San Diego Congressional Reps Introduce Bills To Fight Tijuana River Pollution

Speaker 1: 00:00 Congressional lawmakers unveiled what they're calling a comprehensive package to help clean up sewage and that you want a river congressman Juan Vargas, Mike Levin and Scott Peters joined by Congresswoman Susan Davis announced the proposals in San Diego. Monday, the additional funds would boost money's allocated for Tijuana river clean up by as much as a billion dollars. The proposals by San Diego's congressional Democrats come at a time when city and state lawsuits have been filed against the government to demand river cleanup. Joining me is KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson. Eric, welcome. My pleasure. There are several proposals wrapped up in the announcement yesterday, so let's begin with the one from Congressman Vargas and Peters. Speaker 2: 00:45 Yeah, this is kind of the, where's the money bill? Sort of a piece of the puzzle. One of the big complaints about this cross border sewage situation is that there's not any federal dollars available to work on solutions that might go a long way toward fixing the problem. So, uh, Juan Vargas and Scott Peters have come up with this idea that they're going to funnel money to the North American Development Bank. That's a federal agency that works with Mexico on both sides of the border. Uh, it can fund, uh, projects, uh, that are on the u s side. It can fund projects that are on the Mexican side, uh, projects that are specifically designed to address this wastewater issue. Uh, there are also as part of their legislation directing nad bank to prioritize projects that involve wastewater treatment or water conservation or water pollution and the urging nab bank to, to streamline and accelerate those kinds of projects. The idea is to make a pool of money about one point $5 billion available to people on both sides of the border, uh, to address this problem so they can get some of these, uh, things in the ground and going. And that was a really kind of a welcome news for Imperial Beach Mayor Surge to Tina, whom I talk to a just after the announcement, Speaker 3: 01:59 superstar and grateful that I, Congressional delegation, uh, Juan Vargas, Scott Peter, Susan Davidson, Mike Lebanon are working together to get like a surgical bill package that really this kind of pollution solution that really targets certain federal agencies like the North American Development Bank and the EPA that get the money invested to fix the problem on both sides of the border. And so I'm getting money in into the non North American Development Bank and the U S EPA, they're the ones that have been helping us all along and try to get that money spent on fixing the things that are causing our beach closures. Speaker 1: 02:31 And Mayor Dudina mentions the EPA that's congressman eleven's build. It would increase funding from the EPA. That's Speaker 2: 02:37 correct. What he's asking for in his border water infrastructure improvement act is basically funneling money, $150 million a year for the next five years to the EPA, which you know, is in the process right now of kind of deciding what projects can be done on this side of the border that would help this situation. So he would basically through this legislation, uh, create a funding source that allows the EPA to do some of that work. Speaker 1: 03:02 I'm congresswoman Susan Davis wants the Navy to get involved. Speaker 2: 03:05 Sure. There is this a national defense component of this situation. It impedes having these polluted waters impedes the ability of the navy to train in the water and they just spent a couple of billion dollars upgrading the navy seal training center on Coronado and they require ocean water for seals to train there. And this, this is what she had to say about that. Speaker 4: 03:26 It's an important part of readiness. If you can't train, if people aren't prepared, they're not going to do, be able to do the job they're being asked to do and there their health and frankly their life is at risk. And so we need to be sure that they're engaged and involved. I think they acknowledge that. Um, but we think that they could be more a part of this, this solution. Speaker 1: 03:51 Okay. So these proposals call for either more money or a higher priority for Tijuana River valley cleanup, but how would they do it? I mean, do the proposals contain any ideas about how the sewage would actually be cleaned? Speaker 2: 04:04 Well, no, they don't, but they do provide the mechanism for solutions to get done. As I said, a just a short while ago, uh, the environmental protection agency is in the process of delivering a list of specific projects that would have specific impacts, whether that might be making the collectors that are in the canyons on this side of the border capable of handling more overflow, whether it might be creating a dam, uh, in the Tijuana River valley that could carry or hold some of that water until it can be treated by the wastewater treatment plant. Um, and then sent out, uh, to the ocean as treated water instead of letting it run through the estuary and out to the sea as sewage treated water. So, uh, the, the specific projects will likely come from the environmental protection agency. But concurrent to that, this basically would identify ways that those projects, uh, could be realized by creating the funding mechanisms. Speaker 1: 05:00 Well, as I mentioned, these congressional bills are introduced while the government is being sued over the river pollution issue. Can you remind us about the, Speaker 2: 05:08 sure. There are three lawsuits out there right now. The city of Chula Vista National City, Imperial Beach, uh, the port of San Diego. Those municipalities have, has sued, uh, the federal government to do a better job of controlling the pollution. The regional water quality control board and the state of California have also sued and a separate lawsuit that's similar, but they're asking for better control of the flow that comes across the border. And, uh, the Surfrider foundation file that, that third lawsuit, uh, now, from what I understand, that's moving through the, the legal process, right? It's in Jeffrey Miller's court in federal court here in San Diego. He's looking at it, but there have been some closed door discussions at this point about possibly settling it. We don't know what that means in terms of an outcome, but, um, I think that, um, if the that got together to sue the federal government a were to accept the settlement, it would likely include a, some sort of a fix to the existing ongoing situation. So off to wait and see how that comes out. But if they go to trial, that will likely happen near the end of this year or early next year. Speaker 1: 06:13 So what are the chances that these proposals made by these congressional members are going to pass in Congress? I mean, is there a bipartisan support for river pollution cleanup at the border? Speaker 2: 06:24 That was a question that was asked by reporters and there's not really a good answer to that. I think all of the Congressmen are realistic about the potential outcome, but I think that they also see this, uh, as a necessary step. Uh, they want to be able to show a unified force, uh, from this region. They want to explain to their colleagues in Congress that this is a critical issue, that it's a national security issue, that it's a public health issue. And they hope that by doing that they can make the case that, that this is a viable funding that is critical to the health of this country in this region. Speaker 1: 06:57 And I've been speaking with KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson. Eric, thank you. You're welcome.