LA Rainwater Harvesting Program Debut: A Huge Success

Yesterday, the LA Stormwater Team attended Mar Vista's Wise Water Expo to start collecting sign-ups for the City's new Rainwater Harvesting Program.

The program offers eligible residents and businesses free installation and materials of rain capture systems. The City either provides rain barrels for on-site irrigation or disconnects downspouts to allow for direct watering routes to permeable surfaces such as landscapes and gardens.

The goal of the program is to minimize the amount of rainwater from entering the streets, where it has the potential to pick up pollutants along the way to the ocean as well as to conserve the use of potable water outdoors.

Mar Vista residents who were eager to save money, conserve water and protect our local environment were the majority of folks who visited our booth. During the event, 60 residents signed up for the program!

We are looking forward to much more participation and success with the launch of this program throughout the City.

For more information on the program , including sign-up details, please visit http://www.larainwaterharvesting.org/ or call Codi Harris at (562) 597-0205.

Mar Vista Rec Center Groundbreaking Ceremony and Open House

Join us for a groundbreaking ceremony, celebrating the kickoff of the Mar Vista Rec Center construction.

Thursday, July 23, 2009
Open house – 10 a.m.
Groundbreaking ceremony – 11 a.m.

East side of the Mar Vista Recreation Center on the 3400 block of Sawtelle Boulevard between Rose Avenue and Palms Boulevard.


This project will divert off‐site surface runoff from an existing storm drain in Sawtelle Boulevard to an underground hydrodynamic separator for removal of heavy sediments, oil, grease, and trash, then to a detention tank under the existing tennis courts for further treatment before being released back into the storm drain system.

Click here for the event flyer.

For more information, contact Michelle Vargas at michelle.vargas@lacity.org or visit http://www.lapropo.org/

Two Upcoming Public Meetings to Discuss City Restoration Efforts

1. Proposition O Citizens Advisory Committee Meeting

Wednesday July 15, 2009

2:00 p.m.

City Hall East, 15th Floor
Room 1500
200 North Main Street
Los Angeles, CA 90012

Projects discussed will include:

• Inner Cabrillo Beach Bacterial Water Quality Improvement project
• Westchester Stormwater BMP project
• Allocation of available Prop O funds

For more information, visit www.lapropo.org or contact:
Mark Tullai - (213) 473-7567 /Charles Modica - (213) 473-5704

2. Los Angeles River Revitalization Update and Design Project Workshop
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Meeting One: 1:00 to 3:00 pm
Meeting Two: 5:30 to 7:30 p.m.

Los Angeles River Center and Gardens
The Atrium in the California Building
570 W. Avenue 26
Los Angeles, CA 90065

Additional Information:

Join us to discuss implementation of the Los Angeles River Revitalization Master Plan
(LARRMP) and to share your input on possibilities for future River projects. To accommodate diverse schedules, two duplicate meetings will be held on the same day—one in the afternoon and one in the evening.

UPDATE/WORKSHOP MEETING GOALS
Our two goals are (1) to provide brief updates of various projects and other activities related to the City’s River revitalization efforts and (2) to gather input on future project possibilities through an interactive workshop.

The meetings will first provide updates on current projects (by staff from public agencies and other organizations). The second part of the meetings will be a design charrette workshop to gather input on potential future projects in anticipation of federal support. Your input at the start of this new phase of partnership with the federal government will guide our work in preparing for future funding opportunities.

Updates on a variety of topics related to the LARRMP will be provided, including: the River Improvement Overlay (LA-RIO) District; the Cornfields Arroyo Seco Specific Plan (CASP); the River Revitalization Corporation; the River Keepers; the River Bikeway; River Ecosystem Restoration Feasibility Study; Water Resources Development Act (WRDA) demonstration project opportunities; and various other River projects and activities. Updates by other organizations and groups are welcomed!

Please direct questions to Carol Armstrong or Larry Hsu of the City’s Los Angeles River Project Office: (213) 485-5762, Carol.Armstrong@lacity.org
(213) 485-4562, Lawrence.Hsu@lacity.org

Fore more information on the ongoing LA river efforts, visit www.lariver.org.

