Pacifica Pier News

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Business owners and residents near Reina del Mar Avenue in Pacifica are often treated to ocean views, fresh sea air — and unfortunately, occasional nauseating whiffs of the Calera Creek Water Recycling Plant.

The innovative facility, which was completed in 2000, coverts the city’s sewage into water for nearby wetlands and Class A sludge — a brown, mud-like substance that can be used for fertilizer.

The $53 million plant has been hailed as an environmental success — especially compared with the previous plant near the Pacifica Pier, which dumped treated water straight into the ocean and ultimately required millions of dollars in repairs.

But as plant employees struggle to perfect the water-recycling and sludge-making process, there have been some unpleasant aromas generated along the way.

“The odor at times is so bad it nauseates you,” said Barbara Ash, who, with her husband Hal, owns the Vallemar Station Restaurant on the east side of Highway 1 across from the plant. “It’s totally disgusting.”

Ash said they have actually lost business as a result of the smells. One customer, Ash said, came in complaining about a dead animal smell.

“‘That’s not an animal, that’s the sewer,’” Ash recalled saying.

Plant manager Dave Gromm said when the smell is particularly strong, he fields about 10 complaint calls from the public a month. He’s not enthused about the odors either: He and his employees can smell it on their clothes.

“They used to have this nice air, and now they’re smelling our treatment plant,” Gromm said of nearby residents. “That’s not acceptable.”

The good news, Gromm said, is that it’s possible to fix the odor problem; the bad news is the plant doesn’t currently have the capability to do it.

Pacifica’s used water — which comes from toilets, showers, kitchen sinks — gets channeled through six pump stations. Screens filter out large objects; rock, sand, and asphalt are taken out with a “grit removal” process. Then, the biological sequence — a large “science project,” as Gromm puts it — begins.

Millions and millions of microorganisms begin feeding on the remaining particles. The resulting biomass sinks to the bottom — the water on the top is treated with ultraviolet light and channeled 30 acres of nearby wetlands.

The water part of the plan, Gromm said, has been extremely successful. Things tend to get stinky, however, during a phase in the process in which the remaining material is turned into sludge. As the biological process continues, “mercaptans” — part of a malodorous sulfur-containing compound — are released into the air.

At that point — depending on which way the wind is blowing, and how strong the smell is — Gromm’s phone might start to ring.

But Gromm and Public Works Director Scott Holmes are hot on the mercaptan case. Gromm and Holmes have been working with an Indiana-based company that has developed new technology — an air-blowing system — to eliminate this bad-smelling step of the process. Gromm already has purchased one of the blowers and figured $250,000 into this year’s budget to purchase and install the new components. He hopes to complete the project before the end of the year.

Gromm and Holmes understand the public’s reaction to the smells, but urge people to be patient.

“I know people’s tolerance for odor is zero,” Holmes said. “I feel the same way when I’m at home.”

Staff writer Amelia Hansen covers the Coast. She can be reached at [650] 348-4301 or by e-mail at ahansen@sanmateocountytimes.com .

LOAD-DATE: June 11, 2004
Copyright 2004 MediaNews Group, Inc. and ANG Newspapers
San Mateo County Times (San Mateo, CA)
June 10, 2004 Thursday
SECTION: LOCAL & REGIONAL NEWS

LENGTH: 595 words

HEADLINE: Sludge city;
Odors from water plant

BYLINE: By Amelia Hansen, STAFF WRITER

DATELINE: PACIFICA

BODY:
have caused

complaints

For the past 30 years, Pacifica’s pier has been among the city’s most popular attractions, drawing hundreds of visitors daily. People say the pier is so crowded with fishermen on weekends that they’re forced to stand shoulder to shoulder.

But the years and the elements have taken their toll on the popular pier. Its floor is scarred and cracked, and its railings are decaying. Add to that the sewer line the pier originally was built to support has been removed — a line replaced by Pacifica’s new waste-water treatment plant — and it’s no wonder the pier’s admirers are worried about the structure’s future.

“The pier is falling into the sea,” says Anna Boothe, chairwoman of Preserve Our Pier Supporters (POPS), a community group. “Something has to be done.”

This sentiment is widely shared. State Sen. Jackie Speier applied for and received $ 500,000 in state aid for pier repairs, as well as $ 90,000 in federal grants. The city held a party Friday to celebrate the achievement.

