February Project Report Online

Check out the latest report on our sewer project from John Waddell! You can find it at this link:

http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/Assets/PW/LOWWP/document+library/PM+Monthy+Update+Feb2013.pdf

If you missed reading the January report, you can find it at this link:

http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/Assets/PW/LOWWP/document+library/PM+Monthly+Update+Jan.+2013.pdf

Happy reading!

Dig LO Announces Part of LOVR Complete!

Good news from Dig Los Osos this evening! The sewer lines on Los Osos Valley Road from 9th Street to Alexander Avenue are finished! Please read about the details at this link:

http://www.diglososos.com/2013/03/22/portion-of-los-osos-valley-road-finished/

Granted, navigating around and through the construction areas takes patience. But the equipment and trenches will eventually vanish, leaving us with roads smoother than many of us have ever seen them and unhappy septic tank issues that will never again surface.

Broderson Leach Field Demystified!

Dig Los Osos has a new post on what is happening at Broderson. It is a great place to hike and looks like it will continue to be be so, just a couple of trail re-routes! The article also gives a schedule for work.

The link to the article is here and the link to their map is here, in case you want to go straight to the map first. It takes a moment or two to load the map and scroll down to see the plant list! Especially edifying is the huge removal of the dreaded and icky Veldt grass (Ehrharta calycina). You can read more about that ghastly grass here:

http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=21574

Two New Things From Dig Los Osos And One Is AMAZING!

The latest from Dig Los Osos is a progress report on how the project is progressing, which can be accessed here:

http://www.diglososos.com/2013/03/06/update-on-work-around-town/

And the AMAZING part is the new interactive map! Click on your street to see when the construction is due to begin, or any other part of town that you are curious about. This is really a cool feature to keep us all in the loop!

The link to the interactive map comes off of the Traffic Update Map (http://www.diglososos.com/traffic-update/) and can be found at this link:

https://gisapps.hdrprojects.com/LosOsos/index.html

The scrolling wheel on my mouse expands and shrinks the map area, but the bar on the left with the plus and minus signs will do the same thing. Click on the area where your house is on your street to find out when the construction will start! Have fun!

Festival Has A Water Bar!

Los Angeles sewer system water, Lake Arrowhead water, Mt. Shasta water, Pacific Ocean water, Colorado River water, hot springs water, rain water—all featured at the water bar at the Oasis! One of the venues at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival!

Really, with as unique a story as Los Osos has, couldn't we do something equally wacky to help people understand water issues and innovations for the future?

Check out these links:

http://www.coachella.com/festival-info/sustainability#c-tab3

http://consequenceofsound.net/2013/03/coachella-2013-water-lineup/

The dates for the festival are April 12-14 and 19-21, 2013.

What Our Little Sewer Will Never Be.....

........is like any of these on the link below. Sewer aficionados, take a brief tour of what large metropolitan sewers look like. Amazingly, I found this on the weather.com page:

http://www.weather.com/travel/sewer-tours-20130304?pageno=1

I especially enjoyed the second set of photos, (which seem to be accessed from the article below the first set of photos), which are of the Paris sewer museum (Musee des Egouts de Paris). Lovely, GQ-quality sewer worker mannequins! (The museum sells toy rats. Wish we could think of an angle for tourism and income like that......)

See their site at this link:

http://www.parismuseumpass.com/musee-musee-des-egouts-de-paris-23.htm

Be glad we don't have smell-o-vision on our computers! Enjoy!

Rather Sculptural

The scale of these machines about town and the angularity of the parts remind me of sculptural forms (and sometimes giant insects).

Does Your Property Encroach on the Public Right of Way?

New post by Dig Los Osos. I think a lot of us have probably encroached! I'm pretty sure I am guilty with plants anyway. And a statue; no, make that two statues. And some pots. When my street is given the heads up, I plan on digging up some plants and moving them. And I'll move the rest of the stuff of course. The project can have the weeds however, and gladly!

Please read this so you are ready when the sewer work begins on your street:

http://www.diglososos.com/2013/02/27/does-your-property-encroach-on-the-public-right-of-way/

Construction Safety Tips—Don't Get Squashed!

