POULSBO — While the weather’s been relatively dry lately, residents of the Austurbruin neighborhood have the wet stuff on their minds.
In particular, how to keep it under control.
In June, the neighborhood near the corner of Caldart Avenue and Curt Rudolph Road was awarded a $3,000 grant from the Puget Sound Action Team. Neighbor Kathryn Owen said the funding, which came from a program called the Small Environmental Education Dividends, is allowing the Austurbruin Green Space Project to consider some unique approaches to a very wet problem.
In just six years, Austurbruin has made a name for itself in terms of taking the reins to make its aesthetics and environment better. Last year, residents planted a community garden in a vacant lot.
This year,# they’ve taken an interest in the water in their area. Owen said many of her neighbors have had flooding problems in their basements in recent winters. After talking with representatives of the Department of Natural Resources (DNR), they discovered that part of the reason was that their homes were built on and around wetland areas.
“We learned some of our stormwater goes directly into Liberty Bay down Hostmark,” she explained. “We also learned some of it goes into Dogfish Creek through the Wilderness Park, which is becoming pretty eroded.”
Planting fruit trees and other native species in open spaces has helped cut down on the marshy atmosphere in some of the neighborhood. But Owen said they were told more mulching and plantings were necessary in order to stop the runoff.
The neighborhood was clued into the possibility of applying for action team funding by Mindy Fohn, environmental health specialist for the Bremerton-Kitsap County Health District’s on-site/water quality program. Fohn has been deeply involved in efforts to protect the south fork of Dogfish Creek, into which the neighborhood’s stormwater drains.
“It was pretty fortuitous that there was money available,” Owen said.
The grant money will cover having Chris May of Pacific Northwest Laboratory conduct an assessment of the neighborhood’s current stormwater conditions and make recommendations for work to be done.
“I think that will give us a lot of leverage to ask for more grant money and funding,” Owen said.
Another area of concern for the neighbors is the area’s bioswale that was built along Caldart. Owen said the structure is full of water year round and neighbors have long suspected it may be faulty. She said they were recently told that additional plantings and redesign could help it function better.
One of the possibilities that is being considered for the bioswale is a rain garden. A relatively new idea in stormwater management, rain gardens are bowl-shaped areas that feature native shrubs, grasses and wildflowers and help collect precipitation, allowing it to seep more naturally back into the ground, rather than running off. Owen said the current bioswale is in a good location for a rain garden, however, its turf-style grass plantings cannot adequately catch and hold rain.
If a rain garden were attempted at Austurbruin, it would be among the first such public projects in Kitsap County.
“That would be pretty experimental for this area,” Owen said. “I think it would be neat if we could do something that was really low cost, environmentally friendly but attractive. I think it’s a good opportunity to teach people.”
