Villa Park Irrigation Official Pleads Guilty to Illegal Mining

The general manager of an Orange County water district pleaded guilty Thursday to running an illegal mining operation that damaged a popular county park and destroyed wetlands that were home to endangered birds.

U.S. Magistrate Judge George H. King ordered that David H. Noyes, general manager of the Serrano Irrigation District in Villa Park, pay a $2,500 fine and remain on probation for one year.

Frank Smith Sand and Gravel, a Corona company hired by the water district to do excavation work behind the Villa Park Dam reservoir, also was ordered to pay the county $25,000 in restitution.

Noyes could not be reached for comment and a trucking company official declined to talk about the case.

In a previous interview with The Times, Noyes denied that officials with the water district did anything illegal.

Federal authorities charged Noyes and the trucking company with a single misdemeanor violation of the federal Clean Water Act, alleging that they discharged fill material in a delicate wetlands area behind the reservoir.

In 1986, the water district received a federal permit to remove silt material that had washed down from Weir Canyon and settled behind the reservoir. Under the permit, the water district and its contractor were allowed to excavate approximately 8.5 acres.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Jeffrey C. Eglash said the water district instead excavated 25 acres, including extremely sensitive wetlands that are home to the Least Bell’s Vireo, a songbird on the nation’s endangered species list. The bird, which inhabits Southern California’s willow woodlands, has few such places left to nest.

Eglash said the water district and trucking company sold the excavated material at a substantial profit.

The damage caused by the additional excavation will cost the county an estimated $2 million to restore, Eglash said. County officials have sued the water district in Orange County Superior Court to recover the costs, the prosecutor said.