BOS waive fees for community project
EL CENTRO — A community-led project to cope with the adverse effects of the receding Salton Sea cleared an important hurdle this week as the County Board of Supervisors voted in favor of waiving permit fees to allow the project to move forward.
On Tuesday, residents of Desert Shores along with EcoMedia Compass a non-profit outreach organization which advocates for the restoration of the Salton Sea asked the board to consider waiving all permitting fees associated with the pilot project to allow the community to use those monies for the construction itself.
“This is a community focused project and a community supported project and community paid project funded through donations of materials, donations of labor and fundraising,” said Tom Sephton, president of Sephton Water Technology and EcoMedia Compass board member. “We’re finding ways to do this any way possible because this is important not only to the residents in Desert Shores but around the sea.”
The Desert Shores Restoration and Dust Mitigation Pilot Project consists of a berm installed to block the water within the 28-acre channel that has disconnected from the Salton Sea and allow imported water pumped from the sea to remain in the keys which will prevent playa from being exposed to the local residents. In other to prevent the formation of algae and bacteria within the keys, a solar-powered pump would be used to recirculate the water.
Sephton told the board, the project is important to the local community because under the Salton Sea Management Program’s 10-year plan, the state will focus on building habitat projects at the south and north ends of the lake but has no projects to protect the health of the communities living adjacent to the lake on the west and east side of the Salton Sea. He noted, if successful, the project can be replicated in other communities near the sea such as Salton City and Bombay Beach.
“This is the first example of what I’ve seen in residents actively taking restoration into their own hands,” said Kerry Morrison, executive director of EcoMedia Compass.
“The state is doing some good projects that we are proud of and supportive of but we all know it’s not enough at this point. We know there aren’t projects along west shores taking care of the residents’ health, their property value.” The Board of Supervisors praised the group and the residents for their bold actions. Despite his support for the project, District 2 Supervisor Luis Plancarte wanted to ensure the county wouldn’t set a precedent of forgiving fees associated with any project at the Salton Sea.
County Counsel Katherine Turner said that in order to address those concerns, the county included in the resolution a deadline of Dec. 31, 2018, for the waiving of the fees and also allows the Planning and Development Services Director to seek reimbursement of such fees from grants, mitigation funds or other agencies providing funding for dust mitigation at the Salton Sea.
Those provisions were enough for the board to unanimously approve the proposal.
“We got a lot of issues and I don’t think we’ve seen the half of it,” said District 5 Supervisor Ray Castillo. “It’s going to get worse before it gets better, but hopefully we’ll be able to come up with some solution. I think this is a step in the right direction and maybe more ideas will follow later.”