Hello everyone! 

I want to address some environmental issues in our area that are increasingly important with the upcoming rainy season. I know the city of Gilbert has an initiative with our Environmental Compliance Program which works to ensure the integrity of our water control system to stay on top of this, so I wanted to do the same in my community.

I'm sure we all know how our stormdrains work, however I myself have even just learned recently that anything and everything that flows into the storm drain system is not treated in a wastewater treatment plant. Rather, it flows directly into local waterways and retention basins and many of those are our own community parks. So this means any pollution that goes down our storm drains can be carried into our parks and be harmful to our children, pets and environment. This includes debris like litter, leaves, grass clippings, vehicle fluid run-off, and much more. This is a PSA that it is important for every member of our community to do their part to reduce storm drain contamination. This can be done with keeping up on vehicle maintenance so there is no fluid run-off, washing our cars at a car wash rather than in the drive-way, monitoring landscape irrigation to avoid run off, and sweeping up any fallen leaves or grass clippings before they make their way into the gutter and get them into the trash barrels.

Thank you all for continuing to do your part, and remember, it is so much easier and cost effective to prevent stormwater pollution than it is to clean it up.