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CONTRACT K-1718-85: A MEMORANDUM OF UNDERSTANDING BY AND BETWEEN THE CITY OF NORMAN, OKLAHOMA, THE CITY OF MOORE, AND THE CITY OF OKLAHOMA CITY TO SHARE THE COSTS ASSOCIATED WITH A BRANDING PROJECT TO HELP WITH JOINT PUBLIC EDUCATION EFFORTS NECESSARY TO COMPLY WITH THE LAKE THUNDERBIRD TOTAL MAXIMUM DAILY LOAD (TMDL).
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BACKGROUND: The Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality (ODEQ) issued the Total Maximum Daily Load Report (TMDL) for Lake Thunderbird (Lake) and its watershed on November 13, 2013. The goal of the establishment of this TMDL is for the water in Lake Thunderbird to meet state and federal Water Quality Standards (WQS). The report identified two beneficial uses that the Lake does not meet (referred to as nonattainment): Warm Water Aquatic Community and Public and Private Water Supply. This nonattainment is due to impairment in three categories of measurement: turbidity, dissolved oxygen and chlorophyll-a.
Certain pollutants in the water have a detrimental effect on these parameters for the Lake. The City is required to reduce the amounts of these pollutants discharged within its Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4). The pollutants of concern for monitoring purposes are Total Nitrogen (TN), Total Phosphorus (TP), and Total Suspended Solids (TSS). Modeling of the Lake and its watershed was done by ODEQ to determine the Waste Load Allocations (WLAs) for the three cities in the watershed, Norman, Moore and Oklahoma City.
The City of Norman (Norman) has a vested interest in a successful program as Lake Thunderbird serves as Norman’s primary drinking water source. The Cities of Moore and Oklahoma City must also comply with the TMDL; however, neither of these cities use Lake Thunderbird as a source for their drinking water.
All three cities were required to develop and submit Compliance and Monitoring Plans by November 13, 2015. Norman’s Compliance and Monitoring Plans (Plans) were developed by Olsson Associates and endorsed by the City Council on October 27, 2015, through Resolution R-1516-25. The Plans were submitted to the ODEQ for review and approval on November 5, 2015. After several discussions with ODEQ, a final response to ODEQ’s comments and revised Plans were submitted to ODEQ on July 22, 2016. ODEQ approved Norman’s revised Plans on September 21, 2016, and they were adopted by Council on October 25, 2016.
On November 9, 2016, representatives from the Cities of Norman, Moore, and Oklahoma City met to discuss forming a Technical Workgroup consisting of personnel in each City’s stormwater program with TMDL compliance-related duties. The goal of this workgroup is to share information and leverage resources for the benefit of each city. At the workgroup’s quarterly meetings, one item that was discussed involved public education and engagement. Each city has committed to public education activities as part of its Compliance Plan. Because this is a common element to each, the workgroup discussed working together on a unified brand for the Lake Thunderbird watershed. This will allow each city to leverage resources and produce template documents and a website that can be used by each city to satisfy its public education commitments.
DISCUSSION: In an effort to develop a unified brand to be used to satisfy the public education efforts required by each City’s Compliance Plan, Norman will enter into a contract with Compa Creative for the creation of a logo, theme, color scheme, a website, and other related marketing items to assist in creating a cohesive branding scheme for these efforts. This will be presented to Council as a companion item, Contract K-1718-86.
This Council action is to approve Contract K-1718-85 between Norman and the Cities of Moore and Oklahoma City, which is a Memorandum of Understanding that allows each city to share the costs associated with the Compa Creative contract and use all elements of the branding scheme for its own TMDL-related public education and outreach efforts.
RECOMMENDATION: Staff recommends approval of Contract K-1718-85, between the Cities of Norman, Moore, and Oklahoma City.