Stirring Up the Water

Concern about water quality off Huntington Beach has dominated the public debate in Surf City in recent years. Beach closings in past summers have cast a shadow over an entire recreation industry. Also, the Orange County Sanitation District’s waiver from the Clean Water Act, permitting the discharge of sewage offshore that is only partially treated, has stirred a storm of controversy.

One would think that clean, clear water would be getting all the attention it could. But now we learn that last fall, the district took a monitoring device that measures the cloudiness of water out of a Huntington Beach treatment plant shortly after a meeting with a state water-quality inspector. The inspector questioned whether the device, which is voluntary, was improperly calibrated and was giving false readings.

The inspector thus wondered whether the sewage that was going into the ocean actually exceeded legal limits for turbidity.

Though not required, such monitors can provide an extra layer of feedback, something this district in particular should want to have, given the scrutiny it is under. The Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board apparently agrees. As the chief enforcement arm for federal and state discharge permits, it is looking at requiring the district to reinstall the device.

When faced with the possibility of being required to reinstall the monitor, the district signaled its opposition. It argued that its current daily lab samples are enough to be sure that partially treated sewage passes muster under clean-water guidelines, and, in general, seems to regard having the additional layer of monitoring as something in the realm of an experiment.

This type of monitoring no doubt measures only one of many variables in water quality. But these are important times for the district when sending the right signal on its resolve to thoroughly test water is important. There is a lot of pressure for the district to treat the wastewater to the same standard as other agencies across the nation, and the case for not renewing the waiver is strong.

Given that the waiver renewal is on the table, the district ought to be taking any extra steps to be sure there is public confidence in the current level of treatment. The district, after all, is the largest public agency in the country with a Clean Water Act waiver and discharges 243 million gallons a day of partially treated waste water 41/2 miles offshore.

Meanwhile, with all this on its plate, the district is asking the state to allow it to take on urban runoff. It’s a nice sentiment, but changing the district’s charter to broaden its work seems like too much to take on at this particular time. What it really needs to do is get its house in order, and prepare for the likelihood of having to meet a tougher clean-water standard.