An escalating battle over Southern California water, and the pollution that can or can’t be allowed to flow into it, involves three counties, two very different cultures and one thorny question:
How much should we collectively pay to keep the ocean as clean as possible?
“I don’t know,” said Anthony Valdez, a 29-year-old who works for an auto parts distributor in Fontana, roughly 60 miles from the Santa Ana River Jetty.
“A lot? I mean, I think it’s pretty important to have a clean ocean,” Valdez added.
“Wait. Why are you asking me this?”
Because he’s potentially on the hook for a potentially big bill.
As public officials and scientists and business types from Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties argue over water pollution rules that will be used in the region for the next five to 20 years, one economic impact report has looked at the costs of updating public properties and establishing monitoring systems and the like, and reached a possible answer to the “how much” question:
Something north of $11 billion.
And much of that tab, if some politicians are to be believed, eventually will be picked up by people and businesses in San Bernardino County; taxpayers and business owners like Valdez.
Or not.
So far, the economic report – and the proposed rules its authors use to come up with the $11 billion price tag – are just talking points. Actual new rules aren’t likely to be imposed until later this year, possibly at a meeting slated for Aug. 21 in Loma Linda. But even that date isn’t solid; this water debate has been in “anytime now” mode for several years, as officials have bickered over rules that, in theory, expired in 2015.
The issue in question is something known as an MS4 permit. It’s a federally required legal document used by about 7,300 cities and counties around the country to do their part to implement the Clean Water Act.
And this particular MS4 – the one that might cost guys like Valdez, and his bosses, and 2.2 million other people in San Bernardino County some money – will govern water pollution in Region 8 of the California State Water Resources Control Board. It’s an area that includes about 60 cities and other districts in the parts of Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties that run close to the Santa Ana River.
The debate over this MS4 is mind-numbingly wonky, with terms like “discharger” (any city or government agency that’s supposed to monitor a sewer or storm drain or whatever) and “in-pipe monitoring” (the idea of tracking pollution in a pipe or gutter, etc., rather than after it plops into a river) used far too freely for my taste.
But the overall idea is simple enough: The next MS4 in Region 8 will determine how much nasty stuff – everything from car wash soap to cat poop to french fry grease – will or won’t flow into the Santa Ana River and, from there, the Pacific.
The rules, much like the pollution, figure to touch everything. Streets, gutters, farms, front yards, storm drains, backyards, flood control channels, parking lots, university campuses, golf courses; anyplace that might generate or carry pollution into fresh water sources, and eventually the ocean, will be regulated by this MS4.
There are a few reasons this particular MS4 has been a contentious thing to write.
First, the Clean Water Act says water pollution laws can’t go backward, meaning all new permits have to be at least a little more stringent than the permits they replace. Second, this particular MS4, which will apply to the three-county area, will be replacing three separate MS4s that currently govern the flow out of each county.
And the current rules, in those counties, reflect the politics, economics and culture of each area. The MS4 in beach-focused, environmentally curious Orange County is tighter than the one in exurb-centric Riverside County. And the Riverside rules are, in turn, a little firmer than the rules in still rural-ish San Bernardino County.
So, while the region’s next MS4 will probably represent a slight jump for Orange County, it’ll be a much bigger, and more expensive, change for dischargers in Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
In July, when they met in Orange to hash it all out, again, officials from several San Bernardino County communities argued that more spending on water pollution means less spending on cops and teachers and the like. They used their $11 billion price estimate – which came from an economic impact report the county paid for – as a political cudgel.
And they were smart to do so.
It’s tough to argue for $11 billion in spending that nobody is asking for, and for which no elected official will get thanked.
But if you break down the numbers, just a little, that money doesn’t feel so huge.
Divide the current population of San Bernardino County by $11 billion, and spread that out by 20 years, and you get a number closer to $46 per year, per person. What’s more, by the end of the equation, 20 years out, that price tag falls closer to $25 per person based on current rates of inflation.
That said, if you’re reading those numbers and thinking “it’s nothing,” your attitude also might be part of the conflict.
Logistics-centric San Bernardino County and beach-friendly Orange County are two very different worlds. For many of the people who live in one of those counties, $45 might buy essentials, like two (admittedly cheapish) backpacks when school starts. For some in the other, it might be a slightly outlandish family Starbucks run.
But, in both, it’s money that will pay to curb pollution that can further foul an already creaky ocean.
And $11 billion for that? It might be cheap.
Last week, a 40-something surfer and business consultant who gave only one name, Ellis, buried his bare feet in hot sand and suggested a clean ocean shouldn’t be calculated by money.
“It’s beyond that.”
Then, Ellis calculated the idea by money anyway.
“The single biggest economic driver in our region has got to be the ocean. Hands down,” he said between surf sessions in the waves at the mouth of the Santa Ana River between Newport Beach and Huntington Beach, which happens to be the spot where at least some pollution covered by the region’s MS4 meets the ocean.
“The ocean is why people live here. It’s why they visit. It’s why they make movies here. Your house, even if it’s not on the water, is more expensive because of the ocean. And the ocean is more valuable when it’s clean.
“Everybody in all of SoCal, including people who live way upstream from here, benefits from a (expletive) clean ocean.
“This is a lame discussion,” Ellis added, laughing.
“I’m going back out.”