Although acquiring these funds is cause for celebration in town, the total cost of refurbishing the pier is far from covered. According to a 1998 study by Kermani Consulting Group, repairs to the pier could total between $ 3 million and $ 5 million.

But those who really love the pier have set their minds to raising the money and making sure it’s put to good use. Boothe, the POPS leader, says the group is committed to planning events such as concerts to raise money and awareness.

The group’s initial efforts netted $ 525, which they promptly donated to the city for use on the pier. Boothe says she hopes the city will paint the concessions building and the bathroom.

“We want to augment the value by making the pier pleasant,” she said.

Perhaps the most outspoken proponent of the pier is Andy Pappas, a 70-year-old fisherman who spends nearly every day of his life there. His prowess at netting crabs has become legendary, as attested to by other fishermen as well as photographs taped to the side of the concessions building.

Turning his weather-worn face into the wind, Pappas gazes lovingly at the pier.

“Not only is the pier beautiful to fish from, but you can also see wildlife,” he said, pointing at a flock of pigeons flying in formation in the distance.

“I like the fresh air, the smell of the beautiful ocean, the friends, the barbecues and mainly the beautiful salmon,” he said. Strolling down the pier toward his two fishing poles, Pappas greets nearly everyone he passes, his eyes crinkling beneath his blue Pacifica Pier cap.

“What we’re trying to do is to keep the pier open, but in order to do that we need more bucks,” he said. “If there’s someone out there that can help us, I, Andy Pappas, will personally thank them.”

Pacifica, meanwhile, has applied for an additional $ 620,000 from the state Department of Boating and Waterways and plans to contribute $ 207,000 in matching funds.

That’s still not enough, but they’re working on it. The city council will discuss how to spend the funds in hand at its meeting Monday night. Public comments are encouraged, said Diane Ceravolo, acting city manager.

For more information or to get involved with POPS, contact Boothe at (650) 557-9097.

—–

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JOURNAL-CODE: SJ

LOAD-DATE: August 29, 2000

Copyright 2000 Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News
Copyright 2000 San Jose Mercury News
San Jose Mercury News
August 28, 2000, Monday
KR-ACC-NO: SJ-PIER

LENGTH: 564 words

HEADLINE: Pacifica, Calif., Ocean Pier Needs Millions of Dollars in Repairs

BYLINE: By Steven Raphael

BODY:

Two of Pacifica’s links to the ocean — and fundamental parts of the city’s self-image — are under attack, prompting a desperate search by city officials for money to save them, or at least halt their decay.

Pacifica’s Fishing Pier, built in 1973, is rapidly being smashed to pieces by the not-so-peaceful ocean, while Pacifica State Beach on the city’s south side is being loved to death by picnickers and party animals, according to city officials.

“Pacifica has been discovered, and we have more and more people coming over here to fish off the pier and use that beach,” said Mayor Pete DeJarnatt. “The pier is being beaten to death by millions of waves, and the beach is being trashed by more and more people.”

The pier, which extends 1,400 feet out into the ocean, was built with state funds to carry the old 24-inch outlet pipe used to dump the city’s treated water from the wastewater treatment plant. It was designed to last about 25 years — that is, until about 1998.

With the city’s new Calera Creek wastewater plant scheduled to go online in a few months, the outfall pipe will be obsolete, and city officials fear that the pier itself will begin to decay more rapidly.

City engineers estimate that it will cost as much as $10 million to fix the pier and as much as $14 million to replace it. The city’s projected budget for the coming fiscal year is only $16 million, DeJarnatt said.
“We flat out do not have the money to fix it or replace it,” DeJarnatt said. “It is obviously something we would like to keep, since it is the only pier of its kind sticking right out into the ocean in the northern part of the state. It defines Pacifica.”

In recent years, especially during winter storms, the city has had to close the pier for safety reasons more often. Storms in El Nino years frequently sent waves passing completely over the pier.

“On weekends and during the salmon season, there must be 8,000 people out there on that pier,” said Pacifica City Councilman Jim Vreeland. “At some point, it won’t be safe for people to go out there at all. If we fail to do something very soon, it’s going to become just a huge blight along the coast, a massive, ugly thing decaying into the ocean, and by then it will be even harder to find money to fix it.”

