[Water_news] 4. DWR'S CALIFORNIA WATER NEWS: WATER QUALITY - 7/24/07

Department of Water Resources

California Water News

A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment

 

July 24, 2007

 

4. Water Quality

 

SEWAGE ISSUES:

Sewage disposal worries residents; Board to vote on Toland Landfill - Ventura County Star

 

LIABILITY CONCERNS:

City to shift sewer line responsibility - North County Times

 

 

SEWAGE ISSUES:

Sewage disposal worries residents; Board to vote on Toland Landfill

Ventura County Star – 7/24/07

By Tony Biasotti, staff writer

 

It's folk wisdom in the Santa Clara River Valley: Locals say when the rest of Ventura County doesn't want something — a jail, a landfill, an asphalt plant — it ends up in Santa Paula or Fillmore.

 

Gordon Kimball, who farms avocados just west of Santa Paula, says he sees it happening now with a proposal to dispose of treated sewage at the nearby Toland Road Landfill.

 

What makes it even worse, he said, is that the landfill would be taking waste the people of Kern County have decided they won't take.

 

The Ventura County Board of Supervisors is scheduled to vote today on whether to allow the landfill to accept the sewage waste, which is known technically as "biosolids" and more colorfully as "sludge." The county Planning Commission approved the proposal last month, and a group led by Kimball appealed that decision to the Board of Supervisors.

 

Taking sludge to the Toland Road Landfill would clear up a headache for many Ventura County cities.

 

Simi Valley buries its sludge at the landfill just outside of its city limits, but the rest of the county trucks the stuff to Kern County, where it is used for compost or plowed into empty fields.

 

Last year, Kern County voters passed an initiative to ban the practice in most circumstances.

 

Ventura Regional Sanitation District officials and county planners say the treated sludge is safe, much safer than the sewage that's already treated at wastewater plants in Santa Paula, Fillmore and the rest of the county.

 

"We're transporting material that's already being transported statewide and nationwide, and we're putting it in a landfill, and it has no way of getting out of the landfill," said Mark Lawler, the Sanitation District's general manager. The district owns and operates the Toland Road Landfill.

 

Contamination concerns

 

But Kimball worries about the risk, however remote, of pathogens from the sludge coming into contact with his avocados. An outbreak of E. coli — such as the one set off last year when spinach in Northern California was contaminated by cattle feces — would be devastating to Ventura County's agricultural industry, he said.

 

"That's the thing that keeps you awake at night," Kimball said. "We take pride in delivering safe, healthy food. As farmers, we eat this, too."

 

Lawler said the sludge will be treated until it has no detectable pathogens.

 

"The dry material that's coming out is a far superior product, more sterilized, than what's coming out of the (sewage) treatment plants, and those are near the fields," he said. "We didn't expect pathogens to be such an issue. We have good science behind this."

 

The biosolids facilities at Toland Road would process up to 360 tons of sludge per day, enough to handle the entire county's needs, according to Planning Department documents.

 

Thousand Oaks and Oxnard have volunteered to send their sludge immediately, and the other cities could follow suit. The sludge would arrive on covered trucks and would be dried in covered hoppers until the water content is down to about 25 percent. The final product would then be used to cover part of the exposed portion of the landfill.

 

More traffic expected

 

Lawler said he expected the complaints to center on traffic, and some of them have.

 

About 80 to 100 trucks now come in and out of the landfill every day from Highway 126. Adding biosolids dryers would bring about 25 more round trips a day, Lawler said, leaving the landfill still short of its maximum permitted traffic of 152 round trips per day.

 

"In terms of whether that's a noticeable difference, that's an individual's judgment call," he said, noting that more than 30,000 vehicles a day pass by on Highway 126.

 

Santa Clara Elementary School, also known as the "Little Red Schoolhouse," is on Highway 126 near Toland Road. Principal Kari Skidmore said the idea of bringing any more trucks to the landfill is "a very scary thought."

 

"We are deeply concerned about the extra traffic," she said. "Already, the 126 is very busy, and they travel at very high speeds. It's really scary for our parents."

 

The Ventura Regional Sanitation District bans trucks from turning left onto Toland Road when school is starting in the morning and getting out in the afternoon. It's an informal agreement, but if the sludge-drying operation is approved, it will become a permanent rule, Lawler said.

 

Today, the Board of Supervisors will hear from the Sanitation District, the county planners, and the opponents of the sludge disposal plan.

 

"I'm really not sure what to expect, but we've had a pretty extensive public outreach over the last year and a half," Lawler said.

 

"I think the (Planning Commission) vote reflects that we have a good plan." #

http://www.venturacountystar.com/news/2007/jul/24/sewage-disposal-worries-residents/

 

 

LIABILITY CONCERNS:

City to shift sewer line responsibility

North County Times – 7/24/07

By Barbara Henry, staff writer

 

CARLSBAD -- If there's break in the pipe that links a home to the city's main sewer system, the property owner may now have to foot the bill.

The proposal, which aims to limit the city's financial liability for some sewage spills, will go before the City Council at tonight's 6 p.m. meeting at City Hall.

 

"What we're doing is clarifying what exactly our policy is," said city Communications Director Denise Vedder. "We didn't really have it written down."

 

In the past, if a small sewer connector line or "laterals" broke, the Carlsbad Municipal Water District might pay the repair bill. It depended on whether the property owner sought the city's assistance to solve the problem, Vedder said.

"If they called the city, we would come out and take a look, and in many cases we would take care of it," she said.

The city's water district, which mostly handles sewage issues for the northern end of town, typically received six to eight calls a year from property owners seeking assistance, she said.

Now, the city wants no part of those repair jobs. That's because new, stricter state regulations regarding sewer spills have the city scrambling to limit its liability issues, Vedder said. Among those new requirements are that cities take "reasonable steps" to prevent sewage spills, including video inspection and regular cleaning of all of its lines, a city staff report notes.

If the city declares that the laterals are the private property owner's responsibility, then the city doesn't have to regularly inspect them or conduct cleaning operations, the staff report notes.

Maintenance is a concern for the city because about half of the 22,166 sewer lateral lines in the city don't have "cleanouts" --- easy access points where crews can get equipment into the pipe. It would cost about $2,000 each to install those access spots, the city staff report states.

Carlsbad's situation is unusual; most cities already require residents to foot the bill for sewer line linkup breaks, Vedder said. Representatives for the two sewer districts that cover parts of southern Carlsbad agreed.

Leucadia Wastewater District put the responsibility on property owners back in the late 1980s, district General Manager Paul Bushee said. The district has about 10,000 customers in southern Carlsbad.

Meanwhile, property owners within the Vallecitos Water District, which covers the northeastern corner of La Costa among other areas in North County, have had to foot the bill for lateral line repairs for at least 30 years, district Assistant Manager Dale Mason said.

Bushee, Mason and Vedder all said breaks in sewer lateral lines are somewhat unusual regionally because pipes in Southern California tend to be newer. However, all three said it has happened to them.

"We actually moved out for eight weeks" after a line break caused sewage to back up inside his home, Bushee said, adding that he now tells people to hire inspectors once every two years or so to look at their lines.

"Ours wasn't that traumatic, we just didn't have a toilet for a couple days," said Vedder, who added that they didn't have a cleanout access point and had to have one installed as part of the repair work.

Mason said right after he sold his former home, he had a sewage line break problem and had to pay part of the repair bill. #

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2007/07/24/news/coastal/4_22_107_23_07.txt

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