Department of Water Resources
A daily compilation of significant news articles and comment
August 23, 2007
4. Water Quality
URBAN WATER USE:
Otay officials investigate water foul-up; Stores may reopen if samples test clean - San Diego Union Tribune
Editorial: Water foul; Warning from Otay: What's in your pipes? - San Diego
LOS OSOS SEWER:
Osos residents get a win in court; Superior Court judge denies the state’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by a group of residents against the Regional Water Quality Control Board - San Luis Obispo Tribune
FLUORIDE ON DRINKING WATER:
MWD to add more fluoride to local water; Critics say move could hike risk of bone disease in kids - LA Daily News
Locals take chloramine fight to EPA; Several Mountain View residents say tap water additive causes allergic reaction - Palo Alto Online
URBAN WATER USE:
Otay officials investigate water foul-up; Stores may reopen if samples test clean
San Diego
By Anne Kruger, staff writer
CHULA VISTA – Otay Water District officials spent the day yesterday trying to determine how a Chula Vista
“We thought we had a good process,” said Mark Watton, Otay's general manager. “Obviously, there's a gap.”
The 17 stores at
Otay officials are investigating, but it appears a mis-marked pipe was the cause.
Two food-related businesses – the Candy Bouquet, which creates candy baskets, and Dream Dinners, a meal-preparation store – were shut down by the county.
If recent water samples are clean, the state Department of Public Health is expected to declare the water safe today, allowing the stores to reopen.
Otay serves about 190,000 people in a 125-square-mile district ranging from
Watton said the district's approximately 500 meters for recycled water will be inspected. All pipes carrying recycled water are in eastern
Recycled water flows through a separate system of distribution pipes, colored purple to distinguish them from pipes carrying drinking water.
Watton said when the business park was built in 2002, a purple plastic sleeve placed over the copper recycled-water pipe somehow slipped below ground when the pipe was installed. Whoever hooked the pipe to the water meter didn't realize the pipe carried recycled water.
The district still hasn't determined how its inspectors or supervisors for the contractor on the project could have overlooked the error, he said.
Some business owners are concerned a former Otay inspector who pleaded guilty to a bribery charge could be at fault.
In 2005, Otay inspector William Cooper pleaded guilty to taking $5,000 in exchange for overlooking deficiencies in underground water and sewer lines on two
Watton confirmed Cooper was one of the inspectors on the
When the business park opened in July 2005, Otay blended recycled water with drinkable water. In May, Otay reached a deal to buy recycled water from the city of
When the district first received a complaint about the business park's water July 27, Otay employees tested the water at the main line on the street. The district doesn't usually test water at the tap in response to a complaint, Watton said.
The main line carried drinkable water, so the tests showed nothing wrong. Watton said Otay employees thought the water might be stagnant because the park was new and many of the offices unoccupied.
The property manager sent the water to a private lab, and the results that came back Friday showed the water contained coliform bacteria, which indicates contamination.
Recycled water is safe for full body contact, though it's meant for irrigation and manufacturing, not consumption.
Lea Brooks, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Public Health, said recycled water is treated but can contain bacteria and viruses that cause diarrhea and other illnesses.
Jane Ballard, who owns a sign company in the business park, said she's told her 10 employees to see their doctors. Watton said the district would pay for the exams and compensate businesses for their losses.
“We just want to know that we're all OK,” Ballard said. “Everybody is just kind of a little tense waiting.” #
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/metro/20070823-9999-1m23otay.html
Editorial: Water foul; Warning from Otay: What's in your pipes?
San Diego
And some question the bottled water craze.
Sales have to go up after the report that for two years the Otay Water District piped contaminated recycled water into drinking water pipes in a
Just as disturbing, the district couldn't say immediately who misconnected the pipe.
Does the district have no policy about who hooks up new service – the district or the builder? Does it have no records to indicate immediately who did what?
The district now says the purple sleeve on the pipe had slid down, so the contractor didn't see it. To avoid a repetition, it's investigating how this was missed. Here's a suggestion: Paint at least a purple stripe on the pipe itself.
Here's another: Decide who does a final inspection of basic apparatus in a new or remodeled building – the builder, the city or the water district.
In one respect, the Otay Water District lucks out. Its reclaimed water was clean enough – most of the time an unusual four parts drinking water to one part recycled water – that the buildings' tenants haven't fallen ill. Yet.
