City ground water coming up clean

Tariq Malik

HUNTINGTON BEACH -- Initial tests of ground water from beneath

Downtown Huntington Beach have found no traces of contamination from

bacteria.

City officials announced the preliminary results Monday after

laboratory tests of water samples from the area came up clean.

“These results are the first of five weeks of testing,” said Robert

Beardsley, the city’s Public Works director. “They’ve all come up clean,

with no detection of contamination, so we’re all very pleased.”

Water samples were drawn and tested from 10 Downtown monitoring wells

by the Surf City-based Komex H2O Science Inc., an environment and water

resources company, on March 28 and 29. Komex officials will take samples

from the wells once a week over the next four weeks to confirm the

results.

Anthony Brown, the hydrologist leading the Komex study, said about two

liters taken from each of the 10 wells not only failed to contain any

contaminants, but fell well within the general parameters expected of

ground water in Orange County.

The results, city officials said, were expected and are a vindication

for the city, whose past sewer problems have taken center stage in recent

days.

Last week, the city pleaded guilty to three counts of violating the

state water code regulating the negligent and intentional discharge of

pollutants.

Orange County Superior Court Commissioner Martin Engquist sentenced

the city to five years’ probation and $75,000 in fines to be suspended

pending successful probation completion. The city was also ordered to

spend at least $250,000 to assess and clean any remaining sewage and

comply fully with an abatement order from the Santa Ana Regional Water

Control Board.

That sentence was revisited Monday, when the city and Assistant Dist.

Atty. Bob Gannon appeared before Engquist to clarify that the charges

against Huntington Beach were misdemeanors and not felonies.”We

understood that this was a misdemeanor case from the beginning,” Gannon

said, adding that the charges were listed as a public offense and carried

a misdemeanor sentence.

Garry Poulson, the city’s attorney, said it’s important to the city to

clear up that it did not engage in a felony, and to send out the message

that Huntington Beach “stepped up to the plate” to handle its sewer

problem correctly.

The city first became aware of its ailing sewer lines in 1996, when

video camera inspections found broken pipes in the Downtown and Old Town

areas. The city has since repaired those sewer lines, measuring about

48,000 feet of pipe, with a slip-lining seal.