About Cambria

From the Marin Voice about a week ago:

THE PEOPLE have spoken, and they want a say in whether to build a $400 million desalination plant in Marin.

The Coalition for the Public’s Right to Vote on Desalination has collected over 17,000 signatures in support of their initiative, which would require that the Marin Municipal Water District get a public vote before expending funds on a costly and questionable desalination plant.

The county Registrar of Voters is currently certifying the signatures, and if there are enough valid signatures, the measure will be on the November ballot.

Environmental and fiscal groups are united in support of this effort. The initiative was supported by the Marin Republicans and the Marin Democrats, as well as by the Surfrider Foundation and the Marin United Taxpayers Association.

Although the MMWD board members have voted unanimously to support the desal plant, they now have a chance to change course. They can issue a resolution stating that, before they start the building process and incur any further debt towards a desalination plant, they will put it to a public vote.

They can also vote to restart the Citizens Advisory Committee they have…

Read the full article here.

Or an article from the Contra Costa Times here.

Or the AP story in the San Francisco Chronicle here.

From an article by DANIEL LOPEZ, staff writer in a recent edition of the Monterey County Herald:

A guide to assist in planning and operating future seawater desalination plants beside the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary was released Monday.

The 20-page document prepared by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the National Marine Fisheries Service addresses some of the most common project concerns, including site selection, construction and operational impacts, plant discharges and intake systems.

The final draft was published after three years of work with the California Coastal Commission, Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board and several other state and local entities.

“The guidelines are designed to protect the sanctuary’s unique and sensitive environment, while also addressing the practical challenges surrounding water supply along the Central Coast,” said Paul Michel, sanctuary superintendent.

The sanctuary stretches along 276 miles of coastline — from Rocky Point in Marin County to Cambria — and encompasses more than 6,000 square miles of ocean.

Read the rest of the news story by clicking here.

Read the report by clicking image

An item was posted on the website FedBizOpps.gov in the category “Opportunities” soliciting interested qualified vendors for Cambria’s “Geotechnical Feasibility Investigation Study”. The solicitation outlines what is expected of the company that gets the business and (as of today 5/5/10) includes 6 interested vendors from as near as Paso Robles and as far as Florida.

Check it out to gain some insight on the process. The on May 10, 2010, watch the California Coastal Commission hearing on the federal consistency determination (if it isn’t postponed for some reason.) Click here to link to the agenda for that meeting.

Washingtonwatch.com tracks the bills in Congress, along with estimates about their costs or savings, when available. They also provide earmark data like the request for Cambria CSD by Lois Capps for $2,000,000 for desalination. Visit the site and make your comments there or here.

This earmark request can be attributed (at least in part) to the work of our lobbyist federal advocate.  Our community has spent a small fortune on this part of the project. How much? Thanks to OpenSecrets.org, it’s easy to find out. OpenSecrets.org is a federal watchdog site that provides information on lobbying expenditures, searchable by client, lobbying firm, individual lobbyist, industry, issue, agency or bill. View the report on Cambria Community Services District here.

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As the desalination project starts moving forward again with the test wells, the Cambria Community Services District Board and staff refer to the Water Master Plan – a series of studies and documents that have been approved over the last decade and a half. The new CCSD website isn’t as easy to navigate as the previous one, so finding some of this information can be trying or near impossible. If you want to make an informed decision or better understand what the Board is basing their decisions on, add these documents to your reading list.
(I welcome any suggested additions to this list. Just send me an email amanda at aboutcambria dot com or in comments below.)

A collection of several documents in one download.

