Grover Beach’s City Hall was packed to capacity during a Dec. 11 City Council meeting, where a public hearing discussed rising water and wastewater rates to help pay for the Central Coast Blue project.
Although the rate increases passed 3-2 with Councilmembers Clint Weirick and Robert Robert dissenting, more than 20 community members spoke against it. The meeting capped the proposition 218 period, where residents could protest the potential increase, and the city didn’t receive enough protests to deny the increase.
“I’m really glad the city is interested in long-term water security; I think it’s a really important issue. However, Central Coast Blue is an unnecessary and very expensive boondoggle,” community member Mark Davis said during public comment. “First and foremost, it’s incredibly expensive and this rate structure focuses on small incremental increases. However, when we look at those incremental increases in total, there’s a significant increase to ratepayers and this is going to hurt a lot of people.”
The Central Coast Blue project aims to recycle wastewater and inject it into the groundwater basin to create a more sustainable water supply for Arroyo Grande, Pismo Beach, and Grover Beach. Davis expressed dismay about the project after learning that the city wanted to increase water rates by almost 20 percent to help fund the project.
“The study recommends annual water rate increases of 19.7 percent for years one through four beginning in January 2024 along with a 4 percent increase in year five,” a staff report from September stated.
Central Coast Blue was originally proposed to cost an estimated $55 million but that projection was increased to $93 million. Central Coast Blue Project General Manager Geoff English told New Times that the increase in price is simply due to inflation, which has hit the construction industry hard.
Former Grover Beach Mayor David Ekbom spoke at the meeting, saying that the city had a variety of other water solutions available to it and paying that much for Central Coast Blue is “ludicrous.”
“We’ve spent a ton of money on Lopez Dam. We’ve spent a ton of money on the rebuilding and restructuring of it, and that gives us surface water and it recharges the groundwater,” Ekbom said. “Your proposed project in its infancy here is being slated at $7,200 per acre-foot and all these cost numbers rise, they don’t go down. The point is we should figure out how to use the lowest cost water first or how we can sell the additional water, but when you approve this, we’re mandated to take every drop of the $7,200 acre-feet of water first.”
While many residents at the meeting expressed similar sentiments to Ekbom, City Manager Matt Bronson told New Times in previous reporting that due to almost yearly drought the city needs a more consistent and less drought-impacted option.
“Our water only comes from essentially rainfall that falls into Lopez Lake and falls on the ground that gets seeped into the groundwater basin,” he said. “Lopez Lake ran dry last year, and you can’t get water from a lake that’s dry.”
Resident Michael Mayer said the city should be spending more money on fixing its damaged streets, not water.
“The poorest of the three cities is now being asked to foot the second highest amount of the project and host the work by having torn-up streets and providing the location for all of this,” Mayer told the council. “I think it’s time to go back to the drawing board.”
The project will be built on a vacant property in South Grover that has already been purchased, and construction will take around two years to complete. Pipelines will be constructed on about 1 mile of city streets.
Mayor Karen Bright thanked everyone who was present at the meeting and said that although it might be a “contentious issue,” she was happy to see all the public engagement.
“I believe that there’s been a great deal of information out there, and whether or not it was given to everyone in the best possible way, I do not know. But I do know that there has been at least four mailings to ratepayers and in some cases to every resident in the city,” Bright said. “Two of those mailers came from the city and two came from this opposition group, and whether or not all this information is accurate or not, obviously you’re here so you did receive that information. But there’s still a majority of the population for one reason or another that believes this is a good idea,”
Community members in attendance booed in response.
“I will clear this chamber,” Bright yelled back after banging her gavel three times. “We were respectful to your comments, and if this continues I will close this meeting.” Δ
This article appears in Last-Minute Gift Guide 2023.