Ocala, FL Environmental Rules: Erosion Control (2026)

The city's illicit discharge and connection ordinance in Chapter 102, Article III defines 'construction activity' as any activity subject to NPDES construction permits, including clearing and grubbing, demolition, grading, excavating, utility installation, building erection, paving and landscaping on sites of one acre or more. Anyone holding an NPDES industrial or construction activity stormwater permit from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection must send the city's engineering department a copy of the notice of intent at the same time it goes to FDEP, mailed to the department's Southeast Osceola Avenue address, and operating without having filed that copy is itself an offense.

The engineering department, acting as the authorized enforcement agency, sets best management practice requirements for any activity that may pollute stormwater or the storm drainage system, and site operators must install structural and non-structural BMPs at their own expense to prevent accidental discharges during construction. Those BMPs are folded into a stormwater management plan (SWMP) required for NPDES compliance, and a contractor holding a valid FDEP NPDES permit for the project is deemed compliant with this section to the extent practicable. Runoff, sediment or wash-down water leaving a graded or excavated site into the storm drain system without those controls in place exposes the operator to the same notice-of-violation and penalty structure that governs the rest of the illicit discharge ordinance.