Down the coast, there is equal concern over Pacifica State Beach, also known as Linda Mar Beach, which the city is responsible for maintaining. The mile-long stretch draws surfers, fishermen, families, and beer drinkers and smokers — many of them from outside San Mateo County — who seek a safe ocean beach, city officials said. The plastic from the cigarette butt filters is a major hazard to birds and marine life.

“It’s about a mile long and it’s a beautiful beach, but it has been discovered over the last decade in a major way,” DeJarnatt said. “There seems to be a sense that anything goes there now. It’s not like there is garbage everywhere, but we really want to make it as clean as we can. We have to change the mind-set there.”

The chief problems are a lack of enough police staff to keep an eye on the beach, too few trash cans and decaying bathroom facilities, DeJarnatt said.

The city needs close to $1 million to replace the bathroom facilities, to repave the parking lot and to pay for a beach officer to be on duty most of the day.

Apart from the recently passed Proposition 12, which city leaders believe will produce a one-time payment of $500,000, the only obvious source of new funds is parking fees.

Pacifica has a long history of money problems, largely because it is a bedroom community with plenty of houses and few large commercial developments to count on for taxes. Although the number of hotels and motels has almost doubled in the past four years, they still bring less than $600,000 a year in tax revenue, DeJarnatt said.

In addition, Pacifica has an abundance of open space and parkland — attractions that do not generate tax revenues. The Golden Gate National Recreation Area owns more than 14 percent of the land within the city limits, or 1,132 acres.

City officials have contacted local, state and federal legislators hoping to shake some money free. One of the most sympathetic has been state Sen. Jackie Speier, D-Hillsborough, who recently agreed to be lowered in a bucket down to the innards of the pier for an up-close inspection, Vreeland said.

Speier is searching for money, but so far nothing is definite, said Kevin Mullin, the senator’s district director.

“We’ve been trying to secure funding from the Coastal Conservancy and also through state park bonds, the state budget process,” Mullin said. “We’re trying to determine what is out there — it’s a slow evolving process.”

Caption:
(1) Above: Derek Tims, Kiyana Reyes, Camille and Jasmine Elsherbine, and Danny Barrett played in the waves at Pacifica State Beach., (2) Left: Angler John Cimino signed a petition on the Pacifica pier, where he fishes often and takes walks with his wife.
Photos by Sam Deaner/The Chronicle
Caption:
PHOTO (2)

Push To Save Pacifica Pier
Money also needed to maintain popular beach
THE SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE
May 1, 2000
Author: Michael McCabe, Chronicle Staff Writer
Estimated printed pages: 3
Edition: FINAL / PENINSULA
Section: NEWS
Page: A17
Index Terms: PACIFICA; Fishing Pier; Pacifica State Beach; BAY AREA; BEACHES; ENVIRONMENT; REDEVELOPMENT; PLANNING
Dateline: PACIFICA
Copyright 2000 The Chronicle Publishing Co.
Record Number: 3117935

There is a rare opportunity in Pacifica, a bedroom community of 40,000 people on San Mateo County’s spectacular coast: deciding what to do with three precious acres overlooking the beach and adjacent to the city’s 1,140-foot-long pier.

Tonight, the City Council plans to discuss four proposals for developing the area, home to a crumbling wastewater treatment plant that will be decommissioned later this year. The ideas range from an innovative ocean center to residential and commercial projects. The one officials choose could change not only the face but the fortunes of the cash-strapped town.

“It’s a very emotional decision, a very serious decision,” said Pacifica Mayor Calvin Hinton. “Most things that happen in Pacifica seem to evolve into emotional issues, because people feel very strongly about things over here.”

The plans under consideration are:

– 34 townhouses with some retail and commercial space by Dividend Homes Inc. of Santa Clara.

– A high-tech “incubator” project, defined as a home for startup companies that share equipment, labs and administrative support, proposed by Gangi Development of Glendale.

– A hotel-conference center by Barry Swenson Builder of San Jose.

– A center dedicated to marine and coastal education and conservation, sought by a group of local citizens.

The last proposal has attracted the most excitement so far, particularly among environmentalists. It also appears to have the least chance of getting the nod from the City Council — unless its backers can find some money quick.

