The City of Oregon Storm Water Management Program is guided by the city's Storm Water Management Plan (SWMP) submitted to the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency in 2003. The plan is a requirement with the Storm Water Phase II Rule which was the next step in the EPA's effort to preserve, protect, and improve the nation's water resources from polluted storm water runoff. Phase II is intended to further reduce adverse water quality and aquatic habitat conditions by instituting the use of controls on the unregulated sources of storm water discharges that have the greatest likelihood of causing environmental degradation.

The Phase II Rule defines a small MS4 storm water management program as comprised of six minimum control measures that, when administered in concert, are expected to result in reduction of the discharge of pollutants into receiving water bodies. The City of Oregon, as a small MS4 operator, was required to design a program to do the following: reduce the discharge of pollutants to the "maximum extent practicable" (MEP), protect water quality and satisfy the appropriate water quality requirements of the Clean Water Act. Implementation of the MEP standard requires the development and implementation of best management practices and the achievement of measurable goals to satisfy each of the following six minimum control measures: