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Home My WebLink AboutS22 - Recreational Water Quality TestingCITY OF NEWPORT BEACH CITY COUNCIL STAFF REPORT Agenda Item No. S22 February 24, 2009 TO: HONORABLE MAYOR AND MEMBERS OF THE CITY COUNCIL FROM: City Manager's Office Dave Kiff, Assistant City Manager 9491644 -3002 or dkiff @city.newport- beach.ca.us SUBJECT: Letter Regarding Recreational Water Quality Testing ISSUE: Should the City advocate for changes in recreational water quality testing in light of budget reductions at the County level? Authorize Council Member Gardner to sign and distribute a letter to other cities, the County, and the California Regional Water Quality Control Board (Santa Ana Region) regarding recreational water quality testing. DISCUSSION: The County of Orange's Health Care Agency (OC HCA) and the Orange County Sanitation District (OCSD) sample and test recreational waters for fecal indicator bacteria (FIB) in our region. While OC HCA's water quality program dates back to the 1960s in a more voluntary environment, OC HCA now samples and tests in part per Assembly Bill 411 (Wayne, 1997). AB 411 directed that public agencies standardize recreational water quality testing (and sewage spill response) statewide to attempt to improve the public's awareness of the presence of levels of bacteria that may also indicate the presence of human waste. OCSD does not test per AB 411's directive, but does so as a condition of its ability to discharge effluent in its wastewater outfall off of Huntington Beach. More specifically, testing sites and frequencies in our region are as follows: Recent budget reductions at the State and County have caused OC HCA to consider cutting back on non - mandated testing, including the 50 locations noted above and especially during the winter months (AB 411 only requires testing during the April 1 to October 31 period). Further, Letter regarding Recreational Water Quality Testing February 24, 2009 Page 2 because AB 411's testing is a state - mandated local program, reduced State funding may lead to a suspension of that mandate on OC HCA and that testing, leaving the possibility of less locations tested during the high -use months, too. If OC HCA did this reduction, OCSD's testing program would likely remain — and remain protective of most ocean locations — but locations like the Newport Slough, all of Newport Bay, and portions of Crystal Cove's ocean waters would not be tested at all in the off- season. The Coastal -Bay Water Quality Committee saw these potential changes as both problematic and an opportunity to consider changes in the region's water quality testing protocols. They discussed an opportunity to "right -size' our water quality testing, at least during challenging fiscal times, to ensure that many locations stay tested year -round (in part to keep data consistent from year to year). Key concepts of this right- sizing include: • Sharing resources across agencies that sample and test; • For the short -term fiscal problems, consider reducing the frequency of sampling to save sampling locations; • Consider sampling one or two of the three FIB that we sample for today to save resources; and • Consider eliminating or reducing testing offat storm drain locations that we know to consistently be high in bacteria — instead taking that revenue and using it to solve the bacteria problem instead of endlessly monitoring it. The Committee took an action on February 12, 2009 to ask the Council to consider sending a letter to other coastal cities, the County, and the California Regional Water Quality Control Board, Santa Ana Region, to encourage this discussion. The letter is attached. Environmental Review: The City Council's approval of this Agenda Item does not require environmental review. Public Notice: This agenda item may be noticed according to the Ralph M. Brown Act (72 hours in advance of the public meeting at which the City Council considers the item). Submitted by: U Dave Kiff Assistant City Manager Attachment: Draft Letter Letter regarding Recreational Water Quality Testing February 24, 2009 Page 3 February 25, 2009 Dear Colleagues: As budget crises and bad economic times lead the County Health Care Agency and others to scale back, or in some cases eliminate, recreational water testing in our rivers, bays, and ocean, the City of Newport Beach believes that we should see this crisis as an opportunity. That opportunity is to evaluate and "right -size' recreational water testing in our region, in California, and maybe even the nation. Significant, substantive and appropriate effort was put into AB 411 (1997, Wayne) in Sacramento and into HR 999 (Bilbray, 2000) in Washington DC. Both pieces of legislation led to well- supported and well- researched (at the time) recreational water testing programs and standards in California and across the country. But that was then, and this is now — we're twelve years away from AB 411 and nearly ten from HR 999. Twelve years later, we now know much more about water quality sampling and analysis. And what high counts of certain "indicator bacteria' mean and what they do not mean. We fully admit that we do not know all that we should, but we believe that it is time to: • Share the region's testing and sampling resources, where appropriate. As many are aware, there is a Beach Water Quality Workgroup (BWQW), chaired by the State Water Resources Control Board. This is a good forum — if combined with other interested parties and with decision- makers present — to determine who's doing what monitoring and how it could be more efficient and effective. That discussion might lead to eliminating duplicative monitoring to spread the limited monitoring and analysis funds that agencies have. Indeed, the Model Ocean Water Quality Monitoring Program being developed by the BWQW may be exactly what's needed in a minimal (during difficult budget times) model program. • Stop testing for some indicator bacteria, and emphasize others. For example, some assert that fecal coliform and total coliforms may not be as valuable as testing for Enterococcus (ENT). This could allow us to save up to 2/3 the testing and analysis cost, and could reduce sampling costs, too. Speciation of Enterococcus, while expensive, might give us long -term savings, if we can delineate human sources of Enterococcus versus plant or bird sources. • Instead of stopping beach water quality monitoring in some areas with high public use entirely during the wet season, the region should discuss ratcheting back the frequency of testing in areas where monitoring may be three or five days a week, especially in areas that routinely exhibit good clean water. While frequent monitoring is always desired, it may be time to trade frequency of testing for a broader breadth of testing locations, if the alternative is stopping testing in some swimming areas completely. • At the same time, we should discuss ending the monitoring of some no -water contact conveyances entirely — like storm drains upstream where no one swims. Yes, they have high bacteria counts — they had similar counts last year, and similar counts five years ago — Letter regarding Recreational Water Quality Testing February 24. 2009 Page 4 shouldn't we stop reminding ourselves of this and instead spend that same monitoring money to clean the storm drains up? We recognize that some of these changes will be controversial, and, even if we agreed upon a plan today, would take a long time to change the rules and regulations to implement. But the longer we wait, the more we delay the inevitable — we all know, even if we are reluctant to admit it, that the time has come to re -think and right -size recreational water testing. We have extensive data. We have some of the smartest researchers in the nation right here. We are the ones who should start the next phase of rules and regulations — an AB 411 for 2009 if you will. As noted, we believe that the Beach Water Quality Workgroup and /or the Southern California Coastal Water Research Project (SCCWRP) are two ideal conveners for this discussion. If others are willing to talk about the issues we have raised here, please let us know (949- 644 - 3002). Sincerely, NANCY GARDNER Council Member, City of Newport Beach Chair, Coastal -Bay Water Quality Committee