Repairs Aim to Prevent Sewage Spills

Responding to the first of two probes into last month’s massive sewer spill, city officials assured state water regulators Monday that repairs this summer should prevent any future ruptures.

In a five-page report, public works officials state that a two-year, $8.5-million upgrade due to start in a few months will safeguard against another spill, such as the one in February that dumped 86 million gallons of raw sewage into ocean-bound waterways.

“In essence, what we have now is a line constructed in the early 1960s; it is now early 1998,” said Thousand Oaks Public Works Director Don Nelson.

The new pipeline, he explained, will be wider, deeper and more reinforced.

“Materials of construction have changed in that interval,” he said in an interview. “We’ve also had the benefit and experience of living with a canyon line for roughly 40 years, so we’re better able to design a facility in recognition of the rather hostile environment it’s placed in. That’s not to say that line wasn’t designed properly 40 years ago--it was. But now, we’ll be afforded a higher level of protection.”

Monday’s report--detailing how to prevent future environmental disasters--is the last of three required by the state Regional Water Quality Control Board, which could fine Thousand Oaks up to $5,000 a day for the spill.

However, city officials indicated that they will file another report to regulators containing additional information about the spill within a few weeks. Nelson declined to speak in detail about what that report will contain.

Thousand Oaks city staffers vetted Monday’s report in light of a separate federal investigation into whether the spill violated the federal Clean Water Act.

The city faces a deadline today for submitting to federal investigators thousands of pages of subpoenaed documents relating to the sewer lines.

Because of the sheer volume of the documents requested, only some of the information will be handed over to the U.S. Attorney’s office in Los Angeles today, according to Thousand Oaks City Atty. Mark Sellers.

“We don’t have a specific date on when we’re going to be able to produce all the documents requested,” he said Saturday. “We’re working on that--gathering all the documents and putting them in a manageable order and copying them as requested by the subpoena.”

Previous reports to state regulators said the spill from the decades-old sewer line were an act of God that the city could not have anticipated or prevented.

Once constructed, the new pipeline will run roughly parallel to the existing one, which will be reinforced internally and left in place as a backup sewer main. Both will crisscross the Arroyo Conejo in several places en route to the Hill Canyon Wastewater Treatment Plant. It was at an eroded stream crossing that rains washed out a 30-foot concrete section of sewer main during last month’s storms.

In all, the spill loosed 86 million gallons of waste, but previous city reports note that rain runoff so diluted the spill that no animal deaths or serious environmental effects have been tallied thus far.

Whether Monday’s report will convince Dennis Dickerson, the executive officer of the Regional Water Quality Control Board, and his board to spare Thousand Oaks from thousands of dollars in fines is hard to predict.

“Clearly, what’s key is: Was this an avoidable occurrence? Was there some form of negligence involved?” said Karen Caesar, the information officer for the Los Angeles-area regional board. “That’s the critical factor to consider. We’ll also focus on what long-range plans there are to ensure this situation doesn’t happen again.”

Caesar could not say when regulators might take action against Thousand Oaks, if merited, other than to say that water board staffers would work in a timely fashion.

While cleaning up the spill and preventing another from happening are vital, environmental lawyer John Buse predicted that the regional board will have little choice but to punish the city in some way. Far smaller entities have been punished for far smaller spills, he said.

“The regional board makes its determinations based on: Did it happen? When did it happen? And, how much was released?” said Buse, a staff attorney with the Environmental Defense Center, a public interest law firm in Ventura. “That makes the decision easier. It’s a no-fault or strict liability issue.”

The rare federal probe is another matter completely, he said.

“On the federal level it’s a criminal investigation,” Buse said. “The burden of proof on investigators is fairly significant to show that there was criminal negligence in the least, if not actual wrongdoing. I have no idea whether there was any or if any will be found.”

Nelson, who will discuss the sewer issue at tonight’s City Council meeting, disagrees with Buse’s conclusions.

The regional board “will certainly do what they think is best,” he said. “We believe this was an act of God. We’ll have to defend our position in this in the rare instance that the regional board elects to take an enforcement action.”

At tonight’s meeting, the City Council will consider soliciting bids for the sewer line replacement project.

Over the next two years, the city is scheduled to replace about 8,000 feet of sewer lines--many of them running through the narrow, flood-prone Hill Canyon--for more than $8 million.

Even though all the appropriate federal and state permits for the work have not been issued yet, Nelson is recommending that the city request bids now to get the ball rolling.

The city must have both a low bid and permits in hand in May to begin construction over the summer--otherwise the first half of the work might not be done before the next rainy season, Nelson wrote in a report to the council.

Nelson is also advising the city to pay Boyle Engineering Corp. almost $89,000 for consulting services on the project. The engineering firm was hired to prepare construction drawings and environmental documents for the project.