Low Impact Development seminar was a major success, widely attended by professionals from around Lake George. The Lake George Waterkeeper will continue to work to bring Low Impact Development practices and technologies to the communities around the lake.

The Lake George Waterkeeper sponsored a seminar Challenges and Solutions Using Low Impact Development on May 5, 2011 at the Holiday Inn Resort in Lake George, NY. This seminar featured presentations from regionally and nationally recognized experts on Low Impact Development (LID) and stormwater management, including keynote speaker Larry Coffman (top right), who has been referred to as the "Father of Low Impact Development." Mr. Coffman is currently the President of LNSB, LLLP Stormwater Services Group, but is better known as the pioneer and developer of the Low Impact Development concept, which he started during his days as Associate Director of Prince George's County Department of Environmental Resources, Maryland. Mr. Coffman was the principal author and architect of Low Impact Development Strategies, An Integral Design Approach, which is the initial design manual for the implementation of Low Impact Development. His concept of creating hydrologically and ecologically functional landscapes is the basis of Low Impact Development.

At the seminar, Larry Coffman stated "Unique water quality demands won't be met if using basic stormwater management standards" in reference to protecting Lake George's historic high water quality standards. Chris Navitsky (below right), the Lake George Waterkeeper, picked up on this theme at the seminar stating "We need to change the design approach to land use and development to create a vision that works with the natural hydrology and mimics the existing landscape features. This can be accomplished through Low Impact Development, which has been widely applied in many other areas of the country. Through this approach, we will be able to protect the long term health of Lake George."

The intent of the seminar was to raise the awareness of Low Impact Development measures to land use professionals, municipal review board members and the development community, to answer questions regarding their implementation and increase the comfort level with these measures. The seminar was attended by over 90 land use professionals, area review board members, regulatory agency staff and the development community. The FUND for Lake George, program sponsor for the Lake George Waterkeeper, was an approved sponsor of the continuing education credits for professional engineers in New York State who attended the conference.

"This was the first seminar that focused on Low Impact Development in the area. We were very pleased with the attendance and interest, which reflected the quality of the presenters and the relevance of the subject matter. This seminar was also recognized by the NYS Office of Professional Licensing, who authorized the program to issue professional licensing continuing education credits" said Chris Navitsky, the Lake George Waterkeeper (see picture on right). Tom Hutchins, of Hutchins Engineering, stated "Kudos to Chris Navitsky and the Waterkeeper and FUND for putting on a very worthwhile and enjoyable event last week. It was extremely well organized and obviously took a great deal of effort to put together. All of those that I talked felt the same."

Other recognized presenters were Shirley Clark, Ph.D., P.E. an associate/Assistant Professor of Environmental Engineering at Penn State Harrisburg; Deb Caraco, P.E., Senior Watershed Engineer for the Center for Watershed Protection; Steve Trinkaus, P.E., principal engineer with Trinkaus Engineering, LLC and Lewis Dubuque, Executive Vice President of the New York State Builders Association.

During his presentation Steve Trinkaus said stormwater planning must be the first item undertaken when planning a site and not simply relegated to unbuildable areas. "Stormwater management can't be crammed into the only location on site that can't be built on. You need to be proactive, because by the time you notice a problem like excess sediment or algae, it is late in the game and hard to correct and reverse the situation."

The Towns of Hague, Lake George, Putnam, and Queensbury were well represented at the conference.

"LID professionals presented LID techniques in a way that would make you ask 'Why not incorporate LID to your project and property?' LID planning begins with evaluating your site carefully to minimize land use impacts" said kathy Bozony, Natural Resource Specialist with the Lake George Waterkeeper. "The Lake George Waterkeeper will provide other materials and educational opportunities about Low Impact Development in its efforts to see that LID is practiced widely throughout the Lake George watershed" said Bozony.

See presentations from the seminar posted:

Larry Coffman, Lake George: Low Impact Development Ecosystems Based Solutions.

Olga Vargas and Bob Kort, Impacts of Land Use and Development Activities in Soils.

Shirley Clark, Soils, Development and Stormwater.

Paul Mankiewicz, Gaia Soil - Alternative Soil Mixtures.

Steve Trinkaus, Water Quality and Quantity Impacts of Impervious Cover and Implement Low Impact Development Design Strategies.

Deb Caraco, The Runoff Reduction Method.

John Dunkle, Reducing Runoff with Green Infrastructure.

Jenna Calvi, Green Infrastructure and Low Impact Development.

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