City moves to clean up beach

City Council members are taking several steps to clean up Aliso Beach.

The council voted 3-2 Tuesday to seek alternatives to Orange County’s planned excavation of a natural sand berm that keeps polluted Aliso Creek water from reaching the ocean.

Council members Toni Iseman, Jane Egly and Steve Dicterow voted “yes.” Mayor Elizabeth Pearson-Schneider and Cheryl Kinsman voted against the plan.

Council members also declared urban runoff entering the city a “nuisance” under state law, and will consider a city ordinance to restrict the disposal of waste liquids that can “degrade” area waters.

Iseman brought the issue to the council’s attention.

“The county has taken upon itself to break open the berm, which spreads toxic water onto the beach,” Iseman told the council. “The county will have to convince me that it is the right thing to do.”

Berm-clearing is preferred for safety reasons, said Larry McKenney, the county’s manager of watersheds and coastal resources.

“The project the county is proposing is not to discharge water, it’s to move sand to make sure the channel remains open to the ocean,” McKenney said.

“Most of the time the water from the creek goes to the ocean. It goes straight or it meanders to the north or the south. Our job is to make it go straight,” he added.

County officials are proposing to replace the twice-yearly “breaking” of the Aliso berm with a weekly “breaching” of the sand pile to direct the creek waters to the ocean, McKenney said.

The clearing of the naturally occurring buffer ? or berm ? between the ocean and creek mouth involves excavating 37,000 cubic yards of sand, allowing one million to five million gallons of untreated creek water to be discharged daily, according to the county’s application.

Area homeowner Denis Morin supports the weekly berm-breaching over the more intensive twice-yearly schedule because it may eliminate the need for noisy large-scale earth-moving equipment.

County officials are seeing a permit from the Army Corps. The public has until March 31 to comment.

The public can send comments to U.S. Army Corps of Engineers project manager Corice J. Farrar at (213) 452-3296 or j.farrar@usace.army.mil.

The council is taking initial aim at the berm-breaking, which some complain spews raw pollution into swimming areas. Others counter that the polluted water inevitably reaches the surf line, berm or no berm, and that the toxins may accumulate if not allowed to disperse into the ocean.

The council is also calling for alternative measures to manage the creek flow ? such as diversion of urban runoff from Aliso Viejo and Laguna Niguel to a treatment facility, as is done now with urban runoff from Laguna Creek.

Council members directed city officials to tell the county that they believe the berm-breaking proposal would violate the Local Coastal Program.

The Local Coastal Program is designed by the California Coastal Commission for coastal communities to carry out state law.

The council also directed staff members to meet with South Orange County Wastewater Authority representatives to determine the feasibility of diverting Aliso Creek flows.

McKenney acknowledged that the creek is polluted, but said it has not been shown to be harmful to people.

Steep channels created on the beach by creek outflow ? that meanders rather than flows straight to the ocean ? causes problems for lifeguards and homeowners, McKenney said.

Without the berm-clearing, the heavy creek waters threaten to undermine the county beach parking lot, county officials said.

Eight Aliso Creek homeowners have teamed up to tell the Army Corps that they support the county’s plan.

In their letter to the Army Corps, the homeowners claim the steep channels from the natural outflow create safety hazards for beachgoers.

Phil Rutten said that walls higher than 20 feet form in the sand.

His neighbor Peter Meltzer agrees.

“When the grandkids come we take them to Thalia Street where they don’t have these problems,” Meltzer said.

The homeowners also say that, with the berm in place, bacteria-laden water stagnates and, through osmosis, contaminates a larger portion of beach sand.

Mayor Elizabeth Pearson-Schneider said she couldn’t back the council’s opposition to the berm-breaking ? but did support declaring urban runoff entering the city a nuisance under state law and looking into options for diverting the creek flow.

? Barbara Diamond contributed to this story.

cpt.31-alisoberm-CPhotoInfoK61PF0N320060331iwx1gyknFILE PHOTO(LA)Bethanie Kloepfer, of Ladera Ranch, spends the afternoon with her children, Lily, 2, and Max, 4, at Aliso Creek Beach.