LA Stormwater Reminds You to Help Prevent Pollution This Holiday Weekend

On Saturday, we celebrate another year of our nation’s independence with summer sun, backyard barbeques and firework displays throughout our neighborhoods. The City wants to wish all Angelenos a fun and safe 4th of July and remind everyone to put stormwater pollution prevention tactics to the test this weekend. Make the commitment to join the Team Effort this holiday and keep our City clean for all residents and visitors to enjoy.

We encourage all residents to pick up after themselves when outside during the weekend events. Make sure all litter is properly disposed of in trash and recycling receptacles, so that we can all enjoy clean neighborhoods and beaches throughout the summer. Be sure to sweep up any remaining debris (instead of using a hose) and place it in your trash.

This is also important for the remnants of fireworks and other festive displays (ie: cardboard encasements, shells, packaging), because they contain harmful chemicals that can enter our storm drain system if left on the ground. Perchlorate, a common firework ingredient, remains in water for a long time, polluting our swimming and drinking water, and can also affect thyroid functioning in fish. To avoid beach pollution and storm drain clogs, please pickup any leftovers you see on the streets, beaches and parks.

Thanks for your efforts and Happy 4th of July!


Click here for a list of 4th of July events througout the City and County.

Machado Lake Project Update Meeting

We invite you to join us on Wednesday, July 1st in the evening to hear an update on the Machado Lake Ecosystem Rehabilitation Project and Wilmington Drain Multi-Use Project.

Topics discussed will include:

• Machado Lake and Wilmington Drain Recommended Alternatives


• Permitting Activities


• Detailed Design Activities

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

6:30 p.m. - 8:30 p.m.

Kaiser Hospital Conference Room and Education Center, Room A2

Located on Normandie Avenue between Pacific Coast Highway and Permanente Way

(The address for the Medical Center is 25825 South Vermont Avenue, Harbor City)

*Parking is available in the parking structure (Lot 2), which is adjacent to the Conference Center. Meeting attendees should park on the second floor, leaving the first floor available for patients. Disabled parking is located just behind the Conference Center in Lot 3.

For more information on the meeting:

City of Los Angeles Department of Public Works

Chris Harris at 213-749-3386

Email: Chris.Harris@Pacbell.net

Be sure to read about the Machado Lake restoration project from our first issue of the LA Stormwater e-Newsletter to see how far along the City has come in its efforts.

Los Angeles River Site Tour Hosted by Prop O Committee

The Proposition O General Obligation Bonds Citizens Oversight Advisory Committee (COAC) is hosting a tour of the Los Angeles River this afternoon.

For more information on stops along the tour, please visit: http://lacity.org/cao/propocitizencom/caopropocitizencom235660811_06172009.pdf

Details:
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
12:45 p.m. to 3:15 p.m.

Convene at City Hall East
(Curbside Loading Zone)

200 North Main Street
Los Angeles, CA 90012

The tour will be followed by a special COAC meeting. For meeting agenda, visit http://lacity.org/cao/propocitizencom/caopropocitizencom235660810_06172009.pdf
Regular meetings of the Citizens Oversight Advisory Committee are held on the third Wednesday of each month at 2 pm at City Hall East, 200 North Main Street, Room 1500.

Please see www.lapropO.org for information on Proposition O.

City Invites All to Participate in LA River Metals Workshop II on July 1st

Dear Team:

The City of Los Angeles invites you to participate as a stakeholder in the second workshop for the Los Angeles River Metals TMDL Implementation Plan, being developed for the City's portion of the watershed.

The second workshop is scheduled for:
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
1:00 to 3:00 PM
Los Angeles River Center
570 West Avenue 26, #100

In this workshop, the main focus will be on the Identification of Best Management Practices (BMPs). Three major topics will be discussed: BMP selection strategy, identifying preliminary BMP sites, and watershed collaboration.

This Implementation Plan is being developed during 2009 to comply with urban runoff/stormwater management regulations established in the Metals TMDL for the Los Angeles River watershed.

Specific goals of the Implementation Plan include:

• Identify pollution hot spots and prioritize the drainage areas to be addressed;
• Identify Best Management Practices (BMPs) for reducing pollution in urban runoff and select and verify potential locations for implementation of BMPs; and
• Create an integrated implementation plan that incorporates other benefits whenever possible, such as increasing open space, creating green streets, and beneficially reusing stormwater.

Under the direction of the Watershed Protection Division, the Metals TMDL Implementation Plan will be completed in January 2010.

