Imperial Beach is turning to the White House for help over the Tijuana sewage crisis.
The Imperial Beach City Council on May 3, passed a State of Local Emergency proclamation and will send a letter to the Biden Administration asking for a federal State of Emergency regarding the decades of negative consequences from cross-border pollution of the Tijuana River.
“This is an environmental crisis that is now going on a third generation of IB residents.”
-Imperial Beach Council Member Jack Fisher
“This is an environmental crisis that is now going on a third generation of IB residents,” said Imperial Beach Council Member Jack Fisher.
The resolution also authorizes the Council to oversee binational projects to improve Tijuana River conditions alongside local, state, federal, and Mexican stakeholders.
Mayor Paloma Aguirre said the city needed a local state of emergency because a previous declaration had expired and a $300 million allocation from Congress to resolve sewage problems along the U.S-Mexico border is not enough to reopen city beaches.
She added that “horrifying new data” coming from an airborne transmission study will extend the problem for another decade.
Letter to White House
Aguirre said she was asking for a “formal letter to the White House asking for a state of emergency for our city, for our beaches, for quality of life based on all this new information that has become available recently, and then continue pushing for our regional partners to support us in securing the additional funding that’s needed for the second phase of this project.”
The city’s actions come after The Coronado News earlier this year published a five-part series that investigated how a nearly century-long legacy of broken promises by both countries has resulted in a public health crisis. The sewage problem has exposed local beachgoers, U.S. Border Patrol agents and U.S. Navy SEALS to a myriad of diseases from the fecal-exposed Pacific Ocean. And the millions of gallons of raw sewage coming from Tijuana also has hampered tourism in Imperial Beach and neighboring Coronado.
Aguirre agreed with Councilman Mitch McKay’s proposal to work with Coronado, which recently created a special committee to deal with the crisis. The mayor said she would be happy to represent Imperial Beach.
New state committee
Aguirre also said she had joined a new state committee called the Good Neighbor Environmental Board (GNEB), appointed by Gov. Gavin Governor Newsom.
That group reports annually to the White House and Congress on water, wastewater and environmental infrastructure.
She said it is an opportunity to raise awareness of the sewage crisis and its impacts in the community.
Aguirre said the last meeting was April 27, and she was optimistic about work at the San Antonio de los Buenos treatment plant in Tijuana, after having met with Baja California Governor Marina del Pilar earlier in the day.
She added a private-public partnership should ensure the sewage treatment plant doesn’t get delayed.
Sewage crisis prevails
During public comment, local resident Leon Benham discussed the city’s special meeting about sewage in March, expressing concern about the International Boundary and Water Commission treatment plant at the border and sewage plant shutdowns in Tijuana.
“At that meeting we were thinking that the water was being processed, it actually wasn’t,” said Benham. “It was just being dumped off Imperial Beach.”
Beham also said he is the president of the Citizens for Coastal Conservancy and encouraged the Council to consider a 614-page report by the North American Development Bank and Arcadis which supports cleanliness of the water without the construction of new projects.
White House letters from kids?
Imperial Beach Natural Resources and Environmental Director Chris Helmer presented a strategy report during discussion on the Tijuana River Emergency.
The State of Local Emergency proclamation in Imperial Beach dates back to 1993, alongside the city of San Diego and continued for about 10 years until the first international treatment plant was built.
Helmer said Imperial Beach let its proclamation expire, and the council reissued and reinstated the local state of emergency in 2018, authorizing the mayor and all council members to accelerate solutions in the Tijuana River valley.
Along with the mayor, other Imperial Beach officials took turns proposing ideas for next steps and actions on the sewage crisis that has regularly closed beaches in Imperial Beach this year.
Fisher suggested that the city manager write a letter to the South Bay Union School District asking the principals about whether Imperial Beach school children could also write letters to the White House to bring attention to the sewage crisis.
Council Member Carol Seabury shared that her whole life there has been a sewage problem and suggested listening to other entities with solutions such as Benham’s.
Mayor pro tem Matthew Leyba Gonzalez considered the unsolved crisis frustrating, but said he is not losing hope.
City event affected
Meanwhile, the Tijuana River contamination has seeped its way into the historic Sun & Sea Festival sandcastle competition.
This decades-long event now finds itself impacted by the Tijuana sewage problem, organizers said.
If the ocean water continues to be unsanitary, the city and organizers find themselves seeking a safe water supply to use for sand castles in coming years which limits production capacity, said event co-chair Shirley Nakawatase.