The least you should know (warning: Large File)

Cambria Urban Water Management Plan (December 2005)
2005 Urban Water Management Plan (Download)

Baseline Water Supply and Demand Analysis (2000, also known as the Kennedy-Jenks report. Current surcharge ordinance and drought “stages” are in this document.)
Water Master Plan Task 2 Baseline Water Supply Analysis (Download)

Assessment of Long-Term Water Supply Alternatives (2002. Also known as Task 4 of the Water Master Plan. Includes data used to compare various alternative sources and the basis on which they were evaluated.)
Assessment of Long Term Water Needs and Alternatives (Download)

Buildout Reduction Report (prepared by consultant and approved by CCSD Board in 2005)
Buildout reduction report (download)

Water Master Plan Environmental Impact Report (2007)
EIR WMP Download

Also an interesting read: the appeal on the Pine Knolls tanks project (June 2005)
CCC Staff Report Pine Knolls Tanks Appeal

In my email box when I got home this evening: the agenda for a special meeting of the Cambria Community Services District next Tuesday. Below is the entire one page agenda. The Cambria CSD website was unavailable as of this writing, so I haven’t been able to check if the agenda packet was available on the district’s website. Download the agenda packet with the details at the Cambria CSD website.

?CAMBRIA COMMUNITY SERVICES DISTRICT
CALL BY THE PRESIDENT AND FINAL AGENDA
FOR SPECIAL MEETING OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS
I, Greg Sanders, President of the Cambria Community Services District Board of Directors,
hereby call a Special Meeting of the Board of Directors pursuant to California Government Code
Section 54956. The Special Meeting will be held: Tuesday, January 05, 2010, 12:00 PM, 1000 Main Street, Veterans Memorial Building, Cambria, CA. The purpose of the special meeting is to discuss or transact the following business:
AGENDA
SPECIAL MEETING OF THE CAMBRIA COMMUNITY SERVICES DISTRICT
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
TUESDAY, JANUARY 05, 2010, 12:00 PM
1000 MAIN STREET
Cambria, CA
1.     OPENING
A.     Call to Order
B.     Establishment of Quorum
C. D.     Pledge of Allegiance Adjourn to Closed Session 1. CONFERENCE WITH LABOR NEGOTIATORS
Agency Designated Representatives: General Manager
Employee Organization: IAFF Local 4635, Cambria CSD
E. Reconvene to Open Session – 12:30 PM F. Report from Closed Session
2.     PUBLIC COMMENT Members of the public wishing to address the Board on any item described in
this Notice may do so when recognized by the Board President. Public comment on this agenda will be
limited to 3 minutes per person.
3.     SPECIAL MEETING BUSINESS
A.     Consider Adoption of Resolution 01-2010 Approving a Geotechnical and
Hydrogeologic Study at Santa Rosa Creek Beach and Directing Staff to File a
Notice of Exemption, Pursuant to Title 14 California Code of Regulations § 15306
4.     PUBLIC COMMENT Members of the public wishing to address the Board on any item described in
this Notice may do so when recognized by the Board President. Public comment on this agenda will be
limited to 3 minutes per person.
5.     ADJOURN
Notice of this special meeting shall be delivered to each member of the Board of Directors and
to each local newspaper of general circulation and radio or television station who have
requested such notice. Notice must be received at least twenty-four (24) hours before the time
set for the special meeting.
Dated: December 30, 2009
By:
_/s/__________________________________
Gregory W. Sanders, President

At the November 16, 2009 meeting of the Cambria Community Services District meeting, District Engineer Bob Gresens did a presentation on the costs of various potable water supplies for Cambria. If you missed the meeting and don’t have Charter Cable, you were out of luck on seeing the powerpoint. The Cambria CSD added the presentation to its website at least a week ago as an addendum to the November 16, 2009 agenda packet. It took me a while to find it there, but here is the critical page. (Download the full presentation here.)

There are a number of questions we should be asking, starting with the most important one: how much will it cost Cambrians to go from 90%  to 100% reliability from their water system?**(see below) Note that when the aquifers are completely recharged, we have enough water to meet current demand without threat of saltwater intrusion or habitat destruction.

