San Carlos settles sewage overflow lawsuit

By Shaun Bishop
San Mateo County Times

SAN CARLOS — The city will pay $350,000 to settle a federal lawsuit brought by an environmental watchdog group saying the city's storm sewer systems allowed untreated sewage overflows into the Bay.

The agreement, approved 5-0 on Monday night by the City Council, resolves a lawsuit filed Dec. 2 by San Francisco Baykeeper and commits the city to spending millions more to clean out and upgrade its sewer system and improve its monitoring of overflows.

City officials said it was in the best interest of the city to settle. Taking the issue to court could have cost San Carlos potentially millions of dollars in penalties if Baykeeper could prove the city's violations.

Still, two members of the City Council said the lawsuit adds unnecessary costs, because the city had already begun studying ways to fix its aging sewer system.

"It's just incredibly frustrating," Councilman Andy Klein said. "We were going to get there anyway, and now we just have to pay a bunch of lawyers a lot of money."

"It's unfortunate we have to pay this fine, if you will, for something we had already planned for and were in the midst of doing," added Councilman Matt Grocott.

Baykeeper filed similar lawsuits against Millbrae and the West Bay Sanitary District in December, claiming the agencies' records showed they spilled thousands of gallons of sewage into the Bay since 2004 in violation of clean water laws.

Jason Flanders, Baykeeper's staff attorney, told the council the settlement was an opportunity for the city to "really show their commitment to water quality protection."

San Carlos will pay Baykeeper's $95,000 in legal fees plus $55,000 for experts employed by Baykeeper to monitor the city's compliance with the terms of the settlement.

The city also must pay $200,000 to the Rose Foundation for Communities and the Environment, an Oakland-based group, for "environmental project activities that will benefit the San Francisco Bay or its tributaries."

The settlement funds will come from the city's $3.9 million sewer fund reserves and will not affect the city's general fund, which has a $3.5 million deficit in next year's budget.

The sewer fund will also cover the cost of the nonmonetary terms of the Baykeeper settlement, which requires increased monitoring of overflows and more cleaning.

The city averages 67 sanitary sewer overflows per year, and must gradually reduce that to four overflows per year by 2017 under the settlement.

Officials plan to spend about $2 million over the next year to comply, including $800,000 to hire a contractor to clean and inspect the sewers and $115,000 to spray tree root-dissolving foam through the pipes.

....Click here to read the full piece at the San Mateo County Times.