EPA to Sue City Over Stalled Sewage Plant

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, ending seven months of failed negotiations with San Diego officials over a costly new sewage treatment program, will sue the city in federal court today to force it to comply with the nation’s Clean Water Act, a city attorney said Tuesday.

The lawsuit is to be filed in U.S. District Court this morning by the EPA and the U.S. Justice Department, the two agencies that have been attempting to reach an agreement with the city on plans for a $1.5-billion upgrade of the city’s sewage treatment capabilities, Chief Deputy City Atty. Ted Bromfield said.

EPA spokeswoman Carrie Frieber would not confirm that the lawsuit will be filed, but noted that the timing corresponds with a scheduled news conference being held by EPA Administrator Lee Thomas in Washington, D.C., to review EPA’s enforcement of the secondary sewage treatment standards.

With negotiations snagged over whether the federal government would help pay for the project and when the city would start building the facilities, the lawsuit is not unexpected. Still, the filing will open a new chapter in a battle between the city and the federal government that stretches back to the 1970s.

“It has been expected,” said Mayor Maureen O’Connor. “The council unanimously agreed that we were not going to sign a consent decree that did not address the federal government’s responsibility to give us funds” for the project.

District 6 Councilman Bruce Henderson, the council’s most outspoken critic of the EPA, welcomed the legal action, saying that it will draw attention to the city’s battle and the unfairness of Clean Water Act standards as applied to San Diego.

‘Put-Up or Shut-Up Time’

“Once the lawsuit has been filed, we can go to our congressional delegation and say ‘OK guys, it’s put-up or shut-up time. You’ve got to do your thing to protect us,’ ” Henderson said. The Pacific Beach councilman wants the delegation to propose amendments to the act that would focus on the city’s goal of reclaiming wastewater instead of paying to improving treatment of waste that will be dumped in the ocean.

The Clean Water Act requires all U.S. cities to install secondary sewage treatment systems--which remove 85% to 90% of solids from sewage--by July 1, a deadline the city could not meet.

In April, city officials estimated it would take $1.5 billion to $2.4 billion to finance such a project--the largest public works job in city history--and 39 months just to outline the best treatment system.

The crisis developed because the city abandoned plans for a secondary sewage treatment system in early 1981, when it concluded--mistakenly--that the EPA would give it a permanent exemption from the standards. In 1986, the EPA tentatively denied the exemption and in 1987, the city gave up fighting for one.

Grants Expired

O’Connor, who 17 months ago urged the council to give up its quest for an exemption, said she did so because she had EPA assurances that the federal government would pay most of the construction cost. But when federal grants ran out, the size of the construction effort left San Diego sewer users facing a possible quadrupling of their monthly sewage bills, to $40, to pay for the project.

Negotiations on a consent decree began early this year, but the two sides never moved very close on the major issues of funding and a starting date. “Every other major city that signed (an agreement) was also at the pay window knowing that they were getting 65%” of the treatment system’s cost paid by the federal government, O’Connor said Tuesday.

A source close to the negotiations said that the EPA also insisted on a guaranteed 1997 starting date for the project. The city sought a start date of sometime after 2000 or inclusion of a clause allowing it to extend the 1997 date if financing is not available.

Also undecided was how much the EPA would fine the city for past sewage spills, primarily into Mission Bay and Los Penasquitos Lagoon.

Bromfield, who briefed the council in closed session on the suit Tuesday, said he has not seen a copy of the lawsuit and did not know what actions the EPA is demanding.

“They’re alleging violation of the Clean Water Act,” he said. “But as to what remedy they’re seeking, I won’t know until I see it.” He said that EPA attorney Hugh Barroll telephoned him to inform him that the suit would be filed.

Bromfield, who leads the city’s negotiating team, said filing of the lawsuit will not halt his efforts to negotiate a settlement with Justice Department attorneys.