Nor had they noticed. But how much longer would reclaimed water have flowed from the taps in this business park if Otay hadn't become, in June, the biggest buyer of
The district now promises to take customer complaints more seriously, since it now knows customers can discern drinking water from partially treated wastewater. They wouldn't have known about the problem, however, but for the property manager, who displayed wits the district didn't. He took the tap water to a private lab for testing.
What the lab found – a potentially sickening bacterium – makes an even stronger argument against the city of
Reclaimed wastewater has its significant uses – irrigation, industrial processing, street cleaning, firefighting, etc. Interestingly, and indicatively, the county's Department of Environmental Health discourages irrigating residential lawns with reclaimed water because most homeowners aren't adept at maintaining irrigation systems and keeping potable and nonpotable apparatus separate.
Until every district is adept at separating out every possible contaminant before piping drinking water to customers, reclaimed water should stay in the purple pipe, properly marked and connected. #
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20070823/news_lz1ed23top.html
LOS OSOS SEWER:
Osos residents get a win in court; Superior Court judge denies the state’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by a group of residents against the Regional Water Quality Control Board
San Luis Obispo
By Sona Patel, staff writer
A Superior Court judge Wednesday ruled that some Los Osos residents can continue their high-stakes legal battle against the state.
Judge Barry LaBarbera ruled that the residents’ lawsuit against the state Regional Water Quality Control Board could proceed.
He denied a motion filed by the state Attorney General’s Office that said the case was weak and should be thrown out of court.
The lawsuit filed by the Prohibition Zone Legal Defense Fund demands that the Regional Water Quality Control Board rescind previously issued stop orders precluding about 50 randomly selected residents from using their septic tanks after 2011 or face stiff fines.
The judge’s decision is the latest move in a tangled legal battle over the effort to build a sewer in Los Osos and comes months before county officials will ask property owners to approve an assessment to pay for a wastewater-treatment project.
The town of about 14,000 operates entirely on septic systems, which the water board blames for polluting Los Osos’ groundwater and
There have been several failed attempts to build a sewer, including one that broke ground in August 2005 but was soon halted after a recall election replaced a majority of the town’s services district board.
Legislation written by Assemblyman Sam Blakeslee, RSan Luis Obispo, transferred responsibility for the sewer project to the county.
This lawsuit, filed for the residents by Los Osos attorney Shaunna Sullivan, stemmed from the enforcement actions taken by the regional water board, which has been pressuring the coastal town to build a sewer.
The legal defense fund is made up primarily of property owners who have been issued orders from the water board to stop using their septic tanks.
The Los Osos Community Services District is also a plaintiff in the lawsuit. The defense fund and the services district are splitting Sullivan’s legal costs.
Services district board president Chuck Cesena said that the board would likely discuss its role in the lawsuit.
“I think it’s time for a re-evaluation of whether we are going to stay committed with financial resources,” he said.
Still, he said, nothing has changed in the lawsuit, making it difficult to come up with a reason for backing out.
Board member Joe Sparks, the lone board member who did not support the district’s decision to pay part of Sullivan’s legal fees, attended the court hearing.
Immediately after the hearing,
McPherson answered that she wouldn’t take that position because of her association with the legal defense fund. #
http://www.sanluisobispo.com/news/local/story/124233.html
FLUORIDE ON DRINKING WATER:
MWD to add more fluoride to local water; Critics say move could hike risk of bone disease in kids
LA Daily News – 8/22/07
By Susan Abram, staff writer
GRANADA HILLS - The Metropolitan Water District will begin adding more fluoride to Southland drinking water - including in the
State and federal officials have long advocated fluoridated water to prevent tooth decay, and MWD officials voted to add fluoride at district plants four years ago.
In October, officials will begin retrofitting five treatment plants - including one in Granada Hills serving the
But members of Citizens for Safe Drinking Water and the Environmental Working Group say adding too much fluoride could pose a health risk for children.
"We've associated it with bone cancer among teenage boys," said Bill Walker, vice president for the Oakland-based Environmental Working Group, which cites research by the National Resource Council.
"We find that many water districts don't want to know the truth or consider the evidence."
The two environmental groups also cited a 2006 study that found the Environmental Protection Agency's standard was too high for consumption among children.
Currently,
Edgar Dymally, the water district's senior environmental specialist, said the levels were determined based on estimated water consumption by
Factors considered included warm temperatures that mean Californians drink more water - so fluoride levels are lower than in other parts of the country.
