Orange County Sanitation District (OCSD) claimed for years it was "good for the Ocean". What the OCSD sewage waiver was really doing

Stop the San Diego, California SEWAGE Waiver: San Diego, the last waiver!

Upcoming Events: OOG-led Tour of San Diego's Point Loma wastewater treatment plant, Nov. 6

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While San Diego's Mayor Sanders calls for water conservation, higher rates and expensive, risky desalination schemes, Point Loma dumps over 170,000,000 gallons of poorly treated wastewater into the Ocean every day. This immense disposal of potentially valuable water would be a good place to start looking for new water supplies for San Diego. Reclaimed water, if properly treated, could, with conservation, reduce the need for new water supplies and actually lower water bills. Poorly treated sewage dumped into the Ocean means swimmers are playing a dangerous game of Russian Roulette with their health. Elevated levels of live bacteria can't be good for swimmers and fish, while virus and roundworm larvae are not even part of the testing regimen. The only testing is for live indicator coliform bacteria. Dead bacteria, viable virus, live nematode worms, viable brain worm larvae and other parasites are allowed to float to shore along with fecal flakes and more than 83 contaminants that elude current treatment, including caffeine, pharmaceuticals, birth control, estrogen mimicers and other drugs and chemicals. There is no requirement that the sewage district post any warning about swimming in fecal sewage material other than live coliform bacteria.   Raccoon and feral cat roundworms, for example, are transmitted through feces, and, when they hatch inside a mammal body, can tunnel to the brain or eyes, where they encyst. One such disease is the Brain Worms found in Sea Otters exposed to cat feces in poorly treated wastewater. Brain worm larvae lodge in sea crabs and muscles, and, when ingested, begin their life cycle all over again inside a mammalian host. It's so much simpler to just get rid of the waiver, and clean the Beach and Ocean, than to deal with brain parasites in the water we swim in. Everyone knows in their hearts that the waiver must be stopped, and our valuable Beach property rights restored. But it takes courage to do what's right, and it's so much easier to deny the facts and postpone cleaning up the Beach and Ocean.

Orange County Sanitation District had the longest tradition of poor treatment of sewage and the most arrogant attitude about their "waiver" which allowed them to skip some sewage treatment. Few had much hope the situation could be fixed, and many openly sneered or laughed at our chances. Yet a small group of citizens, concerned about Beach and Ocean quality amidst persistent beach closures, and desiring to improve business, surfing, swimming, boating, fishing, tourism and the habitat, created a multi-pronged, fantastic storybook campaign that cleaned the beach and led to improved water qualtiy. Despite a viper's pit of paid biostitutes, bribed politicians, paid-off consultants, tame Regional Water Board, never-ending million dollar "studies", and outrageous special interests, the campaign won thanks to: Daily picketing by Joey Racano and others, City-by-city campaign led by Jan Vandersloot, Larry Porter, and others, that brought 15 of the 25 cities in the District over to the clean side, Irvine Company, Joan Irvine Smith, Steve Bone, and other business leaders, Leadership by Huntington Beach Mayor Debbie Cook and La Habra, Orange, La Palma, Seal Beach, etc., About 5,000 concerned Citizens contacted by the Sierra Club, Surfrider, and Earth Resource Foundation, State intervention led by then-Assemblymembers Ken Maddox and Alan Lowenthal. Now, the Orange Coast is cleaner, the "mysterious" closures due to sewage dumping have stopped, and the battle moves on to San Diego, the last waiver!

Stop the San Diego Sewage Waiver!

	The 1972 Clean Water Act requires that all sewage be treated to at least "secondary" standards -- still pretty dangerous, and still a public health hazard, but not as bad as "primary" sewage. But San Diego led the struggle to avoid fully treating the sewage, and received the first "WAIVER" in 1995 allowing San Diego to dump poorly treated sewage into the Bay. San Diego is the last of the waivers in California, and the last big waiver. Of the other 30 waivers, most are in small communities in places like Alaska. No major metropolitan area takes a chance with its Citizens' health like San Diego is doing. Joey Racano speech AGAINST the sewage waiver, demanding full treatement of the sewage.
	Mr. MacDonald is a retired high-level EPA Enforcement Officer, so he knows what he's talking about. Mr. James O. MacDonald makes a powerful statement for better sewage treatment.
	Introduction by Doug Korthof: Overview of the sewage waiver issue
	One of the Regional Board members wonders,  When is this waiver ever going to end??
Sierra Club - San Diego fails to oppose the waiver!	Ed Kimura says Sierra Club supports allowing the sewage waiver
Surfrider - San Diego fails to oppose the waiver!	Marco Gonzalez says Surfrider supports allowing the sewage waiver
Coastkeeper - San Diego fails to oppose the waiver!	San Diego Coastkeep signs on to support letting the waiver go forward, failing to treat the sewage to secondary levels.
	It's not the Regional Board, but the EPA which is the final judge, and California must meet federal standards. Speaking as a member of the Sierra Club, despite Ed Kimura said the Sierra Club was for the waiver. We need to stop this waiver and bring San Diego into compliance with secondary treatment standard and, even more, recycling of the wastewater. But if the waiver is granted, in 5 years, San Diego will be even more behind the curve, with more population and less options. The business folks who oppose full treatment do so for money; those environmental groups supporting the waiver are under an illusion that those business folks will suddenly decide to change their minds and treat the sewage. Doug Korthof statement AGAINST the waiver, FOR treating the sewage

1. Citizens stopped the Orange County Sewage waiver 2. Goleta waiver eliminated thanks to Citzens and local groups 3. Morro Bay Waiver abandoned 4. San Diego Sewage waiver must be stopped! Ocean Outfall Group calls for: Full treatment of sewage, Stop the waiver!

San Diego sewage apologists say "our level of treatment is good enough", despite evidence of loss of plankton and other sea life, and diversion of attention to the admittedly contributory "urban runoff" and "on-shore sources". When the people find out about the S.D. waiver, they will not like it nor those who hoodwinked them all these years (since 1995, when a certain Long Beach Congressman got them a waiver by a special act of congress). Could sewage be good for San Diego, and bad for everyone else? San Diego sewage backers stated that their "conditions" were much different than Orange County ... much as OCSD had stated that Orange County was "special" and different from everyone else. Validating the ancient proverb, "...when you are caught up in a contradictory position, try to make a distinction...". The plain fact is, public health is the same everywhere, and it's only a matter of time before increasing population force improved sewage treatment methods. There is nothing "special" about San Diego, except it ignores the primary sewage it dumps offshore.

OOG touring Avila Waste Water Treatment plant Citizen awareness of poorly treated sewage, sewage spills, and how sewage treatment plants work is the first step in improving effluent quality and public health.

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