Please RSVP by June 26, 2009 to Seth Carr at seth.carr@lacity.org or (213) 485-3961 by providing your name and the number of guests that will be in attendance.

City Celebrates South Los Angeles Wetlands Park Project

Yesterday, the City held a groundbreaking ceremony marking the introduction of another Proposition O-funded project aimed to divert rainwater and treat urban runoff in a in a densely populated area of South Los Angeles.

LA residents' overwhelming approval of the City’s clean water bond program (Prop O) has led to a $26-million project that will transform a historic rail yard into a neighborhood resource of open park space, wetlands habitat, and community facilities.

The overall goal of the project is to help the City meet water quality regulations, known as Total Maximum Daily Loads or TMDLs, enacted by the Regional Water Quality Control Board for the Los Angeles River watershed. The project will span an entire city block, and will divert and treat storm drain flow from a 525-acre watershed area. Average daily water diversion is estimated at approximately 14,000 gallons and average dry weather daily water treatment is estimated at 80,000 gallons.

The wetlands park will also provide valuable green space and educational opportunities for through features such as a pocket park, trails and signage, wildlife viewing areas, and the renovation of a existing building into a multi-use center for the community. The photo is a southeast aerial view of the proposed plan to tranform the exisiting railway into green space and trails.

For more information on this project, read the LA Stormwater Program's past newsletter article. For more information on other Prop O projects, visit http://www.lapropo.org/.

2009 Kids Ocean Day: A Major Success!

More than 4,000 students hit the beaches yesterday, to celebrate the 16th annual Kids Ocean Day at Dockweiler State Beach.

The event, hosted by the Michael Klubock of the Malibu Foundation and the LA Stormwater Program, brought out City Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and Public Works President Cynthia Ruiz for a press conference concerning ocean pollution. As winner of the aerial art design contest, fourth-grader Rebecca Chan also gave us insight on why pollution prevention is key to preserving the future for her and her classmates.

Other speakers included Dr. Suja Lowenthal of the California Coastal Commission, Tyler James Williams from Everybody Hates Chris, Tiffany Thorton from Sonny with a Chance and Debby Ryan from Suite Life on Deck.

Students from 25 elementary schools throughout Los Angeles County banded together to create a "Happy Fish" aerial art piece, showing the inextricable connection between a clean ocean and safe future. The helicopter zoomed over the thousands of students, capturing their message of "Save the Ocean". To further display their concern for the environment, the students participated in a massive beach cleanup after the press conference and aerial art excitement.

Kids Ocean Day is the culmination of the year's Adopt-A-Beach School Program. During the school year, Malibu Foundation and Stormwater Program representatives conduct interactive presentations to school assemblies throughout Southern California, emphasizing the connection between clean neighborhoods and clean oceans. To date, the program has reached almost 462,000 school children since October 1991 about the importance of pollution prevention.

A big thanks to all City staff and local volunteers for their efforts in creating another Ocean Day success!

To view more event photos, visit www.malibufoundation.org

During the aerial display, there were many planes flying over, who probably got a great glimpse of the human art. Did anyone on a flight out of LAX see the kids in the "Happy Fish" display? Let us know!

Volunteers Needed for 2009 Kids Ocean Day

2009 KIDS OCEAN DAY: VOLUNTEERS NEEDED!!

ADOPT-A-BEACH CLEAN-UP

Thursday, June 4th

Dockweiler State Beach

If interested in volunteering, please contact Michael Klubock

at (310) 652-4324 or
michael@klubock.com

LAist joins the Team Effort

A special thanks to our friends over at LAist, who promoted the LA Team Effort and Stormwater Program last week when they wrote about the installments of catch basin screen covers throughout the City. The story, called "One Way We Fight Pollution", was an encouraging response to the low water quality grades LA received from Heal the Bay's Annual Beach Report Card.

The story was so well-received that it prompted questions from residents and a followup story about the new City infrastructure and cleaning methods. You can find the responses and followup entry here. (We especially like the emphasis on reminding residents not to litter!)

For even more information on the Proposition O catch basin screen cover project visit www.lastormwater.org/Siteorg/events/PropO/121307.htm

Heal the Bay Gives the Grades

Just in time for the kickoff to summer this Memorial Day weekend, Heal the Bay has released its 19th annual Beach Report Card (BRC), with information on the status of California's coastline. Heal the Bay's BRC provides water quality information to the millions of people who swim, surf, or dive in California coastal waters.

