Monarch Grove Could Hook-Up

The section of Los Osos called Monarch Grove is a subdivision that is not within the urban reserve line of Los Osos. That oversight will be corrected with a General Plan Amendment/Local Coastal Plan Amendment/Estero Area Plan Amendment. The first stop will be a review by LOCAC to discuss any issues or concerns at the local level. Next, it will go to the Board of Supervisors to authorize the County Planning and Building Department to work on this plan amendment. Then the BOS will need to adopt the amendment. 

It is very strange that this sub-division was never included in the Urban Reserve Line!

Why is this important? To back up a bit, Monarch Grove has its own sewage system, and sadly, one that has been plagued with problems over the years. Read about some of that here:

Monarch Grove 2005 - item3_attachment8.pdf


And read the Staff Report for the Enforcement Hearing for October 6, 2005 here:
http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/centralcoast/board_info/agendas/2005/oct6/item3/item3_staff_report.pdf


The treated wastewater from the Monarch Grove housing subdivision's system is currently used to water the nearby golf course, Sea Pines. The Los Osos wastewater treatment plant's Coastal Commission Conditions mandates that water be sent to the golf course as is listed on page 16 (page 19 if you opened it in in Acrobat) of the Effluent Reuse and Disposal Tech Memo, July 2008. However, this is not a problem as it shows that only 16 AFY is going Sea Pines, not enough to water the whole property.

According to the Basin Plan, the golf course currently uses 15-20 acre feet a year from Monarch Grove, still not enough to water the entire property. Water from on-site upper aquifer wells at 75-85 acre feet a year supplements that, totaling 90-105 acre feet a year from both sources to water the golf course.

The Basin Plan has allocated 40 acre feet a year of recycled water for Sea Pines, and the plan is to blend it with their upper aquifer well water 1:1. So the 15-20 AFY from Monarch now is replaced with 40 AFY. So only 50-65 AFY will be used of their upper aquifer well water. As crummy with nitrates as the upper aquifer water is, and despite the fact that 300,000 to 1,000,000 gallons of water leach into the bay DAILY anyway from seeps and springs (.92 AFD - 3.69 AFD), this is a net gain for the basin. 

Once the septics go off line, the water table is bound to lower. That will be a problem for the wastewater team to monitor as part of the conditions of the Coastal Development Permit, Condition #87.

Here is the pre-authorization referral request that is to go before LOCAC, I am not sure when, the March agenda is not out yet.

LRP2014-00021_COUNTY_OF_SLO__MONARCH_GROVE_.pdf


For map geeks, here are links to the County ones from 1997. Monarch Grove sat this point is apparently a remainder parcel of Tract 1589, to be carved up into lots:
https://slocountypwd.org/MapFiles/MB/MB_018/MB_018_032_001.tif
https://slocountypwd.org/MapFiles/MB/MB_018/MB_018_032_002.tif
https://slocountypwd.org/MapFiles/MB/MB_018/MB_018_032_003.tif
https://slocountypwd.org/MapFiles/MB/MB_018/MB_018_032_004.tif
https://slocountypwd.org/MapFiles/MB/MB_018/MB_018_032_005.tif

This moving Monarch Grove into the Urban Reserve Line was on the BOS agenda (among other things) October 5, 2004, Item 11 (after lunch). 
http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/Asset7098.aspx
This item was continued to October 19, 2004. On October 19, the BOS tentatively agreed to include Monarch Grove into the Estero Area Plan Update (see the last page):
http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/Assets/CR/BOS+Minutes/BOS_2004/101904.pdf
But then.......less than a year later.........the sewer project was stopped, Los Osos was left out of the update and here is where we are today.

Monarch Grove does not appear to have an assessment for hooking up (see page 3):
http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/Assets/PW/LOWWP/document+library/Final+Assessment+Roll+-+April+08.pdf

But the Solano Pump Station seems poised to take in Monarch Grove flows (see Page 21):
http://www.slocounty.ca.gov/Assets/PW/LOWWP/document+library/20111024+Final+BODR.pdf

It is a mystery. Much searching found no answer as to why the second half of the subdivision was left out of the Urban Reserve Line, just speculation.

