LA City Prop O Citizen Oversight Committee Chair, Cecilia Estolano, Demystifies The Bond Program

Last year, the voters of Los Angeles passed Proposition O. Could you remind our readers what Proposition O does?

Proposition O authorized the City of Los Angeles to issue some general obligation bonds for up to $500 million. The money is to be spent on projects to protect public health and clean waterways, in order to meet federal and state Clean Water Act requirements. The projects, typically, would be focused on cleaning rivers, beaches, and the ocean. Prop. O could also fund flood protection, increase water conservation, protect habitats and create additional open space.

The idea is to fund projects that will enhance environmental quality, but also have other benefits as well.

What mechanism was created by the bond measure to manage the bond proceeds for the benefits you just mentioned?

There are two oversight committees. One is the Administrative Oversight Committee, which consists of city departments such as the Chief Administrative Officer, the Chief Legislative Analyst, the mayor's office and the Bureau of Sanitation.

The other committee is a Citizen's Oversight Advisory Committee, which I currently chair. It consists of five appointments from the City Council president and four from the mayor. These oversight bodies are intended to ensure that the money is being spent appropriately. To do this, we were charged with developing the project selection criteria, which were approved just last month by the City Council. The Citizen Advisory Committee also has to produce a semi-annual progress report for the City Council and the Mayor.

Could you share with our readers what the water project criteria is that the City Council just approved?

The aim is to ensure that the primary purpose of the projects selected will be to improve water quality. To do this, we developed weighted criteria. The degree to which the project reduces pollution that has an adopted TMDL (total maximum daily load) is weighted 40 percent. These are mandates to clean up specific pollutants in specific water bodies like the LA River and the Ballona channel. So 40 percent of the weighting has to do with how well the project being proposed helps us achieve those goals. About 30 percent of the weighting will be given to whether the project provides multiple other benefits, such as enhancing a drinking water source, providing open space or recreational areas, reducing flooding, or improving the environment in other ways. A very important piece of this is the degree to which the project would be consistent with regional planning efforts that are already underway. We want to make this funding source leverage additional funding sources and assist in other environmental planning efforts that are already underway. Another 30% of the weighting will be given to the feasibility and readiness of the project. This would include issues like the durability and cost of the project and the technology that it uses. It also includes the potential for additional funding sources and whether the project has strong community support.

Those are the criteria that we drafted and that were approved by the council. Now we are moving to get the word out that there is money available for innovative water quality improvement projects.

Could you give us examples of the kinds of projects that have been mentioned as fundable, either during the campaign or in discussions with the council, so that are readers will have a better appreciation of what is eligible?

I was not actively involved in the campaign because I was on city staff at the time, but I can tell you that the types of projects that people were touting were projects that create open space and use that open space for water quality treatment purposes. For example, you could have open space with a water element that would be used to treat urban runoff. Tree People has worked with schools to create underground cisterns that collect stormwater runoff, store it, clean it, and make it available for future use. That is something that could be funded. Projects associated with Los Angeles River enhancement, including habitat restoration and habitat enhancement projects that have water quality benefits could be eligible.

The bottom line is that we are trying to get pollutants out of the rivers and streams, out of the streets, and ultimately prevent them from making their way to the ocean. So what we want to do is divert storm water, store it, clean it, and use it for beneficial uses, including underground recharge. Those are the kinds of things that we are talking about. This is a new arena, however. There are not a lot of off the shelf projects that we can turn to in order to accomplish our goals. This is a very exciting program. There is $500 million to work with. We want real water quality benefits, but we also know that we will be trying some new things.

More conventional types of projects that could also be funded include catch basin inserts that are put in the storm drains to catch trash so that it does not reach the river and end up in the ocean. Those catch basin inserts will actually help Los Angeles meet its requirements under the Regional Water Board's trash TMDL. A few years ago the Regional Water Board passed a rule to reduce the trash in the Los Angeles River to zero in 12 years. We have a phased approach to get there. We make reductions. Every year we have another 10% to 20% reduction. By putting in the catch basin inserts and screening out the trash before it gets to the river, we will be able to substantially meet that goal in the next couple of years.

What will be the timeline for applying for Prop. O funding?

We are creating the timeline now. As I mentioned, the criteria were just approved. We are now soliciting projects for this year and then will establish a regular funding cycle. We are working on the details of that funding cycle now, putting together a calendar of when applications will be accepted, and when decisions will be made. We'll integrate that with the city budget process. We intend to work this out in the next couple of meetings of our committee.

There will be two new Los Angeles councilmembers and a new mayor starting in July. Will this change in leadership make a difference re the implementation of the Prop O program?

I think our elected officials can make a difference. We are hoping to get a lot of ideas from the community and from council offices. Council offices are right there, on the ground, working day to day with community groups. So they are going to be getting the ideas from communities in areas where there may be serious water quality problems that could benefit from some innovative projects funded by Proposition O. We expect that we will be getting a lot of ideas from council offices and from the community groups that they work with.

As for the mayor's office, I know that the mayor-elect is committed to active environmental leadership, and I imagine that he is going to support the efforts of the Bureau of Sanitation to fund these types of projects and leverage funds. He is also very skilled at leveraging money from the state and federal governments. Though $500 million is considerable, it is basically seed money. If we play our cards right, we should be able to leverage park bond money, water quality bond money that the state passed in the last few years, and maybe some federal grants. I think that the new mayor's office may really help us do that and also help city staff come up with a rational, practical way to leverage all these different funding sources. I don't think the city does a great job at that right now, and having strong leadership from the mayor's office, particularly a mayor's office that knows how to leverage funding sources, is going to really be helpful.

To close, who will be making the final decision on the award of the Prop O bond dollars?

Ultimately, it is the City Council, but they will be looking to both the Citizens Oversight Committee and the Administrative Oversight Committee to make recommendations on the types of projects they should fund, but they are the ultimate decision-makers.