Reported from April 2008 through March 2009, Heal the Bay analysts assigned A-to-F letter grades to 502 beaches along the California coast, based on levels of weekly bacterial pollution. To much relief, 91% of beaches statewide received A or B grades during dry weather, meaning very good to excellent water quality. For the first time, Heal the Bay also handed out A+ grades to 79 beaches that never exceeded bacterial standards. Among those sites were Will Rogers State Beach on Pacific Coast Highway, Dockweiler State Beach at the Imperial Highway drain and Portuguese Bend Cove in Rancho Palos Verdes.

However, there were some beach bummers that did not make the honor roll. Some of the lowest grades were given out to Surfrider Beach in Malibu and Santa Monica Pier. While we are on the track to cleaner water and better regulations, we have a lot more work to do in terms of our daily pollution prevention practices. Poor water quality not only affects the health of beachgoers and marine life, but also threatens California's ocean-dependent economy valued at $43 billion.

Since the BRC was first published nineteen years ago, beachgoers throughout California have come to rely on the grades produced within the weekly, summer and annual documents as a vital public health protection tool. The Stormwater Program also works closely with the monitoring teams of Heal the Bay to provide accurate information to all LA residents.

For more information on Heal the Bay and the results of the BRC, visit: http://www.healthebay.org/

Home Improvement Stores Join the Team Effort for Pollution Prevention

As part of our program's public outreach efforts, stormwater staff members visit home improvment stores through the City of Los Angeles to teach employees the fundamentals of pollution prevention.

Our goal is to educate as many employees as possible on the proper use and disposal of paint, pesticides and fertilizers with the idea that they will relay the correct information to the customers. Since the employees are the experts, customers often ask them for information on paint, pesticide and fertilizer use and disposal.

As part of the stormwater presentation and outreach, the employees are asked to sign a committment letter that states he/she will pass on any useful pollution prevention information to customers and encourage them to use safe practices around the house. So far this year, we have visited 22 home improvement stores in the area, recieving 137 signed committment letters from employees.

In addition to the signed committment letters, we asked some employees to commit to passing on the pollution prevention message to one additional employee at the store. When the employee passes on a pre-paid postage 3S’s commitment letter to have signed and mailed by another employee, then both recieve our Stormwater resuable tote bags as a token of our appreciation. An added bonus for joining the Team Effort and spreading the word on pollution prevention!

For more information on our public outreach and presentation, visit http://lastormwater.org/Siteorg/program/pubedpage.htm

New Stormwater Permit Adopted for Ventura County

Last Thursday, the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board adopted new regulations for Ventura County aimed at keeping local waterways and beaches clean.

The newly adopted National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit will be shared by Ventura County government and all 10 cities within county limits. The persistence of pollution in the waters off county beaches has prompted a need for more stringent measures, according to state regulators and environmentalists.

Heal the Bay and the National Resources Defense Council (NRDC) played major roles in support of the permit, making revisions to the permit language to create clear guidelines. One of the major revisions involves Low Impact Development requirements for new development and redevelopment, which requires 95% of the runoff to be infiltrated.

This permit is especially relevant since it is believed to set a precedent for other local municipalities, including the City of Los Angeles. For more information on this permit, visit www.venturacountystar.com/news/2009/may/08/water-board-sets-tougher-regulations-on/

Upcoming Machado Lake Restoration Meeting

Machado Lake and its surrounding environment are in need of a major recovery effort. The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board has identified the lake as an impaired water body for DDT, PCBs, pesticides, ammonia, algae, eutrophic conditions, trash, and odor, all of which have negatively affected human as well as aquatic health. This restoration project needs the support of the community to meet the goals of clean water, wildlife improvements, and healthy parks for Los Angeles.

Upcoming Outreach Meeting:

When: Wednesday, May 20 6:30-8:30 p.m.

Where:Wilmington Senior Citizen Center

1371 Eubank Avenue

Wilmington, CA 90744

Topics to be discussed include:

* Machado Lake Alternatives

* Wildlife Relocation

For more information on this meeting, contact: Rebecca Wood at (213)590-0117 or Rebeccajanewood@yahoo.com For additional community events and meetings, please visit our Stormwater calendar at www.calendarwiz.com/lateameffort