LAKEPORT, Calif. – On Tuesday the Board of Supervisors approved a request from the county’s Special Districts administrator to quickly move forward with hiring an engineer to look at relocating water and sewer infrastructure at a north Lakeport subdivision where sinking ground has destroyed several homes.
A week after the board declared a local emergency, it gave Special Districts Administrator Mark Dellinger the go-ahead to waive the formal bidding process to hire a civil sanitary engineer to come up with a design for moving the damaged infrastructure at Lakeside Heights.
The board also approved a resolution to transfer $350,000 from a county fund for an emergency loan to help cover the work.
Regarding negotiating a contract with an engineer and getting a design for moving the infrastructure, “I think it can happen pretty quickly,” Dellinger told Lake County News later on Tuesday.
Time is of the essence in the situation. “The movement hasn’t stopped,” Dellinger said. “It continues to move.”
Over the weekend, part of one of the damaged houses fell off, and the county has ordered abatement on the red-tagged homes.
Supervisor Rob Brown recused himself from the Tuesday discussion due to the fact that his daughter and son-in-law live in the subdivision.
Jared Pratt, a senior engineering geologist with RGH Consultants, the geotechnical consulting firm working with the county to assess the Lakeside Heights landslide, accompanied Dellinger to the meeting to offer an update on his findings.
Pratt has reviewed original plans for the subdivision, where work began in the early 1980s, and on the maps he found concerning topographical anomalies in the area of the landslide, which runs along Lancaster Road.
He said he also looked at grading on the maps, and in the area where homes are slipping off the hill there is fill that is as deep as 16 feet.
Pratt said his firm has drilled holes and installed monitors to track ground movement, conducted geologic mapping and considered options for helping stabilize the area, including drilled piers to help protect the infrastructure. A large retaining wall that could be used would cost around $500,000, according to an estimate he got from a friend who is a contractor.
There has been work to drain the hillside, and Pratt said water initially decreased but now has increased again.
Pointing to the grading, the topographical anomaly and weight loads being placed on top of the suspect area, he said the landslide has occurred. “There are a lot of driving forces.”
The land is still moving, with two scarps – areas where land is eroding and separating – developing along the front yards of unbuilt lots on Lancaster Road, as well as coming off the hillside perpendicular to Lancaster Road.
Pratt said the ground movement will continue until they remove the driving forces and it reaches an equilibrium.
Dellinger told the board that a sewer bypass will remain in place until they can implement a longterm solution. He said he was “pretty desperate” to get engineering services under contract so they could start looking at how to relocate the water and sewer infrastructure.
He said a US Geological Survey staffer was set to visit the county on Tuesday afternoon to survey the landslide area with Pratt.
During the meeting, Randall Fitzgerald, who lives on Lancaster Road, asked Pratt about the depth of the borings due to monitor the area. Pratt said the holes ranged in depth from 30 to 40 feet, with water detected at varying depths in those borings.
Dellinger told Lake County News that Pratt is still working to finalize his report on the subdivision landslide.
The county is pursuing funding through the California Department of Public Health and the California Emergency Management Agency – thanks to help from the local Office of Emergency Services – to assist with moving the water and sewer infrastructure at Lakeside Heights, Dellinger said.
“We’re seeking multiple funding sources. We don’t know which ones we’re going to be successful on,” Dellinger said.
He said the various agencies will have requirements and “milestones” for their applications. “That’s just one more reason to get this process going.”
Email Elizabeth Larson at
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