These CNS News articles are ridiculous. This guy is a repeat offender and has been on probation for his actions before.
The guy build dams to divert watershed water for his own use. That’s a little bit different than “collecting rainwater runoff” isn’t it? Sure, it’s a clever way of phrasing what he was actually doing, but you can’t argue that there should be some illegality to damming up streams willy nilly. This guy does it, his neighbor does it, his neighbor’s neighbor does it and then what?
Seems like a sane law to me and seems like this guy was repeatedly breaking that law. Go to jail.
Impounding rain water can help with Global Sea Level rise. Save the Earth! Impound rain water.