Water Softener Firms Fight Escondido Law : Environment: City has banned automatic devices, which they contend hinder reclamation efforts.

A group of water-treatment suppliers is suing Escondido in a challenge to the city’s ban on certain water softeners.

The city earlier this year banned use of automatic water softeners because they dump unacceptable levels of salt into the sewer system, said Cynthia Ferguson-Salvati, the city’s water reclamation-conservation administrator.

The city has plans for an extensive $29-million water reclamation plant to be completed in 1993, and high levels of salt in the effluent would make the reclaimed water less marketable to avocado growers and landscapers, the largest potential consumers of the water, Ferguson-Salvati said.

Water-softener companies are facing an increasingly hostile reception from public agencies in San Diego County, which themselves are facing pressures to conserve and reclaim more water.

Several North County cities already have bans on automatic water softeners, including Poway and Oceanside, said Ferguson-Salvati.

The city of San Diego is drafting an ordinance that could ban automatic water softeners in parts of the city in anticipation of its own water-reclamation plan, which goes into effect in 1996, said Harold Bailey, the city’s water reclamation coordinator.

The specifics of the ordinance have yet to be hammered out and will not go to the council until early next year, Bailey said.

In the Escondido suit, the Water Quality Assn., an Illinois-based trade group, contends that the North County city failed to fully study the environmental impact of a ban on the water softeners and failed to receive adequate public testimony.

The ordinance prohibits the installation of self-regenerative water softeners, and requires that existing automatic water softeners be removed in the event the house is sold. The automatic water softeners, unlike less expensive softening systems, do not require regular servicing by the supplier but dump the minerals back into the sewage system rather than having them removed and disposed of.

Ferguson-Salvati said the ban is a necessary step toward water reclamation.

“We are trying to use this reclaimed water on a variety of irrigators,” she said. “One of the main potential customers are the avocado people, and avocados are extremely salt sensitive.”

A city-conducted survey done earlier this year showed that “as many as 11%” of the city’s households have the banned water softeners, Ferguson-Salvati said.

Automatic water softeners, which for a four-person household could cost from $1,500 to more than $4,000, reduce the minerals in the water. Most of Southern California has hard water from the Colorado River and Northern California.

The minerals in hard water increase the corrosion in pipes and appliances that use water, while soft water makes laundry and dish cleaning easier, said Tim Porter, general manager for Rayne Soft Water, a water softening company that does not support the lawsuit.

Bruce Jaques, the attorney representing the 1,500-member Water Quality Assn., said the ban does not take into account improvements in automatic water softers that allow them to use less water and dump fewer minerals into the sewage.

“The new generation of equipment that the Water Quality Assn. has recommended be put into place would cut the amount of salt discharged in half,” Jaques said. He said he did not know about the other cities that have instituted or are considering similar bans.

But Porter said many of the water-softening companies in North County object to the suit being filed. What suppliers should do, instead, he said, is sell the softeners that are acceptable to public agencies.

“It makes us look like we are against water reclamation, and we aren’t,” Porter said.