Posted on 10/23/2005 5:01:02 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
At the front edge of the rainy season, flood-control channels countywide are choked by silt, reeds and brush.
In years past, maintenance crews would have cleared the channels as part of routine cleanup programs. But state and federal agencies are clamping down on cities' flood-control maintenance and emphasizing that wetland protections extend to floodways. The regulators' goal is to curtail the once-common practice of dredging San Diego County's waterways without permits.
Hundreds of miles of creeks and rivers drain the region's watershed to the ocean. Some are natural waterways and others are lined by concrete.
The regulators contend that some cities' maintenance crews have often ignored the approval process for channel upkeep. By operating without permits, workers might inadvertently foul waterways with silt and destroy creekside habitat, environmentalists and water-quality officials said.
"We can't go forward with blinders on as we drive our bulldozers through these channels," said Eric Bowlby, canyon campaign coordinator for the San Diego Sierra Club.
In response, the region's cities are trying to shift from having to get case-by-case permission to comprehensive permits that include mitigation projects to make up for any disturbance to wetlands.
Stepped-up enforcement comes at a price.
Clogged channels can lead to flooding – and that can mean lost business, displaced residents and damaged property, said San Diego lawyer Larry Stirling, a former judge, state legislator and city councilman. A group of his clients along Bonita Creek intend to sue the county and private landowners, hoping to force dredging of flood-control channels before winter rains come.
Although the region has had flooding problems that go back decades, the current regulatory slowdown has made the situation worse, Stirling said. He compared silt-filled channels to inadequate levees in New Orleans, where flood barrier problems were highlighted in August by Hurricane Katrina.
"It seems outrageous," Stirling said. "What we've got is a bunch of unelected bureaucrats who are deciding to sacrifice the private homes and safety of thousands of people throughout the county for some esoteric image they have . . . that some duck may have nested (in these floodways) at some time or another."
While the county hasn't escaped criticism, it's the only local agency known to have received a general permit that broadly covers maintenance work on its flood channels. By contrast, cities are years behind.
Most municipal flood-control departments are relying on piecemeal permits, which require a lot of time and money to secure. For example, getting approval for a small silt-removal project can take six months and cost a few thousand dollars in permit fees, public-works officials said.
That's just a small portion of the expense. Like comprehensive permits, narrowly focused ones commonly include mitigation such as restoring a wetland. These measures can cost several hundred thousand dollars.
The complex protocol for obtaining a permit involves numerous agencies, including the state Department of Fish and Game, the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
Frustrated by the pace and cost of the permit process, several cities have backed off regular maintenance of their dirt flood channels. Frequently, they wait until high water creates imminent threats before intervening with emergency exemptions. It's typically much easier to gain approval from the Army Corps of Engineers for work in concrete-lined channels.
Virtually everyone involved with regional flood control agrees on the need for a more comprehensive approach.
About a year ago, public works officials across the county formed a group to study the complex permit process so they could try to streamline it. They expect to take about two years to obtain overarching maintenance permits countywide.
"Our goal is to overcome some of the barriers that have been placed in front of us," said Dan Cannon, operations manager for Poway public works.
Opinion is split on the degree to which the slowdown increases flood risks. Officials in some cities concede the risks are rising, but others say the current patchwork of emergency and case-by-case permits still allows cities to address the worst flood spots.
"We will continue to respond to emergencies in the most efficient and responsive manner possible," said Marianne Greene, an environmental planner for the city of San Diego.
The controversy over channel upkeep emerges at a critical point for flood-control agencies. Massive fires in 2003 denuded hills in various parts of the county and left them vulnerable to runoff during heavy rains, such as those that pounded the region last winter.
At the Army Corps of Engineers' San Diego office, regulatory official Jeannette Baker said the agency has accommodated emergency maintenance requests, especially in places with fire-related erosion.
"If somebody's house is going to flood, we certainly don't want that to happen," she said.
The Corps of Engineers and water regulators say they aren't using new rules to force changes in flood control. Instead, they rely mainly on long-standing state and federal statutes such as the Clean Water Act. They said their actions are prompted by an evolving understanding of ecologically friendly practices.