Their project is called the Pacifica Ocean Discovery Center, a kind of blending of the Monterey Bay Aquarium with the Exploratorium, only on a much smaller scale. The idea is to recycle most, if not all, of the existing structures at the wastewater plant into a center for marine and coastal education and conservation.

There would be public exhibits, live-animal displays, educational programs and even a connection to the restored Pacifica Pier next door and the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve eight miles south. The existing structures would be reused, while a hotel, restaurant, bookstore and farmers and fish market also are envisioned. The total cost would be $10 million.

“This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. There is no other proposal like this,” said the center’s executive director, Mitch Reid, who runs his own recycling business in Pacifica.

For Reid and his backers, who include educators, marine biologists, planners and a broad collection of environmentalists, it is a classic Catch-22 situation: they need the city’s backing to attract money for the project but they cannot seem to get the city’s attention without first having some solid financial backing, at least $1 million.

“At this point the city appears to be very shortsighted — they are going after the money first and haven’t really thought out what this project is going to do for the entire region,” Reid said.

So far, the project has received $10,000 from the Peninsula Community Foundation to hire consultants and architects to prepare plans. It also has received $3,000 from the Compton Foundation.

“We’re looking for an angel,” Reid said.

Backers of the project say its importance goes beyond the site itself. For starters, there is the connection to the Pacifica Pier. The pier carries the old 24-inch outlet pipe used to dump the treated water from the plant into the ocean. The plan is to recycle that pipe to draw saltwater into the new discovery center for live marine exhibits.

“To replicate that would cost tens of millions of dollars — if you could get Coastal Commission approval,” Reid said.

In addition, said Shari Snitovsky, the center’s education program director, the center could be a site for training people how to tread lightly at the Fitzgerald Marine Reserve, while at the same time insulating the reserve from hordes of sightseers.

“Instead of 300,000 people tramping through the reserve a year as they do now, about half of them could be coming to Pacifica’s new discovery center,” Snitovsky said.

Most City Council members, while expressing admiration for the project’s “vision,” agree with Reid that lack of money is a huge problem.

Hinton said Pacifica’s problem is is that it has few commercial or industrial buildings to help with badly needed tax revenue.

“We hope to one day make Pacifica a destination, particularly if we can get something like this conference center here to get people to come here to meet on business and enjoy the beautiful ocean,” he said.

Pacifica has been struggling with money problems for years. There is a grassroots attempt under way to find money for a new police station to replace the century-old, termite-infested one now barely standing, for example. Only in the past two years has Pacifica balanced its budget.

While some hotel and motel projects are in the planning stages or nearing completion, the town lacks a large shopping center; most of the town’s shoppers spend their money at Daly City malls. But as in the rest of the Bay Area, property values in Pacifica are rising. The town is changing from blue collar to professional, said city manager David Carmany.

Councilman James Vreeland said he is intrigued by the Ocean Discovery concept and is not giving up on it just yet, although he wished Pacifica had more money in reserve.

“It is a shame that this city is not in a better financial situation . . . because if it was, we would be having a totally different discussion,” Vreeland said. “I wish we could just do it. It’s tough, really tough.”

GRAPHIC: PHOTO, GRAPHIC, MAP, PHOTO: Visitors walked along a wave barrier in Pacifica where some seek to convert an old wastewater treatment plant into a marine education center. / Carlos Avila Gonzalez/The Chronicle, GRAPHIC: FROM TREATMENT PLANT TO DISCOVERY CENTER / CHRONICLE GRAPHIC

LOAD-DATE: June 28, 1999

Copyright 1999 The Chronicle Publishing Co.
The San Francisco Chronicle
View Related Topics
JUNE 28, 1999, MONDAY, FINAL EDITION
SECTION: NEWS; Pg. A15

LENGTH: 936 words

HEADLINE: Awash in Possibilities;

Cash-strapped Pacifica considers building marine center, among other ideas

BYLINE: Michael McCabe, Chronicle Staff Writer

DATELINE: PACIFICA

BODY:

Editor — Regarding “Pacifica Sewer Plant Could See New Life as Beach Aquarium” (The Chronicle, July 20), the correct name of our project proposal is the Pacifica Ocean Discovery Center.

On the same page as our article was a story about the proposed $525 million mall stadium. The stadium project would primarily benefit people interested in sports. In interesting contrast, our $25 million project would cost a mere fraction of that and would be a lifelong benefit for the coastal environment and everyone in the Bay Area, especially students.

