Sanitary District fine for sewage spills is less than recommended
State water quality officials are recommending that the Costa Mesa Sanitary District be fined $364,130 in connection with two spills that released thousands of gallons of raw sewage into Upper Newport Bay.
Directors from the Santa Ana region of the State Water Resources Control Board credited the district’s quick response to the spills and cooperation with authorities afterward but noted that the two incidents — during which an estimated 85,100 gallons of untreated sewage made their way into the bay — were each bad enough to close the area for several days.
The recommendation is less than what state prosecutors were hoping for. During a hearing in July, they urged the directors to fine Costa Mesa $503,214 for the spills, which occurred on Aug. 31, 2013, and on New Year’s Day of this year.
The directors are scheduled to approve the fine Sept. 18. The sanitary district would then have 30 days to accept or appeal the decision.
The fine would be the first in the district’s 71-year history.
General Manager Scott Carroll said Friday that district directors have discussed the fine in closed session but are still considering their options.
The board could decide that part of the fine should go toward an environmental cause in Costa Mesa, such as protecting the vernal pools in Fairview Park, according to Carroll.
The sanitary district, which has never denied fault in the spills, had argued that it should pay $204,995. District officials said that while the sewage was clearly bad for the bay, it hasn’t been demonstrated that the materials posed any long-term damage.
The New Year’s Day spill was discovered after the district received a report of a seeping manhole at the Fairway Villas apartment complex, at 20122 Santa Ana Ave. in Newport Beach. Responders traced the problem to a sewage block in the area’s line, a problem, prosecutors argued, that the district had known about since 1999.
About 8,100 gallons of sewage were released into the bay during that incident.
The August 2013 spill, during which about 77,000 gallons of sewage made their way to the Back Bay, was attributed to a failed pump station near Irvine Avenue and Mesa Drive.
State prosecutors and environmentalists argued that the August spill poised significant financial harm to area businesses, whose patrons were unable to enjoy the water during an otherwise idyllic Labor Day that followed.
Sanitary district officials have pointed to numerous improvements made since the spills.
More than $460,000 has been spent to ensure that the pump station doesn’t fail again, according to the district, and an additional $351,000 has been budgeted to fix the problem line.
