A study exploring the environmental effects of removing Rindge Dam is expected to be completed by the end of 2013.
By Elano Pizzicarola / Special to The Malibu Times
About 15 people gathered last week for a Santa Monica Mountains Resource Conservation District meeting that addressed a bevy of issues impacting Malibu, including a regular update on a long-running study to determine the feasibility of removing the aging Rindge Dam.
Suzanne Goode, senior environmental scientist at California State Parks, gave a presentation updating the status of the study, which has been proceeding in stops and starts due to funding issues for the last 10 years. Goode expects the study to be completed by December 2013, but acknowledged it was “on a tight schedule.”
The project is a joint federal-state venture between the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and California State Parks, with the two agencies splitting the costs of the study. Goode said the result would be a combination of an environmental impact report (EIR) and its equivalent under federal law, which is called an environmental impact statement (EIS). The report would examine the impact to the environment of removing the dam.
“We have a lot of subcommittees meeting discussing sediment transport, how [the dam] would be removed,” Goode said Tuesday in a telephone interview. “Looking at different models, like first of all, what if we don’t remove it at all. What will it look like five, 10 years out downstream in terms of sedimentation.”
Goode added that work was also being done looking into the removal of upstream barriers to fish such as bridges and culverts, and increasing aquatic habitat. She said State Parks had been in touch with other agencies about removing sediment from the dam, and that LA County Beaches and Harbors in particular had expressed interest in the accumulated sand at the dam to use for beach nourishment.
“There have been people speculating that this will ruin the lagoon,” Goode said. “Absolutely not, those are the things we’re going to be avoiding, if we have to truck it out and take it somewhere that’s what we’ll do.”
Clark Stevens, Resource Conservation District Director, said the dam is currently blocking the endangered Steelhead trout from moving about the stream, thwarting their nomadic lifestyle and reducing their population.
The trout migrate from the ocean to areas upstream where they release eggs, Stevens said. Newborn fish live in the creek for at least one season until they grow and move downstream to the lagoon. They then travel to the ocean, and return upstream when they reach full adulthood. But advocates for the dam’s removal say that due to the dam blockage, the population of these fish has plunged, as they are hindered from releasing eggs.
The issue is not a new one for the Resource Conservation District. The group has examined the dam removal since the late 1980s and faces an uphill battle with much to address, including the question of how to fund the dam’s removal.
But Dennis Washburn, who chairs the Malibu Creek Watershed Council, remains optimistic. “As long as everybody keeps talking there is progress being made,” he said.
“The more voices, the more people, the more involvement, the better.”
Since then, they have involved other organizations that sprouted up, but have been forced to grapple with having to satisfy conflicting demands.
“’In the end, nothing happens until everybody’s satisfied.’ It’s one of those things that a mediator puts on his bumper sticker,” he said.
Washburn reflected on the growing public support over the past roughly 10 years, spurred by cities like Calabasas being incorporated, housing environmentalists.
“Everybody recognizes that it isn’t going to happen unless they actually act,” he said.
For funding, the organization has no plans of pursuing the newly-uncovered millions of dollars California Sate Parks has reported, as the money could likely go elsewhere.
“Were competing with hundreds of other state parks that have virtually a boundless need for support,” he said.