Sharpsburg, PA
Supporting the Development of a Comprehensive Stormwater Management Plan Our Approach Project OutcomesProject Goal
WaterNow partnered with the Borough of Sharpsburg to develop a Request for Proposals (RFP) and a budget that are serving as building blocks for a future Comprehensive Stormwater Management Plan, that will complement the existing landscape of community plans in Sharpsburg. The goal of this project was to prepare Sharpsburg’s infrastructure capabilities against localized flooding due to storms and to mitigate water quality impacts on the local watersheds, while ensuring that the community is resilient and knowledgeable about stormwater risks.
Our Approach
The Borough of Sharpsburg, located along the Allegheny River about five miles northeast of downtown Pittsburgh, sits at the bottom of multiple watersheds, making it one of the most flood-exposed municipalities in Allegheny County. The Borough is working to identify the most impactful areas and corresponding solutions – including green stormwater infrastructure solutions – that are ripe for investment to mitigate flooding and advance social equity and ecosystem health.
In this project, WaterNow laid the groundwork for a Comprehensive Stormwater Management Plan, empowering the community to leverage limited tax dollars and employ grant funding to make the biggest impacts to protect the health and safety of residents, properties, and public assets. This project generated a Request For Proposals (RFP) and an estimated planning budget, positioning Sharpsburg to create an innovative and Comprehensive Stormwater Management Plan that will guide the Borough’s stormwater, parks, development, and capital improvement efforts for the next 25 years. In creating the RFP, WaterNow worked with Sharpsburg to research exemplary municipal stormwater management plans to inform their own goals, build an understanding of how the new plan will interface with the regional and local landscape of environmental planning and regulation, and conduct community engagement to ensure the plan can incorporate and benefit from existing networks of community connection.
Outcomes
The Request for Proposals was released on September 3rd, 2024, and the Borough plans to select a firm to create the Comprehensive Stormwater Management Plan before the start of 2025. The resulting Plan will:
- support Sharpsburg in selecting and prioritizing stormwater management projects based on their stormwater benefits and community co-benefits,
- improve the Borough’s asset management of their stormwater system,
- evaluate Sharpsburg’s ordinances and policies for any potential changes to support effective stormwater management, and
- build a robust community engagement effort around stormwater.