ISJ - Water Board Conniption Correction

The Interlocutory Stipulated Judgement, or the “ISJ” as it is acronym-ed, is our Los Osos water basin’s long-awaited fate cradled in the protective and silent arms of the court. As with anything pertaining to water in Los Osos, its creation has been fraught with angst, speculation and criticism. The final document of this judgement, to be called The Basin Plan, is still only in draft form after this whole thing was launched by a lawsuit 2004. Updates have been given sporadically to the Los Osos public and various agencies over the years. Needless to say at this point, our to-be-cleaned-and-reused “sewer water” plays a large part in this watery vision that floats out somewhere after 2016 on into infinity.

Much was made about the update of the ISJ that the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board had requested for their September 25-26, 2014 meeting. The usual-suspects-in-the-sewer-complaint-department were out in full force, not only at that meeting, but to complain about what happened at the RWQCB meeting at the following Los Osos CSD meeting, the following LOCAC meeting, and of course, at the September 30 Board of Supervisors meeting. They were furious at the County for not attending the meeting, they were furious at our CSD for having no representative there to give an explanation of the ISJ, they were furious at our District 2 Supervisor for not being at that meeting as well! Just FURIOUS!

(I will confess, it was a relief to get a new topic for those perennial complainers to yammer about. I wish I could have been at the RWQCB meeting myself, but I was out of the country.)

So, curious to know about what actually happened at that RWQCB meeting that I missed without the political spin, I have been looking daily for the minutes from that meeting. (This was at the same meeting where the CDOs were lifted from the 38 property owners.) Today I hit the jackpot!

Here is a photo of how the Water Board described that part of the meeting in their minutes:

See the minutes in person here:

http://www.swrcb.ca.gov/centralcoast/board_info/minutes/2014/sep_mins.pdf 

OR,

You can hear this part of the meeting for yourself off this link:

http://www.swrcb.ca.gov/centralcoast/board_info/agendas/2014/Sepember/item19/item19.mp3

You would never have known that it was a hair-on-fire moment from the politely cloaked froth and spittle soft-balled by the Usual Suspects at that meeting. The cloaking of course came off in the other meetings where the Usual Suspects felt more comfortable to project their true personas, finely crafted from years of rage and imagined authority. It was particularly hilarious to hear their supplications to the almighty Water Board for them step in and get this ISJ on track, helpfully offering up all sorts of regulatory sounding tools that the Water Board does not possess. These same persons cursed and vilified this very same Water Board over the Cease and Desist Orders they issued a few years back which they claimed were put in place to force residents to vote for an assessment to pay for a sewer! The overused but apt word “schizophrenic” comes to mind.

You’d have thought that the Water Board was either weeping profusely or sharpening hatchets for an attack on County offices from the Usual Suspects' interpretations on how the Water Board felt during the subsequent, other meetings. It did neither.

Water Board Section Manager Harvey Packard thought the reason given for the lack of response by the ISJ participants to the Water Board’s request for information, “confidentiality,” was a smoke screen. I have my own assessment: giving any free proprietary information in public to the Complaint Department would be tantamount to providing fire bombs for one’s own imminent destruction in a hideously painful and prolonged way.

We should have known if any update on the Los Osos basin situation was given at the Water Board's November 14-15 meeting as direction was given to staff to come back at that meeting with new information, and those audio recordings have already been posted, but I have found nothing. Nor were there any speakers at Public Comment.

Water Board Meeting Notes

I attended the Regional Water Quality Control Board's meeting today in SLO. Staffer David LaCaro was giving an update to the Board on the status of the wastewater project. John Waddell, Project Manager from the County, was there to answer questions from the Board. The Los Osos regulars were there too of course.

The first and only public comment at Public Forum (comments for items not on the agenda) mentioned CDOs (Cease and Desist orders). You might recall those orders were issued because the LOCSD Board stopped the sewer project in 2005 after a recall election. These orders were "the stick" to get a sewer project going again as the Water Board was NOT pleased, to say the least. This technique was objected to by a group called PZLDF and they went to court to try to overturn these orders. They kept losing in court after higher court—up the food chain—but until they stopped suing the Water Board, the Water Board was not going to drop the CDOs. It finally ended, and you can read about it here, but since the sewer IS being built, the CDOs are meaningless and the desire to drop them was forgotten until now. The request was noted for investigation by the Water Board's legal counsel.

