Residents raise drainage ditch questions
Concerned about potential winter rains and still reeling from flooding caused by an overflowing drainage ditch during the July 19 rainstorm, some residents turned to the Ramona Community Planning Group to help them obtain answers from the county.
Their experiences and comments sparked planning group chair Jim Piva to unleash his frustrations with the impact environmental legislation has on residents. Piva, who has been working with flooded residents of San Diego Country Estates and whose own business, Piva Equipment Rental at 124 10th St. was flooded, said, “There’s absolutely no common sense to the rules right now. And who’s getting the back seat? Every one of us.”
The question posed by the residents was: who owns the drainage ditch that runs along E and 11th streets as well as other streets in the downtown area? Is it the county? Or, does each property owner own the section of the ditch adjacent to his property, as two residents say they are being told by the county, and therefore responsible for cleaning it out?
Eighty-five-year-old Lennie Baker said he has lived in his house in the 900 block of E Street for 55 years, and he has only been flooded twice: in 1980 and in July. Nearly every year the county would send out workers to clean out the ditch, he said, but that stopped three or four years ago.
“I thought it was owned by the county,” he said of the rock-lined ditch that he said was created by the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in 1932.
Susan Richardson has lived in the 500 block of 11th Street for 37 years and said the last time the county sent workers to clean the ditch by her was January 2014.
Richardson said the day before the July 19 downpour, she knew there was a blockage in the drain because she couldn’t hear water hit the pipe. The next day, when three inches of rain fell, her garage and homes to the north of her completely flooded, she said.
“Our goal is...we just don’t want this to happen anymore,” said Richardson.
When she contacted the county, Richardson said she was told the ditch adjacent to her property was her responsibility. Even if it is, Richardson said she couldn’t get in to clean the ditch because the county has a chain link fence around it with a locked gate. A sign on the gate says “San Diego County Property, No Trespassing.”
“This is like a mystery and we’re trying to get to the bottom of the mystery,” she told the Sentinel.
According to Richardson, her 1889 deed says there is an easement on her property but the location is unknown.
County staff removed the lock on the gate so she could get in, Richardson said, and among the vegetation in the ditch were two or three mulberry trees, grapevines and two oleanders. A 30-foot-high pepper tree grows along the side of the ditch, she said.
In response to a Sentinel inquiry, the county said portions of the ditch are privately owned and portions are owned by the county — generally those areas that run within county road right-of-way and drainage easements.
Baker is concerned about the ditch between Eighth and Ninth streets that runs between Ramona Elementary School and the Ramona Unified School District administration office.
“That ditch is completely overgrown,” he said. “If ownership belongs to the school (district), why isn’t something being done to clean that thing?”
According to a map provided by the county, that section of the channel is owned by the school district.
Piva said the state has passed a lot of legislation in the past 30 years to protect environmental species, and that limits what can be done in the waterways.
“This legislation prevents the county and others from going in and doing what they’ve always done,” he said.
Government’s inaction because of potential litigation is affecting residents who pay their property taxes and their bills and are getting “the short end of the stick,” said Piva, who added that he has a problem with species becoming more important than people.
“Now we’re dealt with this huge, humongous problem,” he said.
Piva said county flood control staff is supposed to be at the planning group’s Nov. 5 meeting.
In other business, concerns of flooding in the back of a 2.87-acre vacant parcel on 16th Street where the 62-unit Valley Park Apartments are proposed to be built prevented the planning group from supporting the project’s environmental document. Planner Richard Tomlinson said what the proponents propose for drainage is unworkable.
The apartment project, which is to be built next to Ramona Lutheran School, will next head to the county Planning Commission.