Local environmental groups say this should have been done long ago, and cite lax enforcement by city and county officials.
By Melonie Magruder / Special to The Malibu Times
Faced with national news headlines such as “Sniffing Out Source of the Malibu Smell'” (L.A. Times), “DNA May Implicate Malibu Star’s Toilets” (ABC News) and “Malibu Poop Patrol Makes a Stink With Celebs” (Fox News), city of Malibu officials are trying to put a clean face forward, announcing in a press release Oct. 10 that the city and the county of Los Angeles have joined forces to pinpoint the sources of pollution found in Malibu’s oceans waters.
Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, whose district includes Malibu, has urged officials to find the cause of the pollution using DNA testing. The county will begin testing seawater near the outflows of Escondido and Ramirez canyons. This will determine whether the waste is human or animal related.
In Malibu, such pollution could come from myriad sources, from storm run-off, horse manure or bird droppings up stream, to restaurant or other commercial facilities, surface run-off from streets and the multitude of septic systems located closer to the shoreline. There are a reported 2,400 septic tanks in Malibu.
Andrew Sheldon is with the Environmental and Building Safety Division of the City of Malibu and notes that the newer septic systems automatically disinfect any effluent that might be discharged into groundwater and are, therefore, safe even for homes located close to the beach. The problem, however, is that new septic systems can cost upwards of $100,000 to install.
“So, before we make any expensive recommendations, we must make sure we have solid evidence of where the pollution is coming from,” he said.
Tracy Egoscue of Santa Monica Baykeepers, the public outreach and advocacy group which monitors the environmental health of the Bay, is unimpressed.
“We have been testing storm drains that empty into the bay since 1998 and we’ve been reporting since then that the bacterial levels are alarmingly high,” she said, “They should have done this four years ago.”
Once the sources of the contamination have been determined, it is up to local and county authorities to fix the problem. The California Regional Water Quality Control Board is poised to enforce laws regulating the Total Maximum Daily Load, or TMDL, established in 2002, which designate how much of a pollutant a body of water can absorb before it is degraded.
“The TMDL is a formal, enforceable permit,” explained David Nahai of the RWQCB, “Because, in the big picture, we are talking about public health as well as the coastal economy. If we can bring bacterial levels to a point of safety, we must. The deadline to comply with the permit is in place now. So the city must work now to locate the source of the problem and fix it.”
However, Egoscue questioned the lack of oversight and enforcement up till this point. “How do you characterize a governmental body’s reluctance or refusal to act on this issue?”
She also pointed out other sources of pollution, saying that Baykeepers have noted contaminated water flowing from buried PVC pipes leading to private beach homes in Malibu that dump effluence onto the beach.
“This private run-off includes lawn waste and even fabric softener,” she said. “Of course, it is totally against building codes, but nothing is done.”
Ray Sheehan is an eight year resident of Paradise Cove and welcomes the DNA testing as a vital effort to clean up the beaches.
“They started replacing the septic system here in Paradise Cove two years ago,” he said, “There are 257 individual homes feeding into the septic tank here and, when the system is breached, it just plain smells. DNA testing? I’m all for it if we can zero in on the cause of these F ratings from Heal the Bay.”