Supervisors near crucial vote on Los Osos sewer project
If approved, the resolution will 'cement our intention to proceed,' area's representative says
David Sneed
San Luis Obispo Tribune
03/10/2011
The Los Osos sewer project faces a make-or-break decision Tuesday when county supervisors will vote whether to formally commit to building the large infrastructure project.
The project, debated for three decades, has been nearly five years in the making under the county’s control. During that time, supervisors have taken multiple votes to move various aspects of the project forward, but Tuesday’s vote will be crucial, said Supervisor Bruce Gibson, whose district includes Los Osos.
County supervisors Tuesday allocated another $750,000 to keep the Los Osos sewer project going.
The 4-1 vote, with Supervisor Frank Mecham voting “no,” marked a shift from financing and permitting to designing the $165 million project that is expected to begin construction in September 2011.
Mecham has been a critic of the continued use of county general funds to keep the project alive. The board has spent $6 million in general funds so far, mostly on Public Works Department staff time.
The county’s Los Osos sewer project will face two key hearings before state water officials in coming months.
On March 1, the State Water Resources Control Board in Sacramento is expected to approve more than $86 million in loans and grants, a significant chunk of the $189 million needed to build the facility.
On May 5, the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board in San Luis Obispo will set the discharge requirements the new sewer system must meet when it goes on line in 2014. These dictate how clean the water must be when it is discharged from the treatment plant.
Far fewer than half of the required property owners in Los Osos on Tuesday protested service charges for the county’s planned sewer project, allowing the Board of Supervisors to adopt them.
The charges will generate $5.74 million a year to cover the operations and maintenance costs of the sewer. The county will begin charging the fees when the sewer system becomes operational, which is expected to be in 2014.
The law requires that the county give property owners in Los Osos a chance to protest the fees. The threshold is 50 percent of the property owners plus one for the protest to be successful.
It’s been more than 30 years and some of the same people are still lobbying against it. Some are not property owners; others do not even live in the Prohibition Zone (which means we property owners are paying for their delaying tactics).
The state has made it clear that a gravity system — which in the opinion of most is the best method, and is used in countless seaside residential communities — is the most efficient. If we expect to reclaim our most precious and dwindling water resource before it is beyond saving, we must move ahead. Irreversible saltwater intrusion has now become as much or more of a threat than septic tank pollution.
San Luis Obispo County supervisors are expected to vote Dec. 14 on 2nd District Supervisor Bruce Gibson’s nomination of Ken Topping to replace Anne Wyatt on the county Planning Commission.
Gibson’s office announced Tuesday that Wyatt was resigning effective at the end of the year. Wyatt, co-owner of the Bridge Street Inn hostel in Cambria and former chairwoman of the North Coast Advisory Council, took Gibson’s place on the commission in January 2007 after he was elected supervisor.
“It’s has been a pleasure serving as a planning commissioner these last four years,” Wyatt said in a statement released by Gibson’s office. “I’m now looking forward to focusing on housing policy issues and a few other projects that will likely take me out of the county for much of the next year.”
“This resolution puts us on the hook to do this project,” he said. “It cements our intention to proceed.”
The $189 million project calls for the construction and installation of an entire sewage collection and treatment system to serve the Los Osos and Baywood Park communities. The treatment plant will be able to handle 1.2 million gallons of wastewater fed to it by 41 miles of collection lines.
The hearing is expected to take the better part of the day, depending on how much public comment is received, Gibson said. At previous hearings, critics of the project said the monthly expense to homeowners — which has been as high as $200 — would force seniors and others with fixed incomes out of the community.
Construction of the project will be financed by a combination of state and federal funds, mostly in the form of low-interest loans. Securing those loans has brought the monthly cost down to about $165, Gibson said.
Later this year, the county will hold an election to include undeveloped properties in Los Osos in the assessment district. If that passes, the cost could go down to about $135 a month because it would spread the cost around to more properties.
“I’ve said publicly many times that the cost of this project is a very big concern,” Gibson said.
The county has already spent $8.2 million in general and road funds to move the sewer forward. Approving the project and its financing will allow the county to recoup those costs.
The Los Osos sewer project is the county’s largest infrastructure project in recent years, eclipsing the recently completed Nacimiento pipeline, which cost $176 million. If approved, the sewer project is scheduled to be complete in 2014.
