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Sarmiento at the OCWD – pic by John Earl
First a note from Vern the humble editor: Vince Sarmiento (right) is running for Santa Ana Mayor, and some of my friends think he’s the best choice out of a bad bunch; he is also currently President of the OC Water District Board, and has been on that Board for most of the last seven years, during which time we’ve never heard him say a word or cast a vote against the Poseidon desal proposal. (And the boondoggle would be dead if it weren’t for OCWD support.)
Yesterday he came (via Zoom) to Los Amigos to ask for our support, and your humble editor called him on his apparent acquiescence to Poseidon, pointing out that it’s hard to trust any politician who would risk saddling the public with such an obviously bad project. Vince assured us all that there exists a “poison pill,” which will prevent the project from ever happening. What is this poison pill? Well, Vince says he is bound by instructions from the SA council to explore “any alternatives” for extra water, but to only pursue them if they are “cost-neutral,” which everybody knows Poseidon, or desal in general, can never be. So ergo, despite all of his votes in favor, Poseidon can never really happen
That doesn’t seem good enough, and I told him he sounds like a passive spectator. “Why don’t you let your voice, your vote be the poison pill?” He replied that he has to do what his council instructed him to do, and still explore all alternatives. “Well, since you know Poseidon will never be cost-neutral, why don’t you agendize a Council discussion on it, explain that to your colleagues, and get them to change their instructions?” “That’s a good idea, maybe I’ll do that.”
But of course he won’t, AT LEAST not before this mayoral election – he would piss off too many construction unions, and they would support someone else and attack him. Politicians…
But look at me going on, this is supposed to be John Earl’s story. Let me just remind you that the July 31 Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Board hearing on Poseidon is fast approaching, and it would be really helpful if we could get them not to approve it. For more info on that meeting, how to comment and observe, click on this Surf City Voice link. Meanwhile, here’s John:
Poseidon’s “Reliability” Promise:
Pay More, Don’t Get More!
by John Earl, Surf City Voice
Poseidon’s reliability argument [that the public needs to pay more in order to have a “reliable” source of water] rests on the false assertion that a plethora of other much cheaper and less environmentally harmful water sources, including conservation (and none of which were studied by the project’s lead agency, the Orange County Water District, as alternatives to the project), are unreliable and that the ocean provides a limitless supply of drinking water for the future in Orange County, albeit for an extra “reliability premium.”
John Earl
Poseidon’s reliability argument also falsely assumes that the ocean’s fragile and already severely damaged ecosystem is eternally impervious to the destruction of marine life its project would cause through its seawater intake and outflow systems, an issue that is also central to the upcoming permit hearings before the regional water board.
But underlying every other aspect of the proposed Poseidon ocean desalination project is that, if nothing else, it is a corporate scam for which the ratepayers of the Orange County Water District will pay dearly.
These issues, examined in my article below, related to the permit hearing of the Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board scheduled for July 30, 31, and possibly August 7 as well (information on how to digitally participate are provided).
Continue reading here, and please consider supporting the crucial work John does…
A caricature of the ocean god Poseidon that the OJ Blog frequently borrows from the defunct OC Weekly.
Single dumbest abuse of ratepayers I’ve ever seen.
Pay way more, get exactly what you have now.
All that wasted money that could have gone into conservation, recycling, and technology upgrades . . . A flushed to shareholders in exchange for exactly nothing.
“Dumb.” Not dumb for Poseidon and other folks that would be making money off it.
Just dumb for any member of the public who supports it.
Here’s the problem for Vince (who would otherwise be my choice unless Tinajero — or someone even better — jumped in:)
https://www.santa-ana.org/sites/default/files/cc/elections/documents/2020%20Candidate%20Filing%20List_0.pdf
Right now, the other candidates who have filed are Jose Solorio, Claudia Alvarez, and Mark Lopez. Jose, of course, is awful an unprincipled, Claudia, as I understand it (most of her service was before my time watching the city), is only slightly less of both, and Lopez is a Republican. If the Republican vote coalesces around Lopez, and Claudia does well with the women’s vote, Vince is fighting with Jose for the Democratic Latino male vote. There’s a huge opening here for a really progressive candidate, and it’s hard to imagine that one won’t show up.
But that’s just the start of his problem: unprincipled Jose or Claudia can outflank him on the left SIMPLY ON THE ISSUE OF POSEIDON, and the promise to remove Vince as the City’s rep to the OCWD.
The center (i’d call it center right) lane is full. Either someone new comes in — Michelle Martinez? Tinajero? Julio Perez? Claudio pretending to be a leftie? — or once the filing period is closed someone who isn’;t getting the labor vote anyway (my guess is Jose) can fake left and slam Vince on consumer protection and taxation grounds.
Poseidon isn’t a major issue on voters’ minds right now — but that could change really quickly after Kris Murray’s board approves their report on it. Those young warriors can be pulled off of Vince’s campaign, if a more leftist alternative shows up, once they see him mealy-mouthing on the issue.
You hear that, Vince?
Although it wouldn’t be Solorio, who’s been shilling for Poseidon for more than a decade, or Claudia either, who I’m told has the building trades’ support.
If she has the Trades support (and I presume that Solorio has the SAPOA support) then *what the hell is Vince worried about*? They’re already going to attack him! He thinks it will be less intense if he tiptoes around the issue?
