New Report: LA County’s Safe Clean Water Program Making Progress Toward Resilient Stormwater Management Goals; Improvements Needed to Deliver on Program’s Full Promise
$1 Billion invested in first three years
Report IDs need to do more to promote green schoolyards, prioritize projects in disadvantaged communities and secure community benefits
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
February 16, 2023
LOS ANGELES, Calif. – LA Waterkeeper released a new report today that assesses the first three years of Los Angeles County’s Safe Clean Water Program (SCWP). The program is funded by a voter-approved tax (2018’s Measure W) that raises about $280M per year, in perpetuity, to better manage urban and stormwater runoff. The program’s overarching goals are to improve water quality, enhance local water supply and provide community investment benefits, with a particular focus on disadvantaged communities. Program priorities also include community engagement and green workforce development.
“Changing the Course?: What’s Worked, What Hasn’t, and What’s Next for the Safe Clean Water Program” specifically examines one of three programs that comprise the SCWP, the Regional Program. The Regional Program receives 50 percent of SCWP funds, with the remaining funds allocated between the Municipal Program and the District Program.
“In the wake of the recent storms and floods, we’re seeing the power and potential of the Safe Clean Water Program to serve community needs while strengthening our region’s water independence,” said Bruce Reznik, executive director of LA Waterkeeper. “Instead of flushing this water out to the ocean, we can leverage a much greater amount of the rain that falls to replenish groundwater supplies and meet the needs of Angelenos. This program is central to making that vision a reality.”
With the potential of stormwater capture front and center in the public’s minds after a recent parade of atmospheric rivers dumped tens of billions of gallons of water on LA County in recent weeks, now is an opportune time for an objective evaluation of whether the SCWP is on track to meet its goals. The timing of this report is especially relevant as the first audit (known as the biennial review) of the SCWP is getting underway.
"The SCWP has the potential to change the landscape of water management in Los Angeles and inspire similar programs across the state and country,” noted Sonali Abraham, research associate with the Pacific Institute. “While the SCWP has done a laudable job, there is an opportunity to more robustly evaluate and account for the many co-benefits in projects so that a diverse set of water management strategies are showcased and adopted."
Report Findings
In just over four years since the passage of Measure W, more than $700M has been earmarked through three rounds of the Regional Program, with that total rising to more than $1B including matching funds from other local, state and federal entities. This funding supports the 101 multi-benefit stormwater infrastructure projects throughout the county as well as technical assistance and studies for future projects.
Projects planned and completed to date will provide significant water quality benefits by collecting and treating contaminated runoff, while also helping move us towards captured stormwater being a larger part of LA County’s water supplies. Projects also provide community benefits like adding trees and rehabilitating parks.
“Considering the scope and complexity of the program, which seeks to achieve a broad range of goals simultaneously,” added Reznik, “it is impressive how much has been accomplished in just a few years. The Board of Supervisors, staff at the LA County Flood Control District and innumerable community leaders should be applauded for getting this ambitious program off the ground.”
Despite its early accomplishments, the SCWP has had a slow start in making progress on some of its most important goals. In a county of more than three million acres, only 30 acres of new greenspace were added countywide. Given the massive amount of hardscape throughout the LA region, the SCWP will need to radically accelerate hardscape removal to effectively meet the program’s objectives. Greening at schools, in particular, could provide a whole host of benefits, including increased groundwater recharge and reduced flood risk. To date, very few such projects have been funded.
“It is heartening to see a few schools’ greening projects moving forward through the Safe Clean Water Program, including the Mary Jackson Elementary School project in Pasadena, which Amigos de los Rios spearheaded,” said Claire Robinson, Amigos de los Rios’ managing director. “But considering the tremendous opportunities and benefits school greening provides for our environment, communities, and students, the SCWP must do a better job to ensure more living schoolyard projects come to fruition.”
The Flood Control District has also been slow to roll out community education and outreach and workforce development programs that were promised to voters as part of Measure W. These programs are anticipated to be formally launched in 2023, but the delay threatens to undermine some of the key benefits promised to voters in Measure W, including the goal of projects with strong community support.
“Urban Orchard is a great example of a community-driven multi-benefit project. It is converting a contaminated brownfield into a 7-acre park that will capture and treat runoff along the LA River in South Gate, an historically underinvested community for park resources,” noted Robin Mark, Program Director at The Trust for Public Land. “Funding from the Safe Clean Water Program has been critical in moving this project forward. We need to ensure these types of projects are happening throughout LA County, particularly in our heavily urbanized and industrialized frontline communities.”
Moving Forward
The report includes recommendations large and small for improving the SCWP to ensure it successfully achieves its myriad goals. Specifically, the report calls for:
LA County, in consultation with other stakeholders and robust community input, to develop a proactive vision that identifies the kinds of stormwater treatment and capture projects that would be most impactful and identifies where such projects should be developed.
Greatly accelerating the replacement of hardscape with greenspace, particularly at schools and in park-poor communities.
Providing greater guidance (including specific metrics) and incentives to maximize the program’s promised community investment benefits and ensuring those benefits are fully realized.
“The LA Waterkeeper report demonstrates that Measure W has catalyzed the construction of numerous already-planned projects to reduce stormwater pollution” said Dr. Mark Gold, adjunct professor in UCLA’s Institute of the Environment and Sustainability and Director of Water Scarcity Solutions with NRDC. “However, the County needs to greatly accelerate the process of using the best available science, combined with robust community input, to site, design and build projects that will quickly result in water quality standards attainment and dramatic progress towards local water self-sufficiency. In particular, larger, strategically placed, multi-benefit stormwater infiltration projects are needed to augment local groundwater supplies.”
More About LA Waterkeeper’s Assessment of the SCWP
The report identified 20 exemplar projects that provide a template for community-driven, multi-benefit projects in a variety of settings. It also notes that a lack of specific metrics and clear definitions in certain areas of the SCWP has resulted in uncertain outcomes to date, particularly around community benefits, nature-based solutions, community engagement and benefits to disadvantaged communities. As a result, the SCWP may underperform in providing promised community investments, particularly in frontline communities. Even where metrics and definitions are clear, such as water quality and water supply, anticipated benefits may not be fully realized due to shortcomings in the project evaluation process.
Los Angeles Waterkeeper has served as LA’s water watchdog since 1993, fighting for the health of the region’s waterways, and for sustainable, equitable, and climate-resilient water supplies. LA Waterkeeper envisions the Los Angeles region as an international leader on integrated, sustainable and equitable water management; a region that is water self-sufficient; and where all waterways throughout the county are safe, healthy and accessible to the public.
LA Waterkeeper was integrally involved in the development of Measure W, the ballot measure that established the SCWP. The organization continues to be engaged in the implementation of the program through a formal role in evaluating project applications and an informal role as an advocate.
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