A reminder for all of us around construction on how to remain safe, whether in cars, on bicycles or on foot:

http://www.diglososos.com/2012/11/16/tips-for-your-safety/

County's Project Update, January 2013

Read the update off this link:

http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/Assets/PW/LOWWP/document+library/PM+Monthly+Update+Jan.+2013.pdf

This is a really detailed summary of work done and steps to be done this month. Get out your reading glasses. And the photos are awesome!

Bay News Article - Don't Miss It!

This week's Bay News (February 21-27, 2013) has a very informative article ("What's Next With Osos Sewer") by Neil Farrell on the sewer project. Interviewed is John Waddell, the County's Project Manager, who answers a LOT of questions about the project. There are contact numbers and E-mails to use for additional information. Pick up a copy at your favorite venue about town, or read it online at this link:

http://www.tolosapress.com/managed_files/cms/BNWebIssue022113.pdf

Wednesday, New Dig LO Office Hours

Just out on a new tweet, Dig Los Osos has added Wednesdays 1:00 - 4:00pm. to the Office Hours line-up. Stop by tomorrow!

https://twitter.com/diglososos/statuses/303952358558285824

Like Water to Dry Farmers. Or, the Latest, Angst-Ridden (Tiny) Sewer-Related Protest

Yes, there is always something to nit-pick over, isn't there? But let's just start with the words of Condition 97 in the Coastal Development Permit for the sewer before we get into the details of the protest.

Condition 97 of the CDP (Here is the whole thing.)

97. Disposal of treated effluent shall be reserved for the following sites/uses in the Los Osos Groundwater Basin:

a.   Broderson (not to exceed 448 AFY on an average annual basis),

b.   Urban re-use within the urban reserve line (as identified in the Effluent Re-Use and Disposal Tech Memo, July 2008),

c.    Agricultural re-use overlying the Los Osos Groundwater Basin,

d.   Environmental reservations (not less than 10% of the total volume of treated effluent).

Total agricultural re-use shall not be less than 10% of the total treated effluent. Disposal shall be prioritized to reduce seawater intrusion and return/retain water to/in the Los Osos groundwater basin. Highest priority shall be given to replacing potable water uses with tertiary treated effluent consistent with Water Code Section 13550.

No amount of treated effluent may be used to satisfy or offset water needs that result from non-agricultural development outside the Urban Reserve Line of the community of Los Osos.

Certain members of the public are trying to rouse a rallying cry around the contract that the County let to an agriculturalist last November. They claim because this farm is not over the basin, there is no sea water mitigation, therefore we should go back to the Coastal Commission and get this 10% of recycled water going to agricultural use changed (to what else is unclear). 

But isn't this just a tad soon? The plant hasn't even started construction yet and won't be finished for a couple more years when water delivery can begin. Over-the-basin farmers may come on board. Don't we want to trade the recycled water for the drinkable groundwater that they pump to use on their crops?

Granted, it took twenty years of education to get the farmer's acceptance for using recycled water on crops in Monterey County. But a lot of that educational work has been done and absorbed by farmers everywhere, especially pushed home with the specter of drought that afflicts many areas in California and wells that start pulling up brackish water. It wouldn't necessarily take twenty years here to get more farmers interested in this program.

The farmers over the basin are basically being asked to trade their groundwater that they would normally pump for the recycled water that the plant would provide. They sit over the same basin that we do. They face the same water challenges that we do, and according to water law in California, they get first dibs on ground water, not us. These are the same people just a few years back that had fifty members of their area sign a protest petition against putting our sewage in their neck of the woods, rather than in town, its origination point. Maybe they'd like to see how this all rolls out? Maybe they would like to see how considerate the conditions of the Coastal Permit are to their area concerning traffic, lighting, noise and smells? Maybe they are a little hesitant for signing contracts for a reason? Don't they deserve some consideration from us, we who asked them to accept the plant in their backyard? I think that they do. 

And this is wayyyyyyyy too soon to nag the Board of Supervisors to ask the Coastal Commission to change recycled water conditions. We need far more information years down the road to see if this if is even a reasonable request.

