The United States Section of the International Boundary and Water Commission (USIBWC) held the first in-person San Diego Citizens Forum since the pandemic, welcoming a new board and discussing current challenges and solutions for the transboundary sewage and waste issue.
Close to 50 local residents and public officials convened at the Triton Room inside the Community Center in Coronado and via Teams Webinar on July 12 and were told the problem of processing sewage from Mexico has significantly increased, but they also were told about solutions in the work to fix a growing crisis that has existed nearly 100 years.
At the meeting, USIBWC Director of Public Affairs Frank Fisher introduced the 10 new board members — including City of Coronado Council member John Duncan. They will serve on the board for 2 years, according to USIBWC Public Affairs Officer Leslie Grijalva.
The public meeting comes after The Coronado News earlier this year ran a five-part investigative series that examined the decades of broken promise by U.S. and Mexican officials to fix a mess that has hampered local economies and sickened residents, U.S. Border Patrol Agents and U.S. Navy SEALS.
Continued USIBWC efforts in San Ysidro
Morgan Rogers, USIBWC Area Operations Manager, presented updates and delved into the wastewater system challenges of the San Diego Field Office.
He said significant challenges include: Tijuana’s population growth; infrastructure interdependencies among treatment plants and pump stations; flow and water quality weak points that include pipelines, pump stations and low treatment capacity of the South Bay International Wastewater and the San Antonio de los Buenos (SAB) treatment plants. And discharging untreated wastewater at the ocean outfall in Punta Bandera in Tijuana, he said.
Regarding transboundary flows, Rogers said the Tijuana River has reached annual flows of 32.7 billion gallons in 2023, compared to 10.2 billion in 2022, 9.2 billion in 2021 and 19.8 billion in 2020.
Transboundary flows at Canyon Collectors are due to various reasons but mostly due to pipeline breaks and rain.
Once again, Rogers said that sediment berms and pumps are the best forms to prevent transboundary flows to contain Tijuana River dry-weather flows and expand collector diversion capacity.
The IBWC is set to work on rehabilitation of Junction Box 1, a set of gates on the U.S. side of the border which controls entering wastewater flow as well as sediment removal and levee restoration.
Rogers also noted that projects under Minute 328, an international agreement with Mexico, are also expected to continue to make progress on both sides of the border, including rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts.
Tijuana River Trash Booms Project
The second presenter, Alter Terra Executive Director Oscar Romo, discussed a trash booms project, to help with waste and is expected to be implemented in the Tijuana River sometime during the fall of this year.
This project derives from the Tijuana River Valley Recovery Team Recovery Strategy efforts since 2012 that include communicating with Mexico, understanding the flow of water, trash resource implementation in Mexico, keeping communities on both sides of the border informed and conserving natural resources.
According to Romo, the project area will begin beyond 1,000 feet once the Tijuana River runs through the U.S. side along a concrete area.
Additionally, the trash booms will have three sections totaling a potential trash yield of 30,000 cubic yards.
The center part is expected to be the heavier part and maintain stability, while the sections on both edges will float and prevent trash from moving to the center, he told The Coronado News.
“We’re going to install some barriers to collect or to control, rather, the floating trash,” Romo said in his presentation. “We’re not going to take care of solids, like tires or sediment, the trash booms we’re going to employ are not designed to do that.”
One purpose of this project is to create a barrier line to halt floating trash, which will then be collected in trash bins and taken to a landfill in Otay.
Research consumer behavior
Another aspect of the project is to research consumer behavior and trash routes in Tijuana to best understand how much trash to expect and provide Mexico with suggestions to mitigate waste, he added.
Romo considers the trash problem a consequence of urbanization and accumulated dumping taking place at sediment basins, maquiladora properties, canyons and creeks.
“Tijuana is now growing vertically … [neighborhoods] on each side of the Tijuana River channel are about 500 feet above sea level and the river is the lowest point,” said Romo. “It [trash] ends up in the river by gravity and also by the course of water.”
