LAGUNA BEACH : City to Hear Claims of Flood Losses

More than $5 million in claims filed against the city for losses during back-to-back storms in January will be considered by the City Council tonight and likely denied, officials said.

The claims have been pouring into the city, including one from the Laguna Beach Historical Society for $12,000. The largest claim is from John A. Hamil, owner of Canyon Animal Hospital Inc., for $1.6 million for damage to his house, kennel, garage and animal hospital, all of which are in Laguna Canyon.

“We’ve worked and lived here a long time,” Hamil’s wife, Susan, said Monday. “We’ve been through a lot of natural disasters in Laguna. This flood was, for us, worse than the fire or any previous floods or anything else.”

City Manager Kenneth C. Frank said he was surprised by the number of claims and maintained that the city is not responsible for the damage. “There are absolutely no possible grounds for liability against the city, not even in the most remote circumstances,” Frank said. “There isn’t any question [the City Council] will deny them,” he said of the claims.

Laguna Beach was pummeled Jan. 6 and 10 by storms that sent a river of mud through downtown streets and flooded homes and businesses in the canyon. The storms left a gaping hole in Main Beach Park and wiped out a strip of the popular boardwalk, damage that has since been repaired.

Frank blamed the mudflow on grading that was underway in Laguna Canyon for the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor. He said Monday that the city has filed a $675,000 claim against the Orange County Transportation Corridor Agencies, mostly for damage at Main Beach.

Jerry Bennett, chief engineer for the agency, said the agency has received another half-dozen or so claims. But Bennett said work the agency did in the canyon “actually solved part of the problem” that might otherwise have occurred during the storms.

“The erosion control facilities we had in there actually performed a flood control function to some extent,” he said.