When Ron Munds, general manager of the Los Osos Community Services District (CSD), first saw the mudslide that devastated a local neighborhood on Jan. 9, he couldn’t believe what he was looking at.
“I jumped in the car and drove up there, and it was just beyond belief,” Munds recalled. “I walked up to where the breach happened, and it was an absolute shock. We had no awareness that something like this could happen.”
What happened was relatively simple: After a day of historic rainfall, a retention basin owned and managed by the CSD for the Cabrillo Estates busted a hole in its side, sending a torrent of mud and water into a cul-de-sac of homes down the hill on Vista Court.
Munds is still flabbergasted that the failure happened at all. The basin, though about 50 years old, has held up fine in past storms—performing as designed in a major downpour last winter. At least once a year, before the rainy season, CSD crews do basic maintenance and visual inspections of the basin, which have not raised red flags.
“There was no evidence of an issue,” he said. “You’d think you’d see something.”
A month has passed since the Jan. 9 mudslide destroyed or damaged more than a dozen homes in Los Osos, and CSD officials and impacted residents are still wading through the layers of complex bureaucracy that will determine their next steps.
Why exactly the retention basin failed and who is ultimately responsible for covering the damages it caused are paramount questions that currently hinge on the results of an investigation underway by the district’s liability insurance carrier.
The Special District Risk Management Authority—a public agency tapped by local governments around the state for liability insurance, including the Los Osos CSD—is investigating the cause of the breach to determine whether the district is eligible for coverage, or if was negligent in the incident. As long as that review is unresolved, disaster victims and district leaders are stuck in limbo.
“We’re waiting for that report, and we’re really pushing for a timeline,” Munds said. “That’s the hard part for impacted residents. Until [insurance] makes a determination, we are kind of out here in a space where we don’t know what to say.”
As they wait on the results, the CSD appears to be preparing for worst-case scenarios. At its Feb. 2 meeting, the CSD board of directors announced that it had authorized legal counsel to retain two attorneys with expertise in insurance claims and Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) matters. It also hired a geotechnical firm to interpret the investigative report that the Special District Risk Management Authority ultimately releases, Munds said.
“Not knowing the insurance industry or how this is handled, we felt this would be the best way we could be armed with information, not only for ourselves internally, but for the public as well,” Munds told New Times. “We need to understand better how to approach this whole dynamic and to position ourselves to understand what we have in terms of coverage.”
When asked for an estimate of the total damage that the levee break caused on Vista Court and elsewhere, Munds said he had not been given a firm number from adjusters, but he noted that “you can ballpark it at $15 to $20 million.” Repair work at the retention basin is expected to cost the district upward of $1 million.
As the CSD crosses its fingers for good news on its insurance, most of the affected residents on Vista Court already saw that ship sail. Private homeowners’ insurance has denied the claims of most mudslide victims, according to Munds.
Vista Court resident Julie Quillin is one of the lucky few who got an adjuster to come out to her flooded house. Quillin was taking a nap on Jan. 9 when she woke up to mud and water coming into her home. She and her husband are currently living in their RV with their two dogs, as they line up repairs and apply for any assistance they can get.
While she’s still waiting on a final word on her insurance claim, she doesn’t have high hopes and is gearing up for a slow recovery.
“We did get a little assistance money from FEMA that allows me to at least order cabinets, but it’s not enough to order flooring,” Quillin said. “It all just takes a long time. It took until last Saturday to even get my home insurance adjuster out here. And some people couldn’t even get their insurance to come out at all.”
With FEMA set to close its disaster recovery center in SLO on Feb. 14, three weeks after it opened, the window of opportunity to apply for federal aid is closing (victims can apply online through March 16).
According to a FEMA spokesperson, individual relief grants given to residents like Quillin typically ranged from $3,000 to $5,000. Only four individuals statewide received FEMA’s maximum grant of $40,000. Countywide, the agency has doled out $2.2 million in relief to about 1,500 individuals.
For Los Osos mudslide victims, the best source of assistance has come from the community itself. From GoFundMe donations, to food deliveries, to neighborhood meetings, transportation assistance, and physical labor, everyday residents are helping fill the gaps.
“From day one, we have had an amazing turnout from our community,” Quillin said. “Everyone has been nothing but helpful so far, and I just think the community should be commended for that.”
The help continues. On Sunday, Feb. 26, the Los Osos Rotary Club, South Bay Seniors People Helping People, and Big Big SLO are partnering to host a disaster relief concert at the South Bay Community Center. All proceeds from the event will go to help the Los Osos households impacted by the disaster. Δ
Assistant Editor Peter Johnson can be reached at pjohnson@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Feb 9-19, 2023.
