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HomeMy WebLinkAbout03 - Fecal Coliform TMDL & the Health Risk AssessmentJanuary 25, 2000 Agenda Item No. 3 NEWPORT BEACH CITY COUNCIL ]anuary 25, 2000 Regular Meeting — FROM: Dave Kiff, Deputy City Manager SUBJECT: Fecal Coliform TMDL & the Health Risk Assessment EXECUTIVE The Regional Water Quality Control Board is supervising a study - called a Health SUMMARY: Risk Assessment -that may modify the Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL) for Fecal Coliform (a possible indicator of human pathogens present in Newport Bay). Area residents and nationally recognized scientists have asked whether or not the Assessment will improve the TMDL, arguing that the Assessment relies upon subjective assumptions that may lead to poorly- supported results unable to withstand scientific scrutiny. The Resolution proposed in this Agenda Item states the City's position that the Fecal Coliform TMDL's standards for water contact recreation (" RECI ") be met at all points of the Bay regardless of the results of the Health Risk Assessment. • BACKGROUND: Newport Bay is designated as an "impaired" water body, meaning that it is "not reasonably expected to attain or maintain water quality standards." As an impaired water body, the California Regional Water Quality Control Board (Santa Ana Region) has listed the Bay as "water quality limited" in accordance with §303(d) of the federal Clean Water Act and the Board's Water Quality Assessment (WQA). The Clean Water Act provides two major mechanisms to clean up water quality limited bodies: • Watershed Restoration Action Strategies. This mechanism provides a comprehensive, regional approach to improving water quality throughout a water body's tributary system. TMDLS • Total Maximum Daily Loads. This mechanism focuses restoration activities within specific waters by requiring a reduction of pollutants in order to meet the applicable water quality standards needed to protect "beneficial uses." TMDLs received new emphasis in the early 1990s as citizen organizations brought legal action against the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to comply with the Clean Water Act by listing waters as water quality limited and by developing TMDLs. Eighteen suits, including one brought by Defend the Bay, were resolved via the local development of TMDLs. Today, more than 2,000 TMDLs are under development. About 1,250 have already been established by the EPA or its state partners (in California, the State Water Resources Control Board is the state partner). Ultimately, almost 40,000 TMDLs will have to be established nationwide. Page 2 BACKGROUND: Newport Bay will have at least four TMDLs: (COntd) • Sediment. Adopted on October 9,1998, the Sediment TMDL requires local partners (stakeholders in the watershed) to survey the Bay regularly and to TMDLs for Newport reduce annual sediment coming into the Bay from 250,000 cubic yards to gay 125,000 cubic yards (a 50% reduction) by 2008. The TMDLs' goal is to reduce dredging frequency in the Bay to once every 20 to 30 years. • Nutrients. Approved by US EPA on April 16,1999, the Nutrient TMDL will limit nitrogen and phosphorus inputs to the Bay. The Nutrient TMDL attempts to reduce the annual loading of nitrogen by 50% -- from 1,400 pounds per day today to approximately 850 to 802 pounds per day at San Diego Creek -by 2012. Phosphorus loading must fall from 86,912 pounds per year in 2002 to 62,080 pounds by 2007. • Fecal Coliform (also known as the "Pathogen" TMDL). Approved by the State Office of Administrative Law on December 30,1999, the Fecal Coliform TMDL will attempt to make the Bay meet water contact recreation (RECD standards (swimnung, wading, surfing) by 2014 and shellfish harvesting (SHEL) standards (where waters support shellfish acceptable for human consumption) by 2020. • Toxics. Planned for development in 2002, the Toxics TMDL will address Bay inputs like heavy metals (chromium, copper, lead, cadmium, zinc) and priority organics like (endosulfan, DDT, Chlordane, PCBs, Toxaphene, diazinon, chlorpyriphos, more). The Fecal Coliform TMDL has been among the most contentious of the three TMDLs • Fecal Coliform - an developed to date. The TMDUs monitoring provisions measure whether or not the "IndiCatorBacteria" Bay has met REC1 and SHEL standards by testing for fecal coliform, an "indicator bacteria" whose presence may also indicate the presence of human pathogens like viruses and other bacteria that can make humans sick. The best way to test for the presence of human viruses is to test for the viruses themselves -but such tests are extremely expensive and there is no expert consensus on the best methodology to test for viruses. A cheaper alternative is to look for an indicator bacteria. Experts disagree on whether fecal coliform is the best indicator bacteria to use. For example, fecal coliform is typically present in the fecal matter of many warm- blooded creatures like ducks, cats, dogs, feral animals, humans and more. It is also present in soils and fertilizers when the soils contain manure. Fecal coliform from a non -human source may or may not have any pathogen associated with it that is harmful to humans. But