Director DeMicco asked Gresens to show how he arrived at the numbers shown below and will likely do so in a utilities committee meeting. The information in this chart is incomplete or comparing apples with oranges and could be misleading if misunderstood. I encourage you to take it with a grain of salt (no pun intended). I look forward to hearing Mr. Gresens

Cost of Various Water Supply Alternatives

PRESENT WORTH COST SUMMARY OF POTABLE WATER SUPPLY ALTERNATIVES

**In Task Two of the District’s Master Plan (a.k.a. the Kennedy Jenks baseline water supply analysis)  the following conclusions were developed:
• The District’s current water supplies are marginal to inadequate to provide a 90 percent level of reliability (i.e., in about one out of ten years there may not be enough water for current customers, who will have to cut back on water use).
• The District’s current water supplies are inadequate to provide a 95 percent level of reliability (i.e., in about one out of twenty years there may be a severe water  shortage and current customers will have to cut back on water use).

The recurrence frequency of incomplete refill in the San Simeon Creek basin has been estimated at 1 year in 34. The return frequency for the same event in Santa Rosa Creek basin has been estimated at 1 year in 25 (Yates, 1991).

It also assumes “Public water utilities should have a water supply reliability of 90 to <100 percent, recognizing that the cost to achieve high levels of reliability may be difficult and expensive. Accordingly, alternative criteria of 90 and 95 percent reliability are presented.”

Based on the evaluation criteria presented in the previous section, the analysis  indicates  the projected ending groundwater level in the San Simeon Creek basin is expected to be above the minimum groundwater level criterion if the basin is completely recharged at the beginning of the Dry Season and the probability that groundwater levels will be sufficiently high at the beginning of the Dry Season to maintain the minimum criteria is near the 90 percent reliability objective but well below the 95 percent reliability objective, particularly in critically dry years.
Also, the expected production requirements from each basin is within its dry season water rights limitations. The results of this dry season evaluation indicate that all of the evaluation criteria except for the 90 percent reliability criterion during extreme critically dry years and the 95 percent reliability criterion are met for current water demands. Therefore, the District’s current water supplies are marginal to inadequate to provide a 90 percent level of reliability for current water demands and are inadequate to provide a 95 percent reliability level.

Additional analysis from the Kennedy Jenks study will follow. Download a version marked with my highlighting here.

The “opening act” at the December 14, 2009 meeting of the Cambria Community Services District will be Colonel Thomas H. Magness, IV, 58th commander, Los Angeles District, Army Corp of Engineers. According to Director Chaldecott, the Colonel will provide an update on the status of the desalination project.  Out of respect for his time, he is scheduled at the start of the meeting.

Some information is available, if you really look for it. There is a little information available about funding for Cambria’s project and some brief information about a $70,000.00 contract awarded to San Francisco-based Noble Consultants at the beginning of November,  chosen from a field of eight other interested parties. Visit this site for the  complete source. To read the October 30, 2009  news release issued by the Army Corps of Engineers about the award, click here.

The Cambria CSD recently approved a payment of $166,000 in  matching funds and is awaiting a decision on how much of the money we’ve already spent on desalination will count toward the 25% required matching funds. It seems unclear what amount this is a match for. As of October 16, 2009,  Estimated Recovery Act Funds Allocated of $950,600 and  Recovery Act Funds Obligated was $255,945  Download the excel spreadsheet here.

This project will not be inexpensive or easy or accomplished quickly. I look forward to hearing right from the Colonel’s mouth what the status of our project is.The meeting is Monday December 14, 2009 at 12:30 pm at the Veteran’s hall. I’ll post more agenda information once its available.

See you there!

At the November 2009 Cambria Community Services District Meeting, two speakers raised concern that San Simeon is in talks with the CCSD about buying some of the desalinated water from Cambria’s plant – once it is producing water.

In November 2006, 78% of Cambrians approved Measure P-06. Below is the exact language from the League of Women Voters site:

Shall the ordinance requiring a majority vote of the electorate of the Cambria Community Services District to provide potable water service outside the 2006 District boundaries be adopted? The Board of Directors shall not authorize the extension of water service except non potable water for agricultural and irrigation purposes for outside of the District boundaries, as the boundaries exist at the enactment of this ordinance, for residential, industrial, or commercial purposes without first completing environmental review under the California Environmental Quality Act or its successor statute, amending the Water Master Plan, and then submitting the question for approval to the voters of the District. The property owner seeking water service will pay the costs of the application and election in advance.

