The Westside Basin Groundwater
Management Plan
The California Water Quality Control Board, San
Francisco Bay Region has weighed in with their comments on the Westside
Basin Proposed Groundwater Management Plan. Their postion: "The
integrity of Lake Merced must be preserved." Read
the letter (August 26, 1999) from Ron Gervason, Chief of the Policy and
Planning Divison, to Patrick Sweetland Chair of the Westside Planning Partners.
We would like to post a copy of this plan on the
site; however, we have been unable to obtain a copy in electronic format.
Call the Daly City Department of Water and Wastewater Resources at (650)
991-8200 to obtain a copy.
The "Tier I tasks" described
in theWestside Basin Proposed Groundwater Management Plan largely
constitute a series of data collection and analysis steps. Even this
humble beginning is being delayed as resources are sought to pay for data
entry, summarization and reporting. And so Friends of Lake Merced
has offered to undertake this assignment, contingent upon the data collection
plan include consideration of surface water as well as groundwater impacts.
To date our offer has simply been ignored.
Perhaps
you'd like to review our correspondence.
We've responded to this Plan with a series of
letters requesting that the plan, and the planning process itself, be reviewed.
Little if any attention has been paid environmental issues. No consideration
is given the effect of pumping practices on the level of Lake Merced.
Promised coordination by the PUC of their plans to raise Lake Merced to
historical levels has not been accomplished. We've written to:
Tom Ammiano,
President of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Copies of this
letter were sent to Supervisors Bierman, Teng and Newsom, as well as to
Anson Moran, General Manager of the PUC.
Kevin Shelley, California
Assemblyman from the district that contains Lake Merced. Copies of
this letter were also sent to State Senator Jackie Speier, Assemblywoman
Carole Migden, and Assemblyman Mike Machado, Chair of the Assembly's Water,
Wildlife & Parks Committee.
Loretta Barsamian,
Executive Officer, Regional Water Quality Control Board. Copies of
this letter were also sent to Carl Hauge, Chief Hydrologist, California
Department of Water Resources and to Brian Hunter, Regional Manager of
the California Department of Fish & Game.
We've posted a
summary of our month-long conversation, via e-mail, with John Fio.
John is a Hydrologist with the firm HydroFocus, Inc., in Dixon, California.
He's helped us understand the issues related to pumping water from the
Westside Basin aquifer and its impact on Lake Merced, as well as raising
questions that remain to be answered.
Our original posting about this plan, and the
planning process, follows:
"The
Westside Basin extends from Golden Gate Park south to the San Francisco
International Airport, east under the Bay, and west under the Pacific Ocean
at least as far as the San Andreas fault. The cities of San Francisco,
Daly City, South San Francisco, Colma, San Bruno, Millbrae, and parts of
Burlingame, Westborough and Hillsborough all lie on top of the Westside
Basin. Beneath the ground surface of the Westside Basin are layers
of porous sand and gravel capable of storing large amounts of water.
In 1995, the Westside Basin provided about 30 percent of the water supply
for Daly City, South San Francisco and San Bruno. Water is also pumped
from the basin to irrigate the large turf areas associated with local parks,
golf courses and cemeteries." (Brochure announcing the first public
workshop, distributed by Public Affairs Management.)
The
Westside Basin Groundwater Management Plan is being developed by a number
of commercial water interests who depend on the underlying aquifer to obtain
the product that they sell. This plan is being prepared following
procedures defined by state legislation, AB3030. This law encourages
local agencies to work together to manage shared groundwater resources.
We have not yet been able to obtain an electronic copy of that bill, but
are attempting to do so.
Cities
and communities represented on this group include San Francisco, Daly City,
San Bruno, Colma, South San Francisco and Millbrae. In addition,
a representative of the California Water Service Company, a commercial
interest serving the southern section of the Westside Basin, is included
in the planning group. We requested that a member representing environmental
interests be included in the planning group. That request was denied.
While
we have not seen a published list of members, we beleive that the following
list is complete:
Patrick Sweetland, Chair
Manager of Water & Wastewater Resources
City of Daly City
153 Lake Merced Blvd.
Daly City, CA 94015
650-991-8201
Michael Carlin
Public Utilities Commission
1212 Market Street, 2nd Floor
San Francisco, CA 94102
415-554-8987
