework whereby objectives are the desired environmental outcomes and limits refer to the amount of water available for use.
• Managing catchments within water quality and quantity limits.

Discussion to date has focused on rural water allocation and agricultural runoff. However, the reforms also require setting objectives and limits for urban water bodies - how to do so needs to be addressed. Here we overview the pathway to reform and initiate a discussion on the implications of the reform for stormwater quality management in urban areas.