Taming of San Luis Rey to Begin : July Start Set for $43.6-Million Flood-Control Project

Oceanside residents have long known the hidden fury of the San Luis Rey River.

In 1916, a series of torrential rains battered the region. All that water had to go somewhere. The San Luis Rey, which snakes along Oceanside’s northern edge, quickly spilled over its banks.

When the rain finally let up, the river valley was inundated nearly from side to side. Four people died and the city was cut off from the outside world, except by boat, for two weeks.

In the years since, residents have talked long and hard of what to do about the river. A flood control project was first proposed in the 1930s, but events always conspired against it. There was never enough money, or the right plan, or the right political climate.

Until now. After years of effort, of trips by city officials to Washington to lobby Congress, of designs and redesigns, construction of a $43.6-million flood-control channel along the San Luis Rey is poised to begin.

Ground Breaking Scheduled

In July, a ground-breaking ceremony is scheduled, featuring city officials and representatives of the Army Corps of Engineers, which will oversee the project. Shortly thereafter, work is expected to finally get under way on a 7-mile stretch of the San Luis Rey from the Pacific to the Murray Toll Bridge.

“It’s been a very long, frustrating process, but we’re very happy with the project’s position now,” said Mayor Larry Bagley, who has worked to get the flood-control channel since his days as a city planner in the 1960s.

But, even with the project just a step away from reality, Bagley and other Oceanside officials are not about to assume the deal is a fait accompli. Glitches have reared up before to undermine the project.

Federal lawmakers ordered the issue studied in 1951, but a series of funding delays slowed the process. In 1970, Congress approved construction, but did not authorize money for detailed design work until 1976. By then, several sweeping environmental regulations had been approved by Congress, putting new roadblocks in front of the project. Fiscal constraints in Washington also made financing a problem.

Eager to appease the environmentalists, the Corps of Engineers altered the project in the early ‘80s so that a 3-mile stretch of the river would be contained by a single rock levee on its southern edge. With only one barrier, the river waters could rise up on the undeveloped north bank, which would remain in a more natural state.

The so-called single-levee proposal irked property owners, in particular Alex Deutsch, an electronics magnate who owns about 350 acres just north of the San Luis Rey that he hopes to develop with industrial buildings and houses. Deutsch launched a crusade against the project in Washington, calling it “an environmentalist land grab,” and pushed for a privately funded flood channel.

Redesigned Again

In recent years, the federal project was redesigned yet again, this time incorporating a levee to protect most of the north bank, including Deutsch’s property.

Environmental concerns, in particular about the effect on the endangered least Bell’s vireo, a small gray songbird that nests in the willow thickets along the river, were eased by plans to leave broad swaths of habitat intact in the river bed. Provisions were also made to nurture new sections of willows and other vegetation hospitable to bird and animal life along the fringes of the channel.

Last year, the flood channel won financing in Congress for the first of five years of expected construction, a major breakthrough because money for federal water projects usually are rubber-stamped in subsequent years. For the coming year, funds for the project are included in the President’s budget as well as those for the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Money for subsequent phases of the project is of particular importance to Oceanside officials. During the first year of construction, levees between the beachfront and Interstate 5 will be bolstered. During the years that follow, however, work will focus on the most critical stretch of the river, a section winding past hundreds of houses, condominiums, apartments and businesses that were built in the flood plain.

“The process has been slow and frustrating for the people living in the valley and for elected officials eager to get things done,” said Dana Whitson, the city’s special projects director. “But, relatively speaking, this project has moved light-years in the last few years.”

Indeed, although Oceanside officials have worried for years about how the project will be financed, it now appears that the fiscal constraints on the city will be far less devastating than originally thought. The federal government will provide most of the money, more than $32 million. The state will pay $4.6 million, and Oceanside will pay $6.4 million.

City’s Share Cut

The city’s share, however, has been cut in half by money it has set aside for the project as well as credits it will receive for land already purchased along the river and channel improvements made during the construction of the Murray Toll Bridge in the early ‘80s.

Last week, the City Council agreed to sell $3.2 million in special financing certificates to pay its remaining share. About $250,000 will be needed each year to pay off that bill. Most of the money is expected to come from developer fees.

Once completed, the project will provide several bonuses for residents and merchants in the more than 4,000 homes and businesses that have sprung up along the banks of the San Luis Rey in recent decades. For one, they will no longer be required by insurance companies to pay extra because they live or work in a flood zone.

More important, Bagley said, is the peace of mind for residents living on the banks of a river that can flood without much warning. With such concerns in mind, he and other city officials aren’t about to rest on their laurels.

“I’m not going to be sanguine,” Bagley said, “until I see the Corps awarding that construction contract, and I see machinery out there to do that job.”