Meanwhile, we all can get an education from other areas on how this works. Here are a couple of websites that speak to this issue of recycled water usage on farmland:

http://www.pacinst.org/reports/success_stories/recycled_water_and_agriculture.htm

(Look at the videos.)

http://www.pvwma.dst.ca.us/project-operations/recycled-water.php

http://www.mrwpca.org/recycling/index.php

Cool Cat

Here is one of the many cool-looking hunks of large machinery that inhabit our streets these days.

New Post - Dig Los Osos on Water Line Break

If you were wondering that evening on February 5, here's what happened:

http://www.diglososos.com/2013/02/08/evening-work-on-santa-ysabel/

Sierra Club Uncovers Poop Products

Sorry, couldn't resist. Use the link at the bottom.

The article below reminded me of when I worked at a home and garden center in LA. We sold "Poopets," which were whimsical animals made out of compressed and dried used animal chow of a vegetable nature. (These days from organically raised cattle.) You would place them in your garden where gentle rains or your sprinkler system slowly degraded them into plant nutrients. See what I mean here: http://gardengazebo.com/poopets

Enjoy! Thanks Sierra Club!
http://sierraclub.typepad.com/greenlife/2013/01/4-unexpected-products-made-from-poop.html

PZLDF Correction!

I spoke to someone knowledgeable on the PZLDF case yesterday. This person recommended a closer reading of the judgement against PZLDF. There is a difference I learned, between paying "court costs" and "attorney's costs." Around five thousand compared to hundreds of thousands. So those PZLDF signers, however many of them that are still left, for all those fruitless years of struggle and ultimate defeat, will not be paying much at all to the Water Board, just the court costs. Well, cheers for that small victory anyway, right? Right?

Of course, their own attorney's fees, that might be a different matter, but one shrouded in secrecy to us non-PZLDFers of course. Much like the dollar amount of the mysterious bill that the CSD owed PZLDF's attorney, the CSD having signed to be a party in the case with PZLDF in its early stages, lo, these many years ago. 

Joining the case was determined by some board agreement hatched in some secret Brown-Act violation meeting, with the idea to pay 25% of the total bill to represent the CSD's interests. This pointless idea was never agendized for a public meeting or listed even for closed session, due no doubt to fears of public outcry. The CSD had to pay the attorney's costs from before the contract was even signed! But hey, when your friends need a cash cow to pay bills, you tie a rope on her and bring her into the barn. The CSD was bankrupt but, hey, friends are friends.

The board's decision lacked any sort of public comment until after the fact, and the tone by that time was not pretty, the beef being, besides being snookered into joining the case, is that the CSD—well, let's say the public anyway (not the board members)—NEVER KNEW the TOTAL AMOUNT of the bill, so the dollar amount on the CSD's percentage was just a nice round number that could never be verified. Perhaps the CSD paid the TOTAL bill. We in the community will never know. The CSD exited the case quietly.

Perhaps to exit this story ourselves we can imagine that PZLDF was treated pro bono these past five years, giving a nice warm, fuzzy glow to their losing their bogus and silly case so spectacularly?

LO on BOS Agenda, 2/5/13

Consent Agenda, Public Works:

7. Submittal of a resolution authorizing water conservation program costs from the Los Osos Wastewater Project to be designated as matching funds for WaterSMART grants within the Los Osos Groundwater Basin. District 2.

See support documents off these links:

http://agenda.slocounty.ca.gov/agenda/sanluisobispo/1831/SXRlbV9Eb2N1bWVudF8oUHVibGljKV8=/14/n/11874.doc

http://agenda.slocounty.ca.gov/agenda/sanluisobispo/1831/TE9XV1BfQm9hcmRfSXRlbV8yLTUtMTNfcnNsX3BkZkEucGRm/12/n/11871.doc

Levity for the Toilet Obsessed

http://www.artlebedev.ru/everything/oktopus/

English version, click here:

http://laughingsquid.com/oktopus-a-tentacle-toilet-plunger/

Construction - Close-Up

Since we don't want to get squashed or get in the way, we can't really get close up to view the construction. Here is a link to a video and a slideshow of what it looks like:

http://www.diglososos.com/photos-videos/