It seems like, just, habitual cautiousness, not wanting to offend or worry either side, such as we see SO often with politicans of both parties.
I’m surprised that he told you what he did about the alleged “poison pill.” That will lead the Trades to come after him anyway.
As the great Jim Hightower said:
“There’s nothing in the middle of the road but yellow lines and dead armadillos.”
Also: I’ve read John’s article, and it’s great — as usual.
*Global Warming, Rising tides and Surf, Loss of Sea life Habitats, Lack of planning
for the future……as Pappy always said: “You are pushing stuff against the tide!”
What? we are paying double for food since January 1st, 2020 and you are worried
about $6 bucks a month? Get real….you sea anemone loving hazardous waste!
Plan for future and prepare for the worst……and you might have a clue how we are
going to survive when the recovery comes in 2035!
Hidden gems of Cape Cod Warming temperatures, increased development, and more powerful storms that wash fertilizers, wastewater, and other damaging nutrients into Cape Cod’s ponds have created ideal breeding grounds for cyanobacteria, the toxic ingredients of algae blooms that can multiply in dangerous amounts in very short periods.
——————————————-*But then what do you guys care about again?
GRRRR…..
https://voiceofoc.org/2020/07/regional-water-board-nears-decision-on-huntington-beach-desal-plant-hearing-days-of-public-arguments-for-and-against/
“Other elected officials speaking in support of the project included 72nd state Assemblyman Tyler Diep, and through a video played at the meeting, Santa Ana Councilman Vicente Sarmiento and Westminster Mayor Tri Ta.”
SO sick of these politicians who speak out both sides of their mouth.
As I posted (I think in the Santa Ana Mayor’s race review), Vince says that he has to support it on this board because of the Building Trades, but has figured out a secret way to block it elsewhere.
Here it is in case you missed it while giving me crap over Mark Lopezes:
If any one of Vince’s idealistic young followers want to make the case that he isn’t lying, but is just keeping the truth from the unsuspecting Building Trades until he is elected (despite having spilled the beans to them and to Vern), please come here and try. There’s just no excuse for this, no matter how badly you want power.
Report on Thursday/Friday’s meeting from R4RD – they will have one more day, this Friday August 7, for meeting, so if you didn’t comment last week comment Friday!
Dear Friends and Neighbors,
Thursday and Friday of last week were really quite amazing. The Santa Ana Regional Water Quality Control Board (the “Regional Board”) hearings on the proposed Poseidon desalination plant were full days, starting at 9:00 a.m. and wrapping up pretty close to 7 p.m. The amazing turn-out of public participation forced the hearings into a third day—Friday, August 7th at 9:00 a.m. Congratulations everyone! This may not seem like much, but it very much is!
Our good friends from the Coastkeeper Alliance, Surfrider Foundation, NRDC, Sierra Club, Azul and the Stanford University Environmental Law Clinic made a strong and well-organized case to the Regional Board of the many deficiencies of Poseidon’s plan. If you missed the hearing I urge you to watch the presentation (you can find us at the 4:58 time stamp) or check out the slides our coalition partners referred to in their presentation. It was delightful to watch the great job our local community groups (allies like the Bolsa Chica Land Trust, Banning Ranch Conservancy and Los Cerritos Wetlands Land Trust, to name a few) and community members and leaders (like Mikel Hogan, leader of R4RD), did making it clear to the Regional Board that we care too much about our local environment to be sold a bill of goods from a Poseidon. It’s shameful that Poseidon is so uninterested in our community and our local natural resources that they’re refusing to implement subsurface intakes, and other measures, to make their project far less environmentally damaging.
The hearing also highlighted the fact that Poseidon has NO committed buyers lined up to purchase their water —especially after 17 years of trying. In fact there is so little interest in purchasing Poseidon’s expensive and unneeded water that their back up plan is to inject lower quality desalinated water into Orange County’s ground water basin and degrade that currently high quality water. Crazy, eh?
It is the job of the Regional Board to determine if Poseidon meets standards of the least damaging option to provide needed water. Since, clearly, Poseidon does not meet those standards their permit request should be denied. The proposed permit is so controversial that the Board members did not even finish talking about Poseidon’s “non-binding” mitigation plan (sound familiar?) that the Board clearly did not like.
Since time was running out last Friday, the Regional Board was not able to get to issues like the lack of need and the high cost of the water. Therefore, that and many other issues will be discussed when the Board meets again starting at 9:00AM on Friday, August 7th. I urge you to tune into the meeting and watch it live. No matter what the decision, we have done everything we can to help the Regional Board do the right thing. And, if necessary, we are committed to continuing the opposition to this dreadful project.
Thank you for caring about your community, your coast, and your ocean. Together, we will win.
Stay safe and stay well everyone.
Regards,
~~Dave Hamilton, president
~~Residents for Responsible Desalination (R4RD)
P.S. Voice of OC (a really great online Orange County news source) ran articles about the hearing on Thursday and Friday. I urge you to check them out.
“The hearing also highlighted the fact that Poseidon has NO committed buyers lined up to purchase their water —especially after 17 years of trying. In fact there is so little interest in purchasing Poseidon’s expensive and unneeded water that their back up plan is to inject lower quality desalinated water into Orange County’s ground water basin and degrade that currently high quality water. Crazy, eh?”
Hello, boron.
No new net water. Atrocious project.