Debate Over Ramona’s Ground Water Runs as Deep as Some of Its Wells

Ahhh, country living. Clean air. Clean water.

So when Luke Greeson moved to Ramona from the Los Angeles suburb of South Gate about 20 years ago, he didn’t hesitate to drill a well 100 feet into the ground, tapping into a ready, steady and cheap supply of water to keep his lawn green, his clothes clean and his thirst quenched.

But Luke Greeson is drinking bottled water these days because of concern that the ground water beneath his house may no longer be fit for human consumption.

Yet his next-door neighbor, Julene Gyde, has no hesitancy about drinking that same water. In fact, she is so satisfied by the water from her well that she and her husband disconnected themselves from the community’s piped water supply and now rely solely on the water 100 feet beneath their horse ranch on the south side of town.

And so it goes in Ramona these days, with a brewing and technical debate over the quality of Ramona’s underground water.

Highest Concentration of Drinking Wells

Though most of Ramona’s households are served by the Ramona Municipal Water District, some estimates put at 1,000 the number of homes in and around Ramona that rely on their own wells, either out of preference or because of the cost to tie in to the municipal water lines. County water officials say Ramona has the highest concentration of drinking-water wells in the county.

For these residents, the issue is over the presence of nitrates in the ground water and what harm--if any--is caused to the human body by them.

Nitrates result from decomposing plants, animals and microbes, from the liquid and solid waste of humans and animals and in runoff from nitrate-based fertilizers. According to the federal Environmental

Protection Agency, the presence of more than 10 milligrams of nitrates (as nitrogen) in a liter of water is dangerous to infants up to 6 months old because it converts in the body to nitrite and can cause methemoglobinemia in those who have difficulty assimilating nitrites. The disease, also known as “blue baby disease,” essentially transforms hemoglobin--the blood’s oxygen-carrying component--to another form, which cannot transport oxygen.

Researchers say the disease is very rare and may be brought on because of other complications. Adults are not considered at risk by drinking nitrate-high water because they normally consume far more nitrates in their food than they would get from water itself.

A San Diego State University student working on her master’s degree in public health studied the nitrate problem in Ramona’s ground water and found that, based on her sampling of wells, several of Ramona’s various underground water aquifers are tainted by levels of nitrates exceeding the safety limits established by the EPA.

Turkey Farms and Dairies

The high levels may be of little surprise, given the groves and orchards in the Ramona area that are fertilized with nitrate-rich chemicals, and given the region’s history as home to dairies and turkey and chicken farms--and the mounds of nitrate-generating manure they produced.

But the EPA nitrate limits apply only to public water supplies--such as the water provided through the Ramona Municipal Water District, which, because it blends local well water with imported water, has nitrate levels well within the federal standards.

Private homeowners using their own wells, however, are not governed by the EPA, and, unless they test their wells on their own for chemical analysis, they may not even know if or to what degree they have the tasteless nitrates in their water.

San Diego County’s Department of Health Services approves private wells at the time they are dug, checking them both for construction quality and to make sure the water has not been contaminated by surface bacteria during the boring. But the county is not required to check for the presence of nitrates in private water wells.

Enter Carol Close, a Ramona housewife-turned-activist on the matter of water quality, who has campaigned for public awareness about the presence of nitrates and for more government monitoring of private wells in Ramona.

Close, the mother of three young children, says she is not convinced that Ramonans understand the danger of nitrates. It was through her persistence that the county hired Marijke Lynne Bekken, the SDSU graduate student, to study the nitrate problem in Ramona.

Triple the EPA Standard

In one particular sampling of 24 wells, Bekken found that 15 exceeded the EPA limit for nitrates in water, with one well measuring 34.5 milligrams per liter, or more than triple the EPA standard. Bekken then solicited well users from throughout Ramona to bring her samples of water, and, out of 98, 41 tested over the standard.

Though no one is criticizing Bekken’s raw findings, there is debate over how large a red flag to wave.

