Neighbor Cities Protest L.A. Sewage Rules

In a confrontation of several Davids and one Goliath, the city of Los Angeles is being challenged on its unusual attempt to restrict development in neighboring cities whose sewage flows into Los Angeles’ overloaded sewer system.

Officials in Burbank, Glendale, Culver City and El Segundo have written a joint letter to Los Angeles officials declaring that a Los Angeles ordinance adopted in May is “invalid and unenforceable” and “a breach of contract.”

Los Angeles officials say that, in accordance with their disputed law, they will seek to collect fines starting at $20,000 every three months from the recalcitrant cities. Both sides expect a court fight to settle the dispute.

At the center of the battle is the massive yet inadequate sewer system that is owned and maintained by Los Angeles but serves 27 separate cities and agencies that pay to use it. Los Angeles officials, after approving temporary curbs on the issuance of building permits in Los Angeles because of limited sewer capacity, acted to impose similar controls on other cities.

The goal is to slash by 30% a daily sewage flow rate that has been growing by 10 million gallons a year. To help meet that goal, Los Angeles officials want to require the smaller cities to show, in quarterly reports, that they are slowing new development as a means of relieving pressure on the sewer system.

Los Angeles officials, citing police powers available to all cities, said such temporary controls are legally justifiable because of the city’s duty to protect the public from the risk of overflows caused by more sewage flowing into the Hyperion treatment plant than the plant can handle. The city wants the controls to remain in effect until it can expand its sewage-treatment capacity, expected to be completed in 1991.

“Our position is, it’s our system, and if there are overflows, it will affect the health, safety and welfare of the public,” said John Haggerty, a Los Angeles deputy city attorney. “Under the police powers, we can limit their contract rights.

“We’re trying to control the flow into the Hyperion system; we’re not trying to limit per se their issuance of building permits,” Haggerty added. “They could build their own sewage plant or reclamation plant if they want to.”

But in their letter, the city attorneys of Burbank, Glendale, Culver City and El Segundo said that “neither the law nor the facts” support Los Angeles’ ordinance. “The city of Los Angeles has no power, authority or jurisdiction to regulate affairs beyond its municipal borders,” the letter said. “To the extent (that it) attempts to limit the number of building permits issued by other cities, it is invalid and unenforceable.”

The attorneys said their review of documents prepared by Los Angeles officials suggests that no emergency exists. Moreover, Los Angeles itself is to blame for increasing sewage flows.

“It’s absolutely preposterous for them to think they can change the terms of our contract,” Burbank City Atty. Doug Holland said in an interview. He called the law “a typical Los Angeles tactic--trying to blame someone else for their own problem. Look at airport noise. . . . Look at transportation problems.”

‘Novel Approach’

“How can one city legislate in another city?” asked City Atty. Joseph Pannone of Culver City. “It’s certainly a novel approach to local government.”

Pannone said, “There has to be dire reasons” for cities to break contracts. “There doesn’t appear to be that emergency because Los Angeles could cut back on its own flow without affecting the contractual obligations they have to the other agencies.”

Trouble is brewing now because, under the Los Angeles law, the contracting cites were required to submit quarterly reports starting in October on their efforts to curb growth. Los Angeles will try to collect $20,000 from each city that fails to submit the reports. In addition, fines would mount if the cities issue permits for more than allowable amounts of sewage. An excess of 50,000 gallons of sewage, for example, would add up to a $250,000 fine.

Several other cites and agencies, including Beverly Hills, have failed to comply with the Los Angeles law. But Burbank, Glendale, Culver City and El Segundo are the only ones thus far to make formal protests.