We are totally in support of the candidacy of both Tom Gray and David Pierson as directors for the Cambria Community Services District. Both candidates possess the insight, knowledge, intellect, and calm demeanor to do an outstanding job. Both candidates support the effort of the district to secure a permanent alternate water source, which we wholeheartedly support. We remember, not so long ago, taking buckets of water from our shower down a flight of stairs to try to save some of our trees & plants, not an easy task for a 70-plus-year-old couple.
Lastly, and probably the most important issue, is that the water facility would also do wonders for the environment of the San Simeon Creek by keeping water in the creek’s underground channel during the summer months, which is also our high tourist activity.
Al & Claudia Solomon
Cambria
This article appears in Sep 10-17, 2020.
I couldn’t disagree more with the letter supporting Gray and Pierson.
Cambrians were asked to pay through a Proposition 218 rate increase for an Emergency Water Supply (EWS) brackish water facility. Cambrians were told the EWS would be used for current residents when the District declared a Stage 3 Drought emergency–to guarantee a supply of water during a drought! The District received $4.3 million to help pay for the project with funding from a Proposition 84 state grant funding–applied for under the guise of an EWS. When the District received the funding, they changed the name to the Sustainable Water Facility (SWF) with a different intent–for growth! Cambrians had no say in the change of the project and its intent!
Director Pierson and Tom Gray are the two candidates running who want to grow this town for folks on the Water Wait List (approx. 700 parcels). Our state water license remains at 799 acre feet a year from the San Simeon aquifer, and the SWF does not add to the acre feet per year! So, how does Cambria grow by 700 homes and commercial development, and at the same time provide water in times of extreme drought? The answer is- it can’t!
Cambria is home to a Monterey Pine Forest, which lends to the natural beauty of the seaside town, but it also presents a huge fire threat. As we compare the densely forested areas currently raging in the Dolan and Creek fires, affecting our own lives with ash covering the town, and making it difficult to venture outside, the threat becomes even more evident. Cambria has no reservoir to aid in fighting a fire–we have a few storage tanks, making us even more vulnerable.
Candidates HARRY FARMER and KAREN DEAN, do not support growth. They support resolving our crumbing infrastructure needs and stop the bleeding of our rate payer dollars for the SWF. Currently the costs, without the plant running, are paying $1.5 million annually! Farmer and Dean also recognize that the EWS, built under a County Emergency Permit almost 6 years ago, has cost Cambrians millions of more dollars than the original estimate–yet we do not receive any water from it.
The District recently submitted their Project Description–part of the CDP application to the County Planning Dept. Upon review, it was determined that the application, after six years, was only 13% complete. It will cost thousands more for the District to complete all the requirements the County is asking for. Cambrians have been taken to the cleaners–all for those who want to build here, when our water supply is not adequate as made clear by the Coastal Commission when they have stated there is not enough water for existing customers.
The insanity has to stop–HARRY FARMER and KAREN DEAN are the candidates we need at this critical time in the never-ending mindset of satisfying the Water Wait List, and putting current residents in jeopardy!
Cambrians–VOTE FARMER and DEAN!
Tina Dickason,
Cambria resident
While I agree with the writers’ desire for a safe and secure water supply in Cambria, the current permit request for a “sustainable” water facility”(SWF) is not the emergency water supply (EWS) voted, permitted, built and paid for by Cambrians and which the writer may even be confused by. The SWF permit being pursued allows for 666 new residential water connections as well as new commercial without adding any additional long term water security, and uses the existing EWS plant and generates toxic brine waste that’s shipped on Hwy 1 to Oceano or Kettleman City. This facility has a 20 year design life, so what happens then after all the new users are added? Seems this is going in the wrong direction. Adding an estimated 80,000,000 gallons of additional use annually isn’t helping its hurting. Just complete the permit on the EWS, provide the emergency water as intended for drought, save the riparian habitat, millions of dollars in additional cost and drop the growth motivated SWF idea.
Bob Reid, Cambria Concerned Water Ratepayer
Suggesting that folks vote for David Pierson and Tom Gray is like asking Cambria’s homeowners, renters, businesses and visitors to each drive two more nails in the coffin of financial debt Pierson and Gray and their C4H2O (Cambrians for Water) have shoved us into.
The primary driving force of Gray and Pierson is to change an emergency water system for use in Stage 3 drought situations only into a continually running SWF at the expense of rate payers. Years and millions of rate payers’ dollars clearly prove such a venture is absolutely
UNsustainable!!
Furthermore their venture’s long term, negative effects on local environment is unconscionable as it would produce thousands of gallons of brine waste every day costing rate payers even MORE money through rate increases to pay for dumping the waste. Hauling huge truckloads of brine waste through our town to Oceanside for ocean outfall is costly and polluting!!! Tom Gray even called waste hauling a “stop gap” measure in a recent Q&A when Cambrians asked about that part of his plan.
During his Q&A, Tom was able to list several infrastructure needs that are not being prioritized, but failed to mention that rate payer dollars are being diverted away from infrastructure needs and into this SWF project that he and David Pierson are so focused on.
This duo’s insanity has so be stopped!!!
HARRY FARMER and KAREN DEAN are voter’s best choice to give the CCSD Board of Directors the conscience and wisdom to get rate payers out of this death spiral of unnecessary taxes and fees that has been going on for 6 years by:
-Returning the Emergency Water Facility to use in Stage 3 drought situation ONLY
-Addressing necessary upkeep to vital infrastructure so that all water Cambrians have is not wasted through aging waterlines/connections, storage tanks or treatment plants
-Providing transparency to Cambria’s rate payers about options BEFOREhand
-Protecting Cambria’s environment
-Working FOR Cambrians vs. personal special interests.
Holly Ludwigson
Cambria homeowner and full-time resident
Cambria’s Emergency Water Supply project, now called the SWF, as championed by Tom Gray and Dave Pierson, is a project for Water Insecurity. If it gets a permit that allows it to be used as a way to add new water users, for growth, Cambria’s water supply will never be adequate. Cambria doesn’t have enough water now — that was the pretext for building the plant. After six years, about $20 million dollars, the community in millions of dollars of debt, $3.5 million lawsuit pending, not operating. If it ever does, the water will be extremely expensive. This is what Gray and Pierson support. Stop the madness. Don’t vote for them.