Builders Told to Buy Water They Pump Down Drain

In the latest twist to a 200-year dispute over water rights in the San Fernando Valley, land developers were ordered Friday to buy water uncovered by construction projects that penetrate the area’s rising water table.

Water is now being found within two feet of the surface in some sections of the Valley. Officials said builders are responding by installing elaborate pumping systems to drain excavation holes and subterranean garages and elevator shafts.

Until now, unwanted water pumped from such sites was routinely dumped into nearby storm drains and sewers.

But that kind of disposal is a waste of an important resource and a violation of a 1979 court ruling, according to water officials in charge of a 514-square-mile underground water basin beneath the Valley.

That basin is managed by a court-appointed “watermaster” who oversees pumping from billions of gallons of underground water. Under the judgment, the cities of Los Angeles, Burbank, San Fernando and Glendale have primary pumping rights to the water. Los Angeles gets 80% of it.

‘Money in the Bank’

Watermaster Melvin L. Blevins on Friday asked officials of the four cities to inform him of all building projects that require what he termed “de-watering activity.” He also asked that cities notify builders taking out construction permits that they will have to pay for any groundwater they pump into the sewer. The purchase price of the water was undetermined Friday.

“The water stored in that basin is like money in the bank,” said Blevins, also a senior hydrologic engineer with the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power.

“There are buildings being constructed that down the road will be pumping continuously. They can’t pump without authorization. Water issues are not simple issues. They are ongoing.”

Gene Coufal, a hydrologic engineer for the DWP, said city water administrators know of four major pumping operations at high-rise office buildings in the Valley. He said officials suspect that there are others they do not know about.

One high-rise project under construction in the Warner Center area is pumping so much water that it is sucking groundwater from the nearby Rocketdyne plant--including contaminated water that the Rockwell International Corp. is in the process of cleaning, Coufal said.

Underground Plume Shifts

Rockwell officials alerted water-quality officers that their underground water plume was shifting position when they noticed that the water level was dropping in test wells drilled at their Canoga Avenue manufacturing plant, Coufal said Friday.

Solvents apparently leaking from old tanks and pipes at the 56-acre Rocketdyne site have been identified as the contaminants.

Pumping expert Jerry King, whose Downey company handles many Los Angeles- area water-removal projects, said he has drilled 19 de-watering wells at one high-rise site south of the Rocketdyne plant and five wells at another.

“We hit water at 19 feet in Warner Center,” King said. He said construction crews excavated 40 feet during the construction of some Warner Center high-rises.

Low-rise buildings are also suffering from the high-rising water table at some Valley locations.

In Sherman Oaks, workers converting the landmark La Reina Theater into a two-story, Art Deco shopping center struck water at 15 feet. Unfortunately for them, the project’s underground parking garage and an elevator shaft descend 28 feet into the ground.

Permanent Pumping

Nineteen temporary wells have been installed around the development site to drain water during construction. A permanent pumping system has been designed to keep the parking garage dry after the shopping center opens for business later this fall.

“If they don’t pay their electric bill, they’ll have a swimming pool down there,” joked Roly Nelson, construction superintendent for the 28-store La Reina project. He said the permanent pumps will have their own emergency generator in case of a power failure.

“When they drilled for the elevator pit, water was cascading off the side of the holes like a waterfall.”

City officials allowed the workers to dispose of the water in Ventura Boulevard storm drains after the water tested clean. The nonstop flow, averaging about 70 gallons a minute, has attracted attention from passers-by who have been urged to conserve water because of the drought.

“One lady came by and asked if we could pump it up the street to her lawn,” said Rick Wilkening, carpenter foreman for the La Reina project.

Other workers at the La Reina development said they have been puzzled why their project is awash and other nearby excavations are dry, including one newly dug site a few blocks away.

Water Table Varies

Geologists familiar with the Valley say the area’s fickle water table is to blame.

“It’s fairly common to see some places get more water than others,” said William Waisgerber, a Van Nuys geologist. He said underground rock formations cause “perched” water tables--which are higher than normal groundwater.

Sanford L. Werner, a consulting geohydrologist from Canoga Park, said cutbacks in the use of well water in the Valley have contributed to the rising water table in some areas.

Another consultant, geologist James Slosson of Van Nuys, said Los Angeles city officials have sought to maintain a careful balance of pumping in the Valley to prevent “subsidence . . . where water is removed and the ground starts to settle down.”

The phenomenon of having too much water beneath the Valley is relatively new, however. For most of the area’s recorded history, there have been squabbles over who was entitled to a water supply that was often painfully limited.

Spanish law in effect when El Pueblo la Reina de Los Angeles was established in 1781 gave the settlement the primary right to the relatively small amount of water that trickled out of the Valley through the Los Angeles River. Others along the river could have what wasn’t needed.

Drought Caused Shrinkage

The first litigation over groundwater rights began in 1874, according to city records.

A severe drought between 1895 and 1904 caused the water table to shrink and prompted Los Angeles residents to pass a $1.5-million bond issue to purchase Owens Valley land and water rights to establish a mountain water supply.

In 1907, a $25-million bond issue was passed to finance construction of the Owens River Aqueduct. Pioneer water planner William Mulholland initiated studies in 1911 that showed that irrigation of the Valley with surplus aqueduct water would replenish the Valley’s dwindling water table and help “recharge” the Los Angeles River.

The Valley was annexed to the city in 1913, at the same time that the aqueduct was completed and the first Owens Valley water flowed into Los Angeles. Later, the movie “Chinatown” fictionalized that period of the Valley’s development.

According to city records, deep-well turbine pumps became available in the 1920s, and the Valley’s underground water supply was again heavily tapped during a drought. Heavy pumping had severely lowered the water table by 1931, prompting a round of lawsuits among Glendale, Burbank and Los Angeles that lasted for eight years.

The drought--and the legal squabbling--led to creation of special spreading grounds to replenish the water table.

L.A. Sued Pumpers

A prolonged rainy period occurred between 1937 and 1944, creating surplus groundwater, according to the city records. A long drought followed, causing pumping problems in 1949.

As the drought lingered, Los Angeles sued Glendale, Burbank, San Fernando and about 200 pumpers in the Valley basin in 1955 over the rights to the Valley’s water. The case was not resolved until 1979, when Los Angeles’ pueblo-based water rights were affirmed by the state Supreme Court.

Valley watermaster Blevins, 53, who began working on Los Angeles’ case for the DWP as a 21-year-old, said he survived many changes in DWP personnel, lawyers and judges during the 24-year litigation.

As part of the judgment, he was named to the watermaster post and instructed to manage the Valley’s stored underground water reserves.

He said 60 of the 100 usable wells still in existence in the Valley are now being used. Contamination has closed the others.

“If the drought continues, that basin could be an important part of our water supply next year,” Blevins said.