Sounding Board -- Tod W. Ridgeway

Has Tom Szulga been out of town (Mailbag, “Mayor should have informed

residents of water,) March 21)? In his letter, he apparently overlooked

these articles in the Daily Pilot and Los Angeles Times that many readers

didn’t miss:

* “Newport Shuts Down 4 Water Wells,” Daily Pilot, Jan. 30

* “City Wells Shut Down,” Daily Pilot, Jan. 31

* “9 OC Wells Closed,” Los Angeles Times, Jan. 30

To further disseminate information, our water staff went on Channel 3

on Feb. 1 to talk about the issue.

I wrote my letter requesting that ground-water administrators

reimburse Newport Beach ratepayers for added water costs two weeks later

(Feb. 14).

I would remind Szulga, too, that the city took immediate action to

pull its water wells offline following the discovery of trace amounts of

1,4-Dioxane in the ground-water basin. We then began a series of

discussions with officials from the California Department of Health

Services, culminating on March 6 with the department’s firm advice that

our approach was too “conservative” and that using the wells posed no

significant health risk.

* TOD W. RIDGEWAY is the mayor of Newport Beach.