Yucca Valley property owners who aren't complying with a ban on septic tanks are beginning to feel the hammer from state enforcers, who want an aquifer that supplies drinking water for the rural town off Highway 62 to stop being polluted with toilet waste runoff.
After years of warnings, state water regulators have now issued cease-and-desist notices against three Yucca Valley homeowners for failing to hook up to public sewage lines, and for discharging septic waste into the town's primary drinking water source. If they do not comply by December, they could face penalties of $5,000 a day and referral to the state attorney general for possible further sanctions. None of the owners responded to requests for comment from The Desert Sun.
The notices are the first approved by the Colorado River Basin Regional Water Quality Control Board, an arm of the state's water board, under a policy dubbed the Yucca Valley Septic Prohibition. While more than one million Californians with functioning "onsite water treatment systems" are waived every five years from complying with a state policy adopted in 2012, converting dangerous septic systems in areas where sewer treatment is available is a top priority for the board, including in densely built parts of Yucca Valley.
Dangerous nitrates in groundwater
"Septic tank discharges from households, commercial and industrial facilities have degraded the quality of the aquifer that Hi-Desert Water District relies on to deliver drinking water to Yucca Valley residents," says a news release this week from water board spokesman Dimitri Stanich. "Septic discharges cause nitrates and other contaminants to be absorbed into the soil, which eventually reach groundwater supplies. Ingesting nitrates in drinking water poses a significant public health threat, with pregnant women and infants having the greatest risk of becoming ill."
To address the issue, the board adopted a ban on new and existing septic systems in Yucca Valley nearly four years ago, and is now issuing cease-and-desist orders to property owners who have had access to a public sewer system since 2020 but have yet to convert their septic systems. The Hi-Desert Water District has had sewage lines available within 500 feet of each of the homes for more than three years.
“We need property owners to take the septic system prohibition seriously and partner with us to keep wastewater from polluting critical drinking water supplies,” Peter Satin, regional board board chair, said in the news release. “The goal of these orders is to achieve compliance and stress the importance of eliminating the use of septic systems.”
Homeowners in the downtown Yucca Valley area had 180 days to connect to the sewer system after it came online in February 2020. While Hi-Desert's website says that 95% of property owners covered by the ban have complied, not all have. Despite multiple violation notices, the owners who received the cease and desist orders still haven’t connected to the sewer system, and are violating an area basin plan by discharging wastewater into the Warren Valley Groundwater Subbasin, "a critical source of drinking water for thousands of homes and businesses in the Mojave Desert."
These are the first such orders issued in Yucca Valley, which is phasing in full bans in coming years, and raising monthly rates to help cover sewage treatment facility costs. It is not clear if the tough orders are the first in the state, but there have been strict bans on fecal matter discharges or improvements required to septic systems in the northern city of Chico and numerous other communities outside of major cities, in some cases for decades, including the Cove area of Cathedral City, Mission Creek and Desert Hot Springs aquifers, Malibu, the Russian River watershed, portions of Lytle Creek, Mill Creek, Yucaipa-Calimesa, Quail Valley, Grand Terrace and elsewhere.
Mission Springs Water District held a ribbon cutting last week for a waste treatment and water recycling plant last week that could keep 700 residences and businesses off of septic systems.
The three Yucca Valley homeowners who have received the orders to stop using septic systems are Pedro Luna and Krystyanne Green, whose homes are on neighboring streets just north of State Route 62, and Christopher Heltebran, who owns a home about two miles to the south. None returned phone calls to a reporter seeking comment.
The water board says enforcement staff contacted each of them several times since 2021, including through letters encouraging them to comply with the septic system prohibition, and offering information on financial assistance. The property owners must now submit to the board a certification of connection from the Hi-Desert district by November 11 and comply with all aspects of the septic prohibition by December 1.
Installing sewage lines and closing out old septic systems is expensive. The orders allow for extensions if warranted, and up to $4,000 in U.S. Department of Agriculture assistance is available for owners living below the federal poverty line.
The adopted cease-and-desist orders and tentative orders can be viewed on the board’s website. The board is scheduled to consider additional orders for noncompliance in the future.
(This story has been updated to correct a typo.)
Janet Wilson is senior environment reporter for The Desert Sun and co-authors USA Today Climate Point. She can be reached at [email protected]