Mini-Mudslide at St. Catherine’s School Construction Site

“We’ve Only Just Begun”

Here in Victoria Beach near Nyes Place and Coast Highway we’ve been under siege by paving contractors up and down our narrow side streets, all of the utility companies digging and re-digging one at a time, a rehab of the Coast Highway sewer system that extended almost double its original projected time disruption, a new sidewalk installation, you name it.

Instead of being coordinated and done all at once, it’s been a piecemeal, segmented approach, thus stretching out for about 1 1/2 years. Over 18 months of dust, limited parking, noisy heavy equipment, air pollution from gridlock, and yet we’ve only just begun to experience the the next intrusion: Demolition and reconstruction of St. Catherine’s School.

Insult to injury, last Wednesday July 3rd on arriving at Ruby’s Auto Diner at 7:00 am I saw a small mudslide at the back of the restaurant. It was topping the archaic, short retaining wall and red muddy water was pouring down the lot, curving around the front and exiting onto Coast Highway near the Cal Trans storm drain intake. This evacuates directly down to the Blue Lagoon/Lagunita/Victoria Beach strand.

After much ado, and an incredible 5 minute response time by our LBPD, 3 officers arrived and immediately handled the situation extraordinarily well. ‘Tis true, Laguna Cops ARE tops!

All knew me and understood my concerns were based on professional expertise---In other words they saw the potential for more egregious slope failure and got the general contractor to shut off his water main immediately. That’s exemplary response and deserves acknowledgment by a grateful citizenry.

Apparently, there was an abandoned or unintentionally severed water line that had been pouring out since at minimum the day before. I write at minimum because I discovered that the night manager at Ruby’s noted it the night before, but have no way of ascertaining how long it had been in that state nor how many gallons had saturated the hill.

Ironically, several papers last week carried warnings from water districts about drought-related water shortages, possible rationing and an imploring outreach to please conserve.

I took several photos as evidentiary support, but felt citizens need to understand why even a small cascade should be taken seriously.

First, if it was potable (drinking water), what an incredible waste. A storm drain discharge of potable that evacuates into the receiving waters of the Pacific is a water quality violation.

Second, the transport of sediment that may contain construction pollutants from either this project or previous site efforts is also a violation.

Third, there should have been construction management practices implemented by the grading and general contractors that precluding this occurring. Devices like sandbags, drainage channels or filters which, if a main line broke would direct the water to the sewer system, divert it from a freshly disturbed slope. Slope failures can sometimes occur as the result of multiple subterranean erosions over the years, not just isolated cases. Both Bluebird Canyon slides were partially caused by cumulative undermining.

Fourth, why was the contractor allowed to wash down the parking lot to remove the spill remains, thus flushing it into the storm drain system? Instead of vacuuming it up as I demanded, in the fall Victoria Beach folks will see this crap barfing out onto our sand after the first rainy flush of pollutants.

Several uncomfortable questions remain:

Why didn’t the City demand an upgrade of that archaic, undersized retaining wall at the base of such a steep slope as a mitigation or condition for approval?

Will the same city officials who gave it the greenlight also be willing to sanction (fine) the contractor per state and federal regulations?

Will the same council members who pay lip service to water quality decide that deterrence drives compliance and actually drop the hammer down hard?

Or will it be business as usual, once again giving preferential treatment to their cronies?

Roger E. Butow Clean Water Now! ( Or Whenever The City Gets Around to It) Laguna Beach