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Update on first court hearing Surfrider Foundation vs. City of San Diego.

Today, finally, after 4 date and time changes, was the first of (what
appears to be) many court hearings for the South Bay Ocean Outfall (SBOO)
case (Surfrider Foundation vs. City of San Diego). Rory Wicks, attorney for
Surfrider Foundation, started off strong laying out our complaint. Judge
O'Neill however took over quite soon with a rather unconventional (he
himself called it "Socrates like") approach to matters. The inquiry focused
mainly on three questions:

1) How much more sewage than originally planned for will be discharged
through the SBOO?
The City of San Diego claimed that the figure of 330 Million Gallons per day
(MGD) are well within the range of the original EIS. The EIS indeed contains
considerations of up to 340 some MGD for the SBOO. However, the considered
quality of that sewage (it was thought to include 36 MGD of tertiary treated
sewage, i.e. water usable for agricultural purposes) was one of the more
confusing topics of the day. The matter of discharge QUALITY was not yet
explored sufficiently to make our point, although Rory tried several times
to educate the judge about this issue. Judge O'Neill admitted at the
beginning of the session that he still has to learn a lot about the case and
it's many technical details.

2) Did the City of San Diego comply with it's obligation to supply an
Environmental Impact Report?
The focused EIR prepared by the City of San Diego is virtually identical
with the original EIS and was prepared by a Senior Staff employee of the
City and a student intern. This constitutes in our eyes a violation of the
requirements for expert opinion and thorough studies of the environmental
impact of this project. The City of San Diego states that it consulted an
oceanographic consulting company but other than that referred repeatedly to
the EIS as the relevant document. It turned out that the only "controversial
opinion" considered in the records for the City Council were two letters
from us the Surfrider Foundation. This raises a very dangerous catch 22.
Under the Judge's reasoning, if comments are made to a draft EIR, the agency
can then argue that those matters were considered by virtue of their
inclusion in the Record. To the dangerous contrary, if the comments are not
contained in the Record, thereis no standing to sue.

3) Was the gyre in the area of the SBOO studied enough?
This gyre is a circular water current present 87% of the time which
potentially could bring discharged sewage back onto the shore line and
presumably will contain any discharge and thus concentrate it in its
current. No computer studies of this gyre were included to consider onshore
drift of discharge, even not and explicitly so in the EIS. Again, no
conclusion could be reached in this point today.

Good news was, that Channel 8 sent a camera team and a reporter down and
several newspapers were present as well. Our Executive Director Pierce Flynn
gave a statement on behalf of Surfrider Foundation. Public attention to
these matters is essential since there was much misinformation disseminated.

The next court hearing was set for the coming Tuesday, January 30 at 3 p.m.,
there is a possibility of postponement to Wednesday, January 31 at 10 a.m.
however.

h.


-- 
_____________
Helge Weissig
helgew@sdsc.edu
http://www.sdsc.edu/SDSC/Partners/Surfrider/SanDiego