Close wants the county to notify all well users in Ramona that their water may be dangerous to drink, to conduct a comprehensive study of Ramona’s ground water that would go beyond Bekken’s master’s thesis and to make land-use decisions that eventually will reduce the number of dairies and other nitrate sources in the region.

“When I had my well tested, they gave me a certificate telling me my water was OK. I believed them,” Close said, noting that the test was for bacteria but not for nitrates. “But it’s not safe.”

Some of Close’s frustration is directed at the state Regional Water Quality Control Board, which in 1987 approved the expansion of a Ramona dairy herd from 675 to 1,200 cows.

That decision was appealed by Close and others to the State Water Resources Board in Sacramento, which voted unanimously last October to block the expansion because it would have had a “significant adverse effect” on Ramona’s ground-water supply.

Close acknowledges that there can be no quick solution to the nitrate problem. Experts say that if every nitrate source were immediately removed, it would still take years for the ground water to cleanse itself.

Despite several stories in Ramona’s community newspaper about the nitrate problem, many people say they are not concerned.

Some, like Mary Turner, who has been drinking Ramona well water for 13 years, say that, since there are no infants at home, “it doesn’t concern me.”

Julene Gyde, a director on the Ramona-Julian Resource Conservation District and a resident who lives directly across the street from the dairy that received Close’s wrath, remarked, “I’m more concerned about the pollution in the air and the problems with the greenhouse effect than I am about nitrates in the water.”

But Gyde’s neighbor, 67-year-old Luke Greeson, said he doesn’t want to take any chances. “I stopped drinking my well water three or four years ago when I had it tested. It was high in nitrates. I’m a cautious man, and I’m not sure it might not harm older people. You never know.”

Jim Kast, who moved from Poway to Ramona 10 years ago, said he’s concerned enough by the news to have his well checked regularly. His nitrates are now half the EPA limit.

Proud of the Purity

Patrick Kelly relies on a combination of bottled and well water, and boasts, “I had my water tested, and they said it was cleaner than the city’s.”

Ruth Meyer, a director of the Ramona Planning Group, said she thinks the nitrate issue “has been blown out of proportion by special-interest groups who seem to oppose the dairies.”

Still, she concedes: “There is definitely a lot of nitrates in the water. When we first drilled our well 17 years ago, it was beautiful. But, four or five years ago, we had our water retested and came to find it had excessive nitrates and sodium.” Today, she drinks bottled water, partly out of uncertainty of the effect nitrates might have on her elderly parents, who live with her.

Day Hodges, who lives on the north side of Ramona, says he has ground-water concerns other than the presence of nitrates. “We live next door to the county dump up here,” he noted. He is worried about toxins leaching into the ground water he draws from.

For their part, county officials acknowledge the problem but say it’s not their business to meddle--especially once the private well is dug.

But starting last August, county health officials began requiring that anyone building a home in the Ramona basin first have their domestic water wells tested not only for bacteria, but for nitrates as well.

Mike Devine, chief of the health department’s environmental health services division, said that if a new well shows the presence of nitrates-as-nitrogen in levels exceeding the EPA limit of 10 milligrams per liter, his department will refuse to authorize a building permit for that house.

He said he did not know of any instances since August of new home construction being denied because of high nitrate levels. That fact, he said, may indicate not that the nitrates have disappeared, but that well diggers are boring deeper to penetrate beyond the upper levels of the ground water and tap cleaner water.

Devine said the concern about nitrates serves as a good lesson to people relying on their own water wells. “People check their cars to the nth degree to make sure they’re in good shape. They should have that same concern about the water they drink by checking their wells, too. That’s the key. People are taking their well water for granted.”

Jack Conway, the associate director of the School of Public Health at SDSU and Bekken’s adviser for her thesis, said he welcomes the public discussion over the debate.

“There’s not cause for hysteria,” he said, “but discussion is the better part of valor.”