Illinois Senate Bill SB1595

Illinois 2025-2026 Regular Session

• Introduced: 2/4/25
• Refer: 2/4/25
• Refer: 2/11/25
• Refer: 3/21/25
• Refer: 3/13/26

Caption

DNR FLOOD EVENT CONSTRUCTION

Summary

SB1595 amends the Rivers, Lakes, and Streams Act to create new Department of Natural Resources requirements for permit review and flood-related construction standards tied to worst-case analysis flood events, defined as events up to the 1% annual chance of exceedance (100-year flood). For levee improvements, the bill would require DNR to give applicants notice of submissions, a detailed timeline, specific requirements, and any internal review procedures within 90 days. It also sets explicit water-surface-profile thresholds for construction along navigable waterways: up to 0.5 feet in rural areas and up to 0.1 feet in urban areas.

Impact

The bill would add a new Section 40 to the Rivers, Lakes, and Streams Act and directly constrain how DNR evaluates and processes certain flood-event-related construction permits. It would establish statutory review expectations for levee projects, create numerical standards for allowable water surface profile increases in rural and urban settings, and limit when mitigation analysis is required to cases where those increases exceed an induced head study. In practice, this would affect permit applicants, levee districts, engineers, and other parties seeking state approval for flood-control or waterway-adjacent construction.

Sentiment

Based on the bill text and the limited available context, the measure appears to be framed as a permitting and flood-management streamlining bill rather than a controversial policy overhaul. The caption, "DNR FLOOD EVENT CONSTRUCTION," and the immediate-effective-date language suggest an intent to provide clearer standards and faster review for applicants. No committee transcripts or recorded votes were provided, so there is no documented public debate in the available materials.

Contention

The main likely points of contention are the bill’s fixed water-surface-profile allowances and its limits on when mitigation analysis is triggered. Supporters would likely view the 90-day notice requirement and numeric thresholds as providing predictability and reducing delays for levee and flood-control projects. Opponents, if any, would likely focus on whether the 0.5-foot rural and 0.1-foot urban allowances are too permissive or too restrictive, and whether the bill could reduce DNR’s discretion to account for site-specific flood impacts, environmental concerns, or downstream effects.