By Mary-Justine Lanyon
The forever chemicals known as PFAS were a topic of conversation at three recent meetings: the March 23 meeting of the Arrowhead Lake Association board of directors; the March 26 Lake Arrowhead Community Services District meeting; and the LACSD-ALA interface meeting held on March 27.
Questions had been raised at prior LACSD meetings as to whether PFAS can be found in fish caught in Lake Arrowhead. ALA General Manager Mike Pate reported that three fish had been caught, prepared and sent to a lab in Michigan for testing.
“Rick (Reisenhofer, the lake safety supervisor) was in charge of the process, which was quite detailed. He followed everything to a tee.” Results should be back in early May, Pate noted.
Pate said that two of the three fish caught were brown trout. What he found interesting about that is ALA has not stocked that species in a couple of years so “we will get results on fish that have been in the lake for a while.” Reisenhofer added the fish had “very clear skin with no blemishes.”
LACSD continues to take water samples and send them off for testing. Operations Manager Matt Brooks said at the March 26 meeting that they had received what he called “questionable results. Every one came back ‘nondetect’ for PFAS. That jumped out at us there might be something wrong.”
The lab, Brooks said, had some original samples and was going to redo the tests.
Brooks had met with Dudek, the firm designing a plan to remove PFAS from the drinking water supplied by LACSD, on Feb. 29 and again on March 25. “They are moving along on a preliminary design,” Brooks said. He noted that neither treatment plant – Cedar Glen or Bernina – was designed to accommodate these processes. In fact, LACSD will have to build an addition to the Bernina plant.
The hope is to present the preliminary plan at the April board meeting. LACSD General Manager Catherine Cerri said creation of the treatment process should begin at the Cedar Glen plant this fall, with it coming online before the summer of 2025. “There’s a lot of red tape,” she said, adding the district is applying for grant funding to help cover the cost. “It looks like we have a good chance of getting 100 percent funding,” she said.
The question of the source of the PFAS found in Lake Arrowhead is raised at every meeting. John Wurm, president of the LACSD board, responded to one such question at the March 26 meeting: “The sources are everywhere. Our main focus is eliminating PFAS from drinking water through treatment. We will get it down to an acceptable level.”
At the LACSD-ALA interface meeting, Cerri raised the question of whether human activity could be causing PFOA, one of the PFAS found in the lake. “We had a lot of boats sink last winter,” she noted, adding there is PFAS in the upholstery and the coatings on the boats. She also said they had looked into the shrink wrap used on boats and found it has PFAS. “There are some options for PFAS-free shrink wrap. I don’t know if ALA could start to think about making it a requirement for shrink wrap to be PFAS free.”
Cerri also said LACSD would be interested in seeing the sediment dredged from the lake tested for PFAS. “Maybe the dredging stirred some up,” she said.
When asked if LACSD would be providing recycled water to the Lake Arrowhead Country Club and, if so, when, Brooks said the country club had not yet asked for any but it is LACSD’s option to deliver it.
Brooks told the board he had met with the Lahontan Regional Water Quality Control Board for a routine inspection earlier that day (March 26) and it went “very well.
“I asked about PFAS,” he said, “knowing we may be asked by Lake Arrowhead Country Club soon to deliver recycled water. Lahontan has not yet received any guidance as to PFAS.”
The Lahontan inspector told Brooks that the levels detected by LACSD “are lower than he has seen elsewhere,” Brooks said. “He praised us for going above and beyond.” The inspector also told Brooks LACSD’s operation “is well within our permit.”
“People think PFAS has just come into being in the past year or two or five,” LACSD Director Robert Morris said at the March 26 meeting. “It has been around for 90 years. The chemical companies made it. You’ve been drinking water your entire life so you’ve been exposed to PFAS. Science has just caught up in the past few years to even be able to detect it.
“We’re talking parts per trillion,” Morris added. “It’s everywhere. If you want to get really mad at someone, get mad at the chemical companies. We’re doing everything we can to address the concerns.”
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