While on the subject of money, I would like to express gratitude to Mr. Gabbert (TV 20) and his partner, Mr. Lincoln, for their recent gift of $70 million dollars to the Trust for Public Land. This gift is an inspiration to all and is a positive example of the love and deep commitment people have for the Bay Area.

It is this type of generosity as well as the cultural, spiritual and artistic richness of the Bay Area that we hope to draw upon to transform our dream and vision into reality. We need to raise a few hundred thousand dollars in the next couple months to keep the city of Pacifica from selling off its oceanfront property. Citizens on the coast would prefer to see an aquarium/ocean education center built next to the Pacifica Pier, versus yet more condos and strip malls on the ocean. Time is running out to save the Pacifica Pier and this incredible opportunity for the Bay Area.

MITCH REID
Executive director
Pacifica Ocean Discovery Center
Pacifica

Edition: FINAL
Section: PENINSULA FRIDAY
Page: 2
Column: LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Index Terms: LETTER
Dateline: Peninsula
Copyright 1998 The Chronicle Publishing Co.
Record Number: 3026720

PACIFICA - Gary Hart abdicated any leadership role he may have claimed in protecting the environment when he voted to confirm James Watt as President Reagan’s Interior secretary, Walter Mondale declared Saturday.

It was Mondale’s second straight day in the Bay area of belittling Hart’s Senate record. Friday he assailed the Colorado senator’s involvement in the nuclear freeze movement as late and reluctant.

After sinking a line in the waters below Pacifica pier without getting a nibble but crossing lines with the fisherman next to him, Mondale took to another kind of baiting.

Gary Hart should have led the fight against James Watt instead of voting for his confirmation, he said. As a Coloradan, he was in a unique position to understand the threat that Watt posed.

Mondale charged that Hart, a senator from an environmentally sensitive Western state where Watt had worked as head of the archconservative and anti-environmentalist Mountain States Legal Defense Fund, simply should have known better than to vote for Watt.

Mr. Hart was familiar with Mr. Watt’s activities in the Mountain States. He was aware of who was backing Watt and he knew of Watt’s philosophy that natural resources should be sold, chopped or bulldozed as soon as possible, Mondale told a seaside crowd of about 300.

Only 12 senators voted against the confirmation in 1980. Mondale said it could have been more had Hart led the fight against Watt.

On this issue - the Watt confirmation - and on toxic waste, there are substantial questions about Sen. Hart’s leadership or lack of it, he said.

In New Jersey, to which Mondale flew after his Bay area appearances Saturday, the former vice president has criticized Hart’s absence during a key vote on the federal superfund legislation.

Asked whether he, as a U.S. senator, ever voted against confirmation of any of President Richard Nixon’s appointees, Mondale said, I didn’t end up No. 3 on Nixon’s enemies list for nothing.

But, when pressed, he could recall voting only against former Attorney General John Mitchell and maybe against former Secretary of Agriculture Earl Butz, who resigned during the Gerald Ford administration because of a furor over a racial remark.

The list, nonetheless, contained other nominees, successful and unsuccessful, whom Mondale voted against, including: Supreme Court nominees Clement Haynsworth and G. Harrold Carswell; Butz; and former Attorney General Richard Kleindienst.

A spokesman for Hart’s California campaign said Mondale’s newest charges are just more of his negative campaigning.

Keith Glaser said Hart was given a leadership rating by the League of Conservation Voters this year, while neither Mondale nor the Rev. Jesse Jackson were rated as highly. He disagreed that Watt’s stand on the issues was clear when Hart voted to confirm him.

Mondale, while in Pacifica, also criticized Reagan’s environmental policies as radical and irresponsible, and he outlined a five-point plan to prevent coastal oil drilling.

The key feature, he said, is a moratorium on government leasing of coastal areas for oil exploration or development.

However, the Reagan administration took a little of the sting out of Mondale’s remarks by announcing Friday that it was drastically reducing plans to lease such coastal sites in Southern California and postponing indefinitely leasing in Northern California.

MONDALE ATTACKS HART FOR VOTING FOR JAMES WATT
SACRAMENTO BEE
May 27, 1984
Author: Ricardo Pimentel
Estimated printed pages: 2
Edition: FINAL
Section: METRO
Page: A
Record Number: 125