Tijuana Sewage: Accord Called a Breakthrough

A U.S.-Mexico environmental pact signed in Washington last week is a breakthrough that could end the decades-long spillage of Tijuana sewage into San Diego-area farms, wetlands and coast, according to U.S. experts and lawmakers.

“This is a landmark agreement that will finally begin to resolve the problem,” said Narendra N. Gunaji, U.S. commissioner for the International Boundary and Water Commission, an El Paso-based panel that mediates border matters between the United States and Mexico.

The accord also underlines the growing cooperation between U.S. and Mexican authorities in combatting border environmental problems, from the befouling of the Rio Grande to smelter emissions in the Arizona-Sonora region to the border-wide dumping of toxic wastes. Border-area environmental hazards increasingly have emerged as irritants in U.S.-Mexico relations.

1993 Target Date

“The pollution is mutually detrimental to both nations, and therefore both nations must work together,” Gunaji said.

The agreement commits both governments to the construction of a San Diego-based facility--costing nearly $200 million--that would treat wastes from Mexico. Despite the agreement, the plant is still far from reality, with funding questions still unresolved. The facility is not scheduled to be in operation until at least 1993.

In signing the accord, experts said, the Mexican government in effect abandoned plans to construct a treatment plant in fast-growing southeastern Tijuana, a project that many on the U.S. side feared would exacerbate the problem by depositing huge amounts of barely treated sewage into the already polluted Tijuana River, which flows into San Diego. The proposed plant was to be built on the Rio Alamar, a tributary of the Tijuana River.

U.S. authorities, on the other hand, agreed to allocate tax dollars exclusively to treat foreign wastes. Gunaji noted that Washington, concerned about the pollution of the Rio Grande, already is picking up half the tab of a $44-million treatment plant planned for Nuevo Laredo, across the river from Laredo, Tex. A jointly operated treatment plant has been in operation in Nogales, Ariz., for more than 30 years, but that facility handles wastes from both sides of the border.

In San Diego, lawmakers with little faith in Mexican sewage-treatment methods had been lobbying for years for a U.S.-based plant to handle Mexican wastes. But, until recently, the efforts had received sparse encouragement from their Mexican counterparts. That changed considerably in the administration of President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, who took office Dec. 1 and has emphasized environmental concerns.

While the final details of the agreement still have to be worked out, there was relief among officials that the Mexican government had finally acceded to the concept of a binational facility.

Brian Bilbray, a San Diego County supervisor who has been working on the issue for more than a decade--he once rode a bulldozer to dramatize his displeasure with the northbound Tijuana sewage flows--recalled that many doubted that Mexico would ever consent to such a plan, or that U.S. officials would agree to fund it.

“This was the impossible dream,” he said. “We just kept the pressure up. Now we know that we’ll have our own technology.”

For years, raw sewage from Tijuana has naturally flowed to the northern side of the border via the Tijuana River and down numerous gullies and arroyos. Many Tijuana residents remain without regular plumbing, allowing wastes to enter rough channels that drain to the north. In addition, the city’s sewage pipes are subject to regular breakdown, augmenting the foul flow.

Consequently, much of the city’s sewage--10 million gallons a day or more--ends up in thefetid Tijuana River, which drains on the U.S. side. At the mouth of the river on the U.S. side are a slough and a unique national estuarine sanctuary, one of the few on the West Coast, that attract considerable wildlife, including endangered species. Conservationists fear the impact on the delicate ecosystem. Others worry about health hazards for humans: a 2 1/2-mile swath of beach just north of the border has been quarantined for more than six years because of the sewage.

With the agreement signed, the debate about the treatment project very likely will shift to the fiscal arena. Both nations are being asked to contribute substantial sums at a time when lawmakers in Mexico City and Washington are tightening their fiscal belts. The exact amounts are still to be determined, but early estimates put the price tag of the project at $192 million.

The U.S. government is expected to be asked to chip in about $100 million, of which only $14 million has already been appropriated, officials said. Whether lawmakers from non-border states will be eager to fund a project to treat Mexican sewage remains to be seen.

California also has budgeted $14 million, and is expected to kick in another $1 million. The city of San Diego, has budgeted $12 million.

Mexico, according to preliminary estimates, will be required to contribute about $41 million--$21 million for pipeline construction in Tijuana and another $20 million for the plant. The binational agreement, however, raises the possibility that a loan program will be worked out allowing Mexico to pay its share of the costs over a 10-year period.

Mexico has also reserved the right to reclaim the Tijuana waters treated at the international plant--an important point, given the water shortages that always threaten the semidesert region.

The details are now to be worked out by the two nations’ representatives on the International Boundary and Water Commission. A definitive plan is expected within 90 days, authorities said, and construction could begin next year.