There was a report on a field trip to the sewer project by Water Board Vice Chair Dr. Wolff. It had been attended by two locals, LOCSD District Engineer Rob Miller, the Water Board's Executive Officer Kenneth Harris and board members including  Dr. Wolff. How this trip came into being is a bit of a mystery, as only a large community activist and a local developer represented the public of Los Osos on this trip. I looked back on Water Board minutes and my notes from a meeting on February 1, 2013 and found that Chairperson Young had directed board members Wolff and Hunter to a sub-committee meeting with the County at the that Water Board meeting to study the wastewater plans. I'm not sure what the nexus to this trip might be or why this trip happened. In any case, the report was glowing, that the project was coming along in an organized and clean fashion. Not what some Los Osos members of the audience wanted to hear.

Anyway, not to write a book, but the main points were these:

• On the water to dewater from the trenches, there was only 10% of the expected amount predicted;
• Some areas expected to have high groundwater had none;
• It was clear that both discharge to land and bay were permitted;
• The Water Board has an unclear, or not much of an, ability to influence the ISJ;
• There were 12 citizen comments and 3 agency comments on the Draft Basin Plan;
• The Draft Basin Plan has no timeline to meet the goals;
• The Basin Plan should hopefully be released in early 2014;
• Anything Los Osos water purveyors wish to do regarding water improvements requires coastal review;
• Dr. Hunter had multiple questions on everything and was asked by Dr. Wolff to give other Board members a chance to get their questions out;
• Private well metering was discussed in the context of getting accurate data for modeling the basin—the Board of Supes can issue ordinances forcing well owners to meter, but politically it is a burning-burning-burning hot potato;
• Walker Ditch (used for three weeks only) and the Solano pump station property are no longer needed for dewatering;
• The contractors are rapidly wrapping up dewatering, the flows average 50,000 gallons per day now;
• Dewatering water is going into a blackberry thicket and a eucalyptus grove where plant uptake helps to remove nitrates;
• The salts in the dewater water are significantly less than has the seawater in the bay;
• The dollar per acre foot cost on the recycled water being sold to the farmers is comparable to their pumping costs to give them incentive to use it;
• Once the resistant farmers see how well the farmers taking the treated water are doing, they will be encouraged to sign up;
• The Board was VERY unhappy getting Keith Wimer's hugely long Draft Basin Plan comments submitted 5 minutes before the meeting started; several Board members commented on that. The staff will read the document and make comments in May;
• Some of the public's comments on the wastewater project do not fall into the Water Board's preview;
• The Water Board cannot assist Los Osos citizens if they do not like their Supervisors, as they are elected;
• The Regional Water Board has no latitude to change the nitrate limit requirements (none at this time) in the discharge permit, those comments should go to the State Board;
• Mr. Young and Mr. Harris spoke to the public commenter's and Dr. Hunter's hoopla over the amount of nitrate in the dewatering water going into the bay—

 —the reason we are here today is because of the environmental impacts of the septic flows into the bay....any pumping into the bay is minor compared to what is going in there now. Any nitrate impacts to the bay (if there even are some) are transitory and will self correct (example; the Elkhorn Slough);

• Mr. Young would rather staff take up issues on saltwater intrusion than those around dewatering water's nitrates.

Great staff report by Mr. LaCaro and very helpful background information from Mr. Waddell, thank you both!

And that was pretty much it. (Meeting time: two and one half hours.)

Our new CSD General Manager was in attendance which was a good thing. Her professional, positive, friendly attitude is vital to the success in the relations between the CSD and the County on the subject of the wastewater treatment plant.

Inextricably∞Tied

We have one source for water at present in Los Osos. Since water quality and quantity are so tightly tied to the present sewer project, and needing more of it is the reason for our future water infrastructure projects, it seemed worth a mention on this sewer blog. 

