Summit County, OH Landscaping Rules: Rainwater Harvesting (2026)

Sec. 07(b), the second half of Chapter 1106's Landscape Plan section, addresses stormwater alongside the native-planting mandate in Sec. 07(a). Unlike the 30% native-plant floor, the low-impact-design clause uses encouragement language rather than a mandate: the use of low impact design and other innovative measures to manage stormwater are encouraged, naming bioretention, rain gardens, rain barrels, green roofs, and permeable and porous pavements as qualifying measures. The provision applies only where a Landscape Plan is required, meaning Major Residential Subdivisions being platted in the unincorporated area of Summit County under Sec.

03, not to individual homeowners retrofitting an existing yard or to any parcel inside Akron, Cuyahoga Falls, Barberton, Stow or Hudson. The Landscape Plan itself must still be prepared by a registered landscape architect and reviewed by the Planning Commission, County Engineer and local Township before the Final Plat records, per the lead-in language of Sec. 07. Because the rain-garden and rain-barrel language is advisory, a Developer who omits low-impact-design features from a Landscape Plan is not in violation of Sec. 07(b) itself, unlike the mandatory native-plant and prohibited-species terms in subsection (a) or the separate stormwater-management fee obligations that run to the County Engineer under Sec. 04(a)(5). The current text dates to Res. 2008-026 (March 17, 2008) and was last amended by Ord. 2023-339 (November 27, 2023).