"That's the level consistent with the recommendation from the U.S. Centers for Disease and Prevention and state of California Department of Public Health," Dymally said.
Recommendations to fluoridate water first were made in the 1940s to help reduce tooth decay, especially among children and the elderly.
The Environmental Protection Agency recommends no more than 2 milligrams per liter, but environmental groups fear water agencies may continue to raise the levels.
"Even at the 0.8 milligrams-per-liter level, even without any other exposure, it's too high," said Jeff Green with Citizens for Safe Drinking Water.
"We asked the MWD to remedy the situation," Green said. "There's plenty of people out there who are angry. We fully expect there to be lawsuits."
But Dymally said the levels are well within safe ranges. Studies have found that water containing 4 milligrams of fluoride per liter can be harmful. If consumed in excess for years, it can contribute to bone disease in some people.
"We hear the concerns made from the critics, but we rely on every credible agency for regulations," Dymally said.
"When we go online with our fluoridation program, the water will look and taste the same."
State health officials have said studies on fluoride and its relation to bone cancer are inconsistent.
"People have looked at it, our toxicologists have looked at it and we have not found any concerns," said Dr. Donald Lyman, chief medical director for chronic disease and injury control for the state's Department of Health Services.
"We're very cautious about posing risks to everyone," Lyman said.
Health experts do concur, however, that fluoridated water should not be added to baby formula, which already may contain fluoride.
"The official word from the dental association is you shouldn't add fluoridated water to formula," said Lyman.
Lyman said the state also runs the largest cancer registry in the nation and has seen no trends or clusters to suggest
The $5.5 million retrofitting project is being funded by the California Dental Association Foundation and will begin in late October at the Henry J. Mills Filtration Plant in
The plant distributes water within the San Fernando Valley, to
The Granada Hills plant is the largest west of the
http://www.dailynews.com/news/ci_6693227
Locals take chloramine fight to EPA; Several
By Daniel DeBoit, staff writer
In an effort to help dozens of Peninsula residents, including 30 from
"Constituents have raised their serious concerns about chloramine," said Eshoo, D-Palo Alto. "I think it's important for the EPA and the Public Utility Commission to hear directly from them and I am facilitating this. The use of chloramine as a disinfectant in public water should be guided by sound science showing that it is both safe and effective."
Chloramine replaced chlorine as the disinfectant for Hetch Hetchy tap water in 2004. The switch had been recommended by the EPA to reduce the carcinogenic byproducts of chlorine.
Since then, however, more than 400 Bay Area residents have reported allergic reactions to chloramine, including skin rashes, respiratory problems and inflamed digestive tracts, according to the Menlo Park-based Citizens Concerned About Chloramine.
That group's president, Denise Johnson-Kula, said the goal of the meeting, scheduled for Aug. 27, is to start a discussion with the EPA about providing a "waiver" to local water agencies allowing them to go back to chlorine use -- despite whatever effects that may have on byproducts in the tap water.
On the
The group has joined forces with others from as far away as
The groups celebrated one of their first victories two weeks ago, when a handful of residents in
One-third of the country has already converted to the disinfectant, said Kula. Water agencies, meanwhile, say some places have used chloramine since the early 1900s with no problems.
The EPA recommended that water agencies switch to chloramine to reduce trihalomethanes, a carcinogenic byproduct of chlorine disinfection. But the byproducts of chloramine are even more dangerous, according to Dr. Michael Plewa, professor of genetics at the
In an e-mail to the Mountain View Voice, Plewa stated that the byproducts of chloramine are "much more toxic" than chlorine's -- and that these byproducts are found in
Whether chloramine itself can be linked to people's health problems has yet to be studied. David Ozonoff, MD, a professor of public health at
"A close temporal relationship between the treatment change and the complaints of water users strongly suggests that one is the cause of the other," he wrote in a letter to Vermont-based People Concerned About Chloramine.
"Without a more detailed study of the matter it is not possible to say this definitively, but it is plausible that something about the treatment change has caused this. Water chemistry is complicated and sometimes produces unexpected and untoward results. The complaints are notice to look into the matter."
Such chemistry may have affected water supplies in
Greg Hosfeldt, business manager of the Mountain View Public Works Department, said 24 random water samples were taken from Mountain View homes and wells after the switch to chloramine in 2004. Lead levels were not found to be over the maximum level, he said. The city is slated to test its water again in September. #
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/show_story.php?id=5652
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