You have a new opportunity to get a water education and make suggestions on the future of our water at the Los Osos CSD's presentation of the Basin Plan by District Engineer Rob Miller on Thursday, August 29, 6:00 p.m. at the South Bay Community Center. See the announcement at this link:

http://www.losososcsd.org/Library/2013%20Agenda%20Packet/130829_LOCSD_SpecialMeetingAgenda.pdf

As some of you may be aware, the Draft Basin Plan, which is the impetus for this meeting, has been released for public review. I doubt droves of us are going to read the 300+ page full version, but a reading of the Executive Summary is not too tough and since the costs to fix things are included, it is really worth the read. Wastewater treatment is the first part of the big picture, creating a sustainable water supply so we can continue to live here is the second.

If you want to read the entire plan, you may download the entire 10mb file at this link:

http://www.slocountywater.org/site/Water%20Resources/Reports/pdf/Basin%20Plan%20Public%20Review%20Draft%208.1.2013.pdf

ALSO, another reason to put this information out here is to get as many of you as possible to show up at that meeting. For anyone with a vacant lot that they would like to someday build on, this meeting will be of interest. Realtors too might want to get educated. We should all care as none of us will be living here without water. 

No plans exist at this time to film the meeting (I hope that changes!), so show up to get the info yourself firsthand.

UPDATE: The meeting WILL be taped, so presumably a disc will be at the front desk some days later for home viewing.

ISJ Work Online Friday August 2, 2013

At the August 1 meeting of the Los Osos Community Services District, it was great news to hear that the very, very, very, very tardy ISJ work would become public on the LOCSD website August 2, sometime during the day. The Executive Summary and the Draft Basin Plan will be posted there, copies will go to the library and CDs will be available for check-out at the LOCSD office (remember, there are new office hours). The link to the site is here:

http://www.losososcsd.org/cm/Home.html

There will be sixty days of public review and a TBA presentation of the plan. All comments on the plan must be in writing, but it isn't clear to me just where these comments are to go.

How is this "sewer project information?" WATER! No dirty water, no sewer, but that is hardly the case here in LO. OK, it is a condition of the Coastal Commission permit for the project that there be a "Basin Plan."

This 2011 staff report gives a good overview, here is a cut'n'paste:

Los Osos Wastewater Project 

March 2011 Status Update

EXHIBIT “B”

UPDATES ON THE BASIN MANAGEMENT PLAN, THE HABITAT CONSERVATION PLAN AND THE LOCAL COASTAL PLAN

Los Osos Groundwater Basin Management Plan

Efforts to reach a settlement under existing groundwater litigation are proceeding under the Interlocutory Stipulated Judgement (ISJ) process to develop a basin management plan to balance the basin for existing and build-out demand. The ISJ group, which consists of the County and the three community water purveyors (Golden State Water Company, Los Osos CSD, and S&T Mutual Water Company), released a basin update in May 2010, which includes the following:

• Estimates of the safe yield of the basin water supply were updated in 2009. The current demand, from all users, is theoretically within the safe yield according to Basin modeling. However, under the model the water purveyors need to redistribute their well pumping between the upper and lower aquifers and from west to east in order to balance the basin, and the model results need to be confirmed for actual Basin conditions.
• Recent monitoring has found that the rate of seawater intrusion has accelerated following three years of drought, particularly through advance “fingers”. 
• A peer review has found that the technical groundwater analysis and modeling provides usable results and can reasonably be used to implement a Basin Management Plan, provided there is ongoing monitoring and analysis. 
• The Los Osos Wastewater Project will include several actions that benefit the water supply in the community and be complementary to other basin management actions currently being considered.
• The water purveyors, through the ISJ efforts, are investigating many potential actions to incorporate into the Basin Management Plan in order to balance the basin and stop seawater intrusion.

The ISJ group intends to release a draft Basin Management Plan within the next few weeks. As stated in the May update, the overall basin yield is within the current demand and planned wastewater actions will provide additional benefit to the water supply through conservation and reuse. The result will be some additional supply for new development and, while not yet certain, it is hopeful that through the planning process and careful allocation of water resources there will be sufficient supply to meet build-out demand for the community.

Also useful to understanding how all the water measures fit into the big water puzzle is this document, The Water Conservation Implementation Plan for the Los Osos Wastewater Project.

Having done a bit of snooping, I found this link which suggested that there will be a "water market" and a "watermaster."