Legislative Dist. 33 - Puget Sound Innovation Stories

Don’t Drip and Drive

Helping drivers prevent pollution from drips and leaks Each year, vehicles driving around Puget Sound leak approximately 7 million quarts of vehicle fluids, including motor oil, fuel, lubricants and more into the Puget Sound watershed. Oil and other petroleum products...

Regional On-site Sewage System Loan Program

Helping homeowners repair or replace failing on-site sewage systems The Regional On-site Sewage System Loan Program (RLP) in Washington State consolidates multiple county-level on-site sewage system loan programs into a single public-private partnership between the...

StormFest Education Program

Delivering Effective Stormwater Education to Diverse Communities StormFest is a hands-on, one-day, outdoor stormwater and watershed science education program for middle school students in the City of Burien. The program was developed to teach students what stormwater...

ECOSS Spill Kit Program

Preventing accidental spills before they drain into waterways Stormwater runoff is the leading source of pollution in Puget Sound watersheds. During storms, rainwater picks up everyday spills and leaks from business activities, construction work and vehicles. These...

12,000 Rain Gardens

Improving Puget Sound water quality one rain garden at a time! Rain gardens reduce polluted runoff into streams and Puget Sound by capturing and filtering stormwater runoff from roofs, driveways, roads, and other hard surfaces. Rain gardens are being installed all...

Washington Sea Grant Crab Team

Engaging citizen science volunteers to protect the Salish Sea from invasive European Green Crab The European green crab is listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as one of the world's 100 most damaging invasive species. European green...

Derelict Fishing Gear Program

Protecting marine animals from entanglement in lost fishing gear Commercial and recreational fishing is a way of life in Puget Sound where generations have enjoyed the bounty of the harvest and the thrill of the catch. Lost fishing gear such as gillnets and crab pots...

Salish Sea Marine Survival

Endangered Species Act listed Puget Sound Chinook salmon populations have plummeted by 50% since the mid-80s and steelhead have experienced even steeper declines. Research points to marine survival as the missing link to recovery. The Salish Sea Marine Survival...

Landscape Conservation & Local Infrastructure

The Landscape Conservation and Local Infrastructure Program in Seattle has been a major success. This program gives cities a financial incentive to use transfer of development rights—a market-based growth management and conservation tool. Rural landowners...

Cedar River Knotweed Removal

Stewardship in action: removing invasive knotweed one property at a time Invasive knotweed is an aggressive invader of riparian habitats throughout Western Washington. The plant displaces native vegetation and destabilizes riverbanks, disrupting natural habitat...

Seahurst Park

Seahurst Park is an oasis of 152 acres of forested ocean shoreline in a very urban corridor south of Seattle. The park boasts nearly a mile of natural beach and forested cliffs as tall as 400 feet. Seawalls were built in 1972, and as a result, sand from the cliffs...

Rainbow Bend

Rainbow Bend on the Cedar River was the site of an ambitions levee removal and floodplain restoration project that provided flood risk reduction benefits and restored salmon habitat. The project's first stage included buying a flood-prone mobile home park and...

Washington’s Local Source Control Partnership

Washington's Local Source Control Partnership offers small businesses in 19 Puget Sound communities free, hands-on pollution prevention assistance, such as spill prevention, proper chemical management, and other resources. Many pollution prevention programs focus on...

Floodplains By Design

Floodplains by Design began with $500,000 in U.S. Environmental Protection Agency funding in 2012, and since then Floodplains by Design has invested more than $80 million in Puget Sound floodplain projects. This collaborative effort has brought local and tribal...

Duwamish Gardens in Tukwila

Duwamish Gardens will provide nearly an acre of shallow-water habitat for salmon, as well as a pleasant park for urban residents to enjoy. Young salmon need off-channel, shallow-water habitat, where they can feed on insects and invertebrates that live among the...

Duwamish River Community Health

The Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition Technical Advisory Group launched the Healthy Rivers/Healthy Communities project in 2014 to address community and environmental health priorities in the Duwamish Valley neighborhoods of South Park and Georgetown, two neighborhoods...

Puget Sound Innovation Stories