A few thoughts occur as I’ve thought about how possessive some people seem to be about “our” water.

1. It is premature to be concerned about this at this point. It hasn’t even been shown that desalination is even feasible here.
2. Second, Measure P-06 does not forbid selling water outside the boundaries of the CCSD, just providing water service (except non potable…)
3. As a federally-funded project with the Army Corps of Engineers as the lead agency, the project funding could hinge on whether or not we will sell water to San Simeon, a water-short community less than 7 miles from a major federal project.
4. San Simeon may decide it is worth the money and effort to apply for water service and fund the election required.
5. CCSD wouldn’t be giving the water away for free. They would be selling it. If CCSD charges the amount it costs to create the potable water, it will not cost Cambrians anything.
6. By getting the San Simeon Community Services District in talks this early, we are more likely to be able to strike a deal that includes having San Simeon paying a share of the construction costs, which reduces the burden on Cambrians (and could increase the likelihood that we will get all the funding we need from the Federal Government.)

I favor better management of our current resources, rather than impressive capital expenditures, ongoing operations costs and the  environmental effects of a desal plant. But the CCSD Board is on the desalination path (for the time being).  If we are going to create a project with the environmental effects of a desalination plant, it seems to me that cooperating with San Simeon to help ease their water shortage, while reducing some of the potential costs to Cambrians is a sensible direction to follow.

Quite a few things have to happen before we should need to get all worked up about San Simeon getting “our” water, starting with determining whether we can even have desal.  And then San Simeon will have to decide whether it would be worth it for them to pursue. If the past is any indication, getting a deal in place between the two agencies will be next to impossible anyway.

The bottom line: “Worrying is like a rocking chair, it gives you something to do, but it doesn’t get you anywhere” – Unknown

Marin Municipal Water District (MMWD) is pursuing desalination as a supplemental supply for their customers. As in Cambria, there is vigorous debate over whether that is an appropriate solution for Marin.  In August,  James Fryer, Environmental Scientist and author of Sustaining Our Water Future wrote a paper entitled Water Supply Reliability and Catastrophic Planning Considerations that Cambrians may find interesting and familiar.

Fryer writes

There is a clear lack of consensus on the need to move forward with further effort and investment in developing a desalination facility. Continued investment in desalination with the present lack of consensus  will result in further conflict with a large portion of ratepayers which will create a diversion from focusing resources on viable water supply reliability and infrastructure improvements that have widespread consensus.

Fryer suggests the MMWD Board and a specially formed Citizen’s Advisory Council  work on resolving some specific policy issues:

What is the future water supply deficit and what future growth projections are reasonable for MMWD and NMWD?

Should carbon footprint reduction be used to offset large new energy uses or the existing footprint?

Is the $1,631/af marginal cost use in the MMWD conservation master plan a valid comparison point for conservation planning compared to the $2,900 to $4,400 marginal cost of desalination?

What is the definition of conservation first? Does this really mean simultaneous with desalination?

What is basis of a potential decision to move forward with desalination despite compelling evidence it is not needed?

These issues have significant bearing on water supply reliability planning and each should be specifically addressed before moving forward with a decision on desalination….

But an important question remains, what if Marin experiences a 3+ year severe drought event that far exceeds any drought event on record or detected in the 400 year tree ring analysis of local weather conditions? Is this a potential catastrophic event the MMWD Board should be considering and is it justified to approve a major capital investment of hundreds of millions of dollars for a desalination facility only needed for this type of unprecedented event?

The rest of the paper looks at planning for several different catastrophic events, including  comparison of a full range of relevant possibilities. This would enable the MMWD Board to allocate limited financial resources to preparing for the most likely events, instead of laying out huge sums chasing solutions for events extremely unlikely or completely unprecedented.

In Fryer’s words:

“First, it is important to briefly define and examine each type of catastrophic event. Then the individual events should be ranked for each category of risk and impact. Finally, the four types of catastrophic events should be ranked against each other.”

Read the full paper by downloading it here.

Let’s remember we are not alone in the world. We can learn from other communities – and should.