In 1988, ASLF initiated a lawsuit to stop Onondaga County’s violations of the federal Clean Water Act at its sewage treatment plant, which discharges into Onondaga Lake. ASLF, New York State, and Onondaga County agreed to an Amended Consent Judgment (ACJ) requiring the County to improve its system of municipal wastewater collection and treatment and provide a schedule for attaining compliance with the Clean Water Act. A federal judge approved the ACJ in 1998 ordering Onondaga County to reduce and eliminate the occurrences of CSO discharges.
In 2009, a fourth amendment to the ACJ was approved and adopted to include a strategy which involved the use of both gray and green infrastructure approaches to control CSOs. The ‘Save the Rain’ program was created to implement green infrastructure solutions towards fulfillment of the ACJ requirements.