Regarding previous project implementation at Smuggler’s Gulch Canyon, Romo said two barrier lines were used due to the fast flow in the area.
According to Romo, upon completion in 2022, project administration authority was transferred to San Diego County Parks and Recreation as the agency in charge of the property.
While future expansion of trash booms at all canyons may be possible, Romo said each agency overlooking the canyon properties needs to determine respective implementation mechanisms.
Project efforts concerns some
Leon Benham, one committee member who lives in Imperial Beach, said trash booms are most effective in low-flow areas, but not in high flow areas.
Benham told The Coronado News that he believes the trash booms are a great idea, but have low efficacy as he witnessed with the trash booms found among other trash earlier this year.
“I have been studying these devices for the last 3 years and have shot numerous other videos of them during rain flows,” wrote Benham in an email. “They just don’t work … If you look at the simple horse crossings they are far more effective at capturing trash and are easier to clean.”
Benham said that according to federal records he received under a Freedom of Information Act request he believes these “failed experiments” should cost between $15,000 to $20,000, much less than the higher figure of grant money that has been allocated.
A spectrum of public input
Citizens continued to voice concerns throughout both presentations and during public comment, collectively frustrated over the years-long timeframe set for solutions.
During public comment, “Stop the Sewage!” organizer and Coronado resident Laura Wilkinson Sinton questioned whether USIBWC efforts were in compliance with settlement terms following separate lawsuits and urged for temporary solutions to lessen beach closures.
Residents are upset in Tijuana, Imperial Beach and Coronado with the continual beach closures caused by sewage coming from Mexico.
Still, Imperial Beach Mayor Paloma Aguirre has breathed life into the issue, added Sinton.
Additionally, Sinton echoed the success of water recycling efforts, discussed by Benham prior to public comment, that are happening north of San Diego County.
“It’s the most environmentally sound way to reprocess water,” said Benham. “If we’re going to build a cross border relationship that’s based on incentivizing water…that’s the way to go.”
Recycling efforts
Benham shared during the meeting that recycling efforts may help with the current water problems Tijuana is facing and that San Diego may also face due to the Colorado River drought.
The Groundwater Replenishment System in Orange County can produce 130 million gallons of water a day, according to media reports.
Chris Jonsmyr, principal field representative for Assemblymember David Alvarez, D-Chula Vista, shared potential solutions Alvarez has pushed forward at the state level.
One being Assembly Bill 1597 to bring state funding through the North American Development Bank, he said.
He added that a letter by the delegation to Gov. Gavin Newsom is also requesting a state of emergency declaration at the state and federal level. Attendees were invited to support these and similar initiatives.
Fast-track fixes
Such a declaration would allow the state and federal governments to fast-track fixes along the border, according to Benham in a later interview. Elected officials in attendance included City of Coronado Councilmember Mike Donovan and Mayor Richard Bailey.
While some community members presented hearty comments and expressed their desire for prompt solutions, others showed up to learn more about the issue and listen.
One Coronado couple who has lived in the city 28 years shared that they simply want a clean beach and their motive for attending was to sit and learn, hoping for a plan upon following the issue for the past five years.
$2 Billion solution?
Another attendee and Imperial Beach resident John Keating said that he emailed U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla requesting his help to allocate additional funds.
Padilla has shown an interest in fixing the problem, as he toured the border this summer.
Keating also believes the international wastewater treatment plant in San Ysidro needs to be expanded to process 100 million gallons of daily sewage instead of the proposed 60 million gallons. Currently, the plant can effectively process 25 million gallons a day.
“I’m asking for your help to allocate $2 Billion to solve the pollution crisis in Imperial Beach,” read Keating’s letter. “We’ve got promises for $330 M to upgrade the existing wastewater plant to 60 MGD, but it isn’t enough. With your help we can get the Clean River Project done.”