while fecal coliform may not be the perfect indicator of human pathogens, experts again disagree on what might be better. As the Regional Board considered adopting the Fecal Coliform TMDL in April 1999, some of the City's local partners (including the Irvine Ranch Water District VRWDJ and The Irvine Company) argued that the Board should not adopt the TMDL before The Health Risk conducting a health risk assessment (HRA). The HRA would look for yet another Assessment indicator -a virus called fspeciftc coliphage -and will "model" its movement down the Bay as if f specific coliphage was a coliform bacteria. HRA will then attempt to measure a Bay user's relative health risk in using the Bay. In other words, the HRA will try to estimate the likelihood that a Bay swimmer will get sick from a Bay pathogen • transported like and present to the same extent as f specific coliphage. Page 3 •BACKGROUND: Rather than wait for the HRA's completion, the Regional Board agreed to adopt the (contdJ Fecal Coliform TMDL but to include the HRA as one of the studies that may modify the TMDL at a later date. The Health Risk Assessment What is it? The Assessment includes the development of a model to show the flow of bacteria in Newport Bay AND an assessment of the relative risk to a person's health when swimming in the Bay. It includes a cost - benefit analysis of projects to control pathogens and the projects' commensurate reductions in public health risk. What are its components? The HRA Scope of Work includes at least seven components: • A survey of Bay users. • The configuration of a model that shows how fspecificm/iphageand coliform get transported down the Bay. • Routine testing for fspecificcoiiphageand coliform between July 1999 and July 2001. • An evaluation (via survey) of the "no discharge" limitations on vessel waste. • A characterization of a Bay user's risk of getting sick from a human enteric virus associated with either fsped ccoiiphageor fecal coliform • A comparison of this illness risk with risks in other water quality environments. • A comparison of benefits and costs associated with programs that would limit pathogen inputs to the Bay as tempered by relative improvements in human health risks. Who is managing the Assessment? The Regional Board is the Project Manager, overseeing the Irvine Ranch Water District (IRWD) and its subcontractor, an Oakland -based firm called EOA, Incorporated. EOA will use a bacteria transport model developed by a second firm (RMA). EOA will use a second model - one that estimates swimmer illness - called the "Olivieri" model. . IRWD will oversee both EOA and RMA's work. A 15- member HeaithAd✓ismyCommittee(HAC) meets as needed to oversee the Scope of Work, especially the cost - benefit analysis. Who will pay for the Assessment? Total cost of the Assessment is $260,000. The City has contributed $3,700 - the same amount as most of the local partners. IRWD and The Irvine Company will provide $5,000 each, including in -kind work. Funding for the remaining $150,000 was to come from a State grant. Questions about As the Assessment has been underway, local residents and interest groups have the Assessment questioned its value. They have asked: • Is f specific coliphage an appropriate indicator of human pathogens? F specific coliphage is a virus that infects a coli bacteria but does not cause human infection. 98% of fecal matter does not contain any f specific coliphage, but the fecal matter still could contain significant numbers of viruses harmful to humans. Typically, f specific coliphage indicates the presence of treated wastewater (where the virus has multiplied thanks to the presence of a coli. Because it is most often found in the treatment process, f specific coliphage is not likely to be present with untreated human waste. Therefore, the Assessment might understate the health risk of swimming in the Bay by understating a presence of untreated human waste. • Do user surveys provide appropriate data? Some argue that the Bay user surveys -- asked of swimmers, beachgoers, surfers, and boat owners -may not be answered truthfully. Will the survey results inappropriately skew the results of the overall Assessment? Page 4 BACKGROUND: • Is the methodology of the Assessment valuable? The Assessment uses a (contd) transport model (estimating the path and life of f specific coliphage down the Bay) and a complex risk assessment that projects the incidence of illness in Bay users. The Assessment's model assumes one human enteric virus for each f specific coliphage found. This assumption and others are not as accurate as a full -scale epidemiological study like the one done in Santa Monica Bay in 1996. • What's the end motive? Will the results of the Assessment -even with assumptions subject to debate -be used by upstream local partners to argue that the Regional Board should modify the Fecal Coliform TMDL to allow water that exceeds bacteriological standards into the Upper Bay at San Diego Creek? Other Views While the Assessment can fairly be subject to criticism about its assumptions (criticism that EOA itself has acknowledged), Regional Board staff and others come to the Assessment's defense by offering the following points: • Is there a better alternative? No one has yet proposed a more appropriate indicator to track than f specific coliphage. The indicator has a limited "track record" because this type of Assessment and modeling is somewhat unprecedented (as is the Fecal Coliform TMDL in an estuarine environment). • Helping with the TMDL itself. At least three aspects of the Assessment -the modeling, the review of beneficial uses and users, and the sampling program -all satisfy portions of the Fecal Coliform TMDL's monitoring requirements. Arguably, the City would be hard- pressed to complete these same tasks individually for less than the $3,700 it will contribute to the Assessment. • EPA still matters. If the Assessment shows that swimmers won't get sick from a San Diego Creek bacteria or virus and upstream partners argue for a modified TMDL that doesn t require water clean -up at the Creek, that may not be good enough for Federal EPA. They may still require the Creek's waters to meet the TMDL standards as it enters the Bay. What this Agenda On Thursday, January 6, 2000, the Harbor Quality Citizens Advisory Committee Item does.. voted unanimously to recommend that the City Council adopt the attached resolution. The resolution does not comment on the value of the Assessment. Instead, it states the City's position that all of the waters entering the Bay - including the San Diego Creek and the Santa Ana -Delhi Channel -meet the REC1 standards described in the Fecal Coliform TMDL. RECOMMENDED Adopt Resoluion 2000 -_ ACTION: u 0 • RESOLUTION 2000- A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF NEWPORT BEACH RELATING TO THE APPLICATION OF THE TOTAL MAXIMUM DAILY LOAD (TMDL) FOR FECAL COLIFORM FOR NEWPORT BAY WHEREAS, Newport Bay receives urban runoff from the Newport Bay watershed, an area that includes unincorporated County territory and areas within the cities of Costa Mesa, Laguna Woods, Lake Forest, Irvine, Newport Beach, Orange, Santa Ana, and Tustin; and WHEREAS, the primary tributaries to Newport Bay are the Santa Ana Delhi Channel (draining the cities of Costa Mesa and Santa Ana), San Diego Creek (draining the cities of Irvine, Laguna Woods, Lake Forest, portions of Newport Beach, Orange, and Tustin), and Big Canyon Wash (draining Newport Beach); and WHEREAS, Newport Bay has been designated as an "impaired" water body, meaning that it is not reasonably expected to attain or maintain water quality standards without significant local and regional mitigation actions; and WHEREAS, as an impaired water body, the California Regional Water Quality Control Board (Santa Ana Region) has listed Newport Bay as "water quality limited" in accordance with §303 (d) of the federal Clean Water Act; and WHEREAS, the Clean Water Act contains two primary mechanisms to improve water quality limited bodies, including Total Maximum Daily Loads or "TMDLs and WHEREAS, the Regional Board has developed three TMDLs for Newport Bay, including sediment (adopted October 9,1998), nutrients (effective April 16,1999), and fecal coliform (effective December 30,1999); and WHEREAS, a fourth TMDL -for toxics -is expected to be in place by 2002; and WHEREAS, the Fecal Coliform TMDL requires all waters in the Bay to meet Water Contact Recreation (REC1) and Shellfish Harvesting (SHEL) standards by 2014 and 2020, respectively; and WHEREAS, the City of Newport Beach has been working towards the REC1 and SHEL standards where the City's urban flows contribute to high fecal coliform counts in the Bay by developing storm drain -to -sewer diversion projects, improved National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) actions, and DNA fingerprinting of fecal coliform; and Resolution 2000 -_ Page 2 WHEREAS, while the City can work to improve areas within its own jurisdiction, the City is unable to control what enters the Bay from the San Diego Creek and the Santa Ana Delhi Channel; and WHEREAS, bacteriological tests of the water from these tributaries as it enters the Bay regularly and routinely shows fecal and total coliform counts that exceed state standards and the REC1 and SHEL standards set for the Fecal Coliform TMDL; and WHEREAS, the City is concerned that, as it attempts to meet the Fecal Coliform TMDL in the tributaries and storm drains within its jurisdiction, other agencies upstream may not be as aggressive in cleaning up the Santa Ana Delhi Channel and the San Diego Creek; now, therefore, be it RESOLVED by the City Council of the City of Newport Beach that the City of Newport Beach supports the Regional Board's complete and thorough application of the Fecal Coliform TMDL's "REC1" standards as defined in the current Santa Ana River Basin Plan and in the version of the Fecal Coliform TMDL approved by the State of California on December 30, 1999 (as described in Table 5 -9f of the TMDL) to and at all areas of Newport Bay, including the specific points at which the Santa Ana Delhi Channel and the San Diego Creek enter the Bay. The City believes that the waters entering the Bay - especially given the flows at San Diego Creek - should not be exempted from meeting the TMDL's standards. ADOPTED this 25th day of January, 2000. John E. Noyes MAYOR ATTEST: LaVonne Harkless CITY CLERK • E