SITE INFORMATION AND CORRESPONDENCE

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% . 110� City of Stockton and County of San Joaquin Page 6 NPDES Permit CAS0083470 Response to Comments Reg. 68722 & 68732 calls for flexible interpretation of MEP based on site-specific characteristics and"cost considerations as well as water quality effects...." In developing the first and the second drafts of the MS4 permit,Regional Board staff met with the permittees several rimes and considered the information provided by the permittees in terms of cost of programs and policies required under the MS4 permit and the water quality benefit from these programs and policies. Thus, while the Regional Board is advised to consider costs as a factor in determining the reasonableness or practicability of requirements,there is no state or federal mandate for amore formal economic analysis involving the development of cost/benefit or cost-effectiveness relationships. Regional Board staff considered economics in developing some elements of the Tentative Order. For example, numeric effluent limitations were not included in the Tentative Order partially because meeting these limitations would be prohibitively expensive for the Permittees. The treatment of MS4 discharges to meet numeric effluent limitations is not technically infeasible. If the Regional Board were to require numeric effluent limits to be phased in over time, it would require gradual increases in MS4 effluent treatment. For example,the Permittees could be required to treat 50 percent of dry weather MS4 discharges and ten percent of wet weather discharges within five years; and then 100 percent of dry weather discharges and 50 percent of wet weather discharges within ten years; and finally, 100 percent of dry and wet weather discharges within 20 years,,with an exception for peak discharges from storm events beyond some magnitude (e.g., a 100-year event). This is an example of a technically feasible schedule for implementation of effluent limitations for MS4 discharges. The costs associated with implementing such an MS4 treatment program go beyond the MEP standard. Numeric effluent limitations are therefore not included in the Tentative Order. The City's comments did not identify any particular BMP as too costly to meet the MEP standard, so no specific concern the City may have can be addressed in these Responses. Pursuant to CWC Section 13263 and the CWA's MEP standard,Board staff has considered cost in selecting BMPs for inclusion in the Tentative Order. Every proposed BMP is intended to reduce or eliminate either MS4 pollutant discharges currently causing water quality impairment or pollutant discharges that may cause impairment in the future. Board staff believes that none of the proposed BMPs is technically or economically infeasible. 3. Comment: Use of non-applicable permit requirements from the Los Angeles Permit In making a side-by-side comparison of the Stockton and Los Angeles permits, it is readily apparent that the vast majority of the Stockton permit requirements were copied verbatim from the Los Angeles permit. This has resulted in a number of requirements being included that are not applicable to the conditions in the Stockton permit area. For example, the Industrial/Commercial Program includes the requirement to regulate auto body shops, auto dealers, auto repair shops, restaurants, and retail gasoline outlets. This listing comes directly from the Los Angeles Permit. While these commercial uses may discharge pollutants of concern in Los Angeles, there is no data that demonstrates these businesses are significant contributors to the pesticide, low dissolved oxygen, or pathogen impairments in Stockton-area water bodies. The result of blindly applying this Los Angeles requirement is that Stockton will be