Punishments for flood-control agencies that operate without a permit can range from warning letters to $10,000-a-day fines and criminal prosecution. Regulators said they haven't fined cities, just notices to make sure they comply with the law.
The face-off between environmental officials and flood-control agencies is part of a paradigm shift in Southern California water management, said John Robertus, executive officer of the San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board.
"It's not business as usual," he said.
Robertus aims to use his powerful post to force cities into thinking about how they can return highly altered waterways to a more natural state in coming decades. Rather than lining drainage channels with concrete, for instance, he'd like to see concrete removed and future development move away from the water's edge.
Doing so, he said, would reduce flood risks and allow the region's streams to reclaim their original form.
Major sections of the region's flood-control system were established before the passage of keystone environmental laws and aggressive efforts to implement them.
San Diego County's rapid growth in recent years has burdened the flood-control system. Vast expansion of roads, parking lots and homes has shriveled the amount of open ground that can soak up heavy rains. Instead, rainwater flows into culverts, drains and other channels that eventually dump into the ocean.
Robertus declared an end to "open season" on non-permit flood-control maintenance last fall after his crews noticed several instances of unauthorized channel work. He said efforts by the growing network of river "friends" groups that monitor work on waterways has also helped boost regulatory attention.
The water board chief fired off letters in September 2004 telling cities they must follow environmental laws when cleaning channels. His notice demanded that cities account for their floodway maintenance programs.
The water board has support from the Army Corps of Engineers, the federal gatekeeper for waterway work. Both are pushing flood-control managers to break the cycle of quick-fix dredging and emergency permits by creating long-term solutions to prevent sediment buildup and weed growth.
In decades past, the Corps of Engineers built dams and channeled rivers to help tame the waters of the West. With the era of big dam-building gone, the agency has turned some of its energy toward environmental restoration and preservation, which include enforcement work.
"One of the reasons there is a problem with creeks that have silt and sediment buildup in them is because of the man-made modifications to these creeks," said Baker of the Corps of Engineers in San Diego. "If they were not culverted, if they were not concreted, if they were not channelized, they would serve their natural purpose, which is to deliver sediment to the ocean."
As sediment is deposited in flood channels, it creates fertile ground for plants, including highly invasive species such as arundo, a giant reed pervasive in San Diego County creeks.
Plants slow the water, allowing more silt to drop out of the flow. That creates more habitat for reeds and grasses. Without dredging, the cycle repeats until waterways are clogged by vegetation. To make matters worse, arundo can break off and block culverts.
One sore spot is along Alvarado Creek in Mission Valley. Downstream from where the channel has been lined with concrete, the creek channel is overgrown with weeds and brush.
Mission Valley Pipe and Supply Inc. backs up to the creek. It has endured floods for years.
"This flooding gets worse because of the lack of attention," said Donald Teemsma, the company's chief executive officer. "All the (plant) growth in the channel has raised the water level by at least two feet" during storm flows.
San Diego City Councilman Jim Madaffer blames city staff for failing to comprehensively address the Alvarado flooding. By establishing the Grantville Redevelopment Area, he hopes to generate millions of dollars to restore the creek in a way that accounts for the environmental and public-safety demands.
In the short term, he's aiming for an emergency permit that would allow the city to clear more creek vegetation and silt before the winter rains. The city said it performed an emergency cleaning near Teemsma's business last fall.
"They do a little hodgepodge cleaning here and there," Madaffer said. "They never get the whole thing."
Despite the friction between cities and regulators, there are bright spots.
In the late 1990s, for example, a group of agencies, businesses and environmentalists negotiated a long-term dredging program after repeated flooding of businesses near Los Peñasquitos Creek. The city of San Diego got a permit for the project and has been dredging there every other year.
"They have actually done it the right way," said Mike Kelly, a veteran conservationist with the Friends of Los Peñasquitos Canyon Preserve.
I sure am glad I do not live in California.
I sure am glad I do not live in California.
We are to. We have enough people for other states
living here.
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