City Undecided About Selling Water to Koll for Bolsa Chica Site

After a 6 1/2-hour meeting generated more questions than answers, the City Council told its staff to do more research on whether to sell water to a proposed Bolsa Chica housing development.

A city-commissioned study showed that the cheapest option for the developer, Koll Co., would be to hook up to the Huntington Beach water system rather than pipe water in from elsewhere. But council members wondered aloud Monday night whether Proposition 218 would prevent the city from charging a premium for the service, and whether it would affect city residents’ water bills. Proposition 218 limits the ability of cities to raise revenue.

With so many unanswered questions, Mayor Ralph H. Bauer suggested that City Administrator Michael T. Uberuaga should probably spend time on matters other than negotiating a water deal with Koll. Bauer noted that the controversy concerns a group of people who would be living outside the city limits.

“I just can’t worry about them. We’ve got 200,000 people here now we need to worry about,” Bauer said.

But Councilman Dave Garofalo said it would be “political suicide to abandon the quest to see if we can make money on this”--a 2,500-home development that would be surrounded by Huntington Beach.

A dozen residents, including members of the citizen groups Huntington Beach Tomorrow and the Bolsa Chica Land Trust, spoke against delivering water service.

The Land Trust hopes to preserve the Bolsa Chica mesa from development, much as the State Lands Commission saved the adjoining wetlands from development by purchasing the area two weeks ago.

Council members agreed to revisit the issue of Bolsa Chica services March 17.