By Mary-Justine Lanyon
“This is a tough one,” said Catherine Cerri, general manager of the Lake Arrowhead Community Services District.
Cerri and the district were honoring one of their own – Mike Blackwood, the field operations manager, who was retiring after having been with the district for 29 years.
“I am so grateful you chose to spend those years with us,” Cerri told Blackwood. “Mike has had a lot to do with the district’s success. He has all the integrity in the world. He has been integral in creating the culture we have today. He has fostered a culture of excellence.”
Matt Brooks, LACSD’s operations manager, said that he had “learned a lot from working with Mike, most importantly how to be a leader. Our departments have never worked so well together.”
Blackwood expressed his gratitude to LACSD. “What a great career and experience this has been,” he said. “I came in as an entry level employee, trained and learned, progressed. I grew up in this community. It was a pleasure to work where I grew up. It has been so pleasurable to work the Catherine – she has listened to me, believed in me. I had a great team around me.”
Board President John Wurm told Blackwood he was “grateful for your service. Your reports have been informative, given with candor and professionalism.”
Cerri had noted that Blackwood had laid the groundwork for the work in his department to continue. Nathan Porter, who has been with LACSD in field operations for 11 years, has been named the new manager of the department.
In his first report to the board, Porter said they had replaced 16 service lines in the second quarter, “a little higher than normal.” He added they are replacing steel with poly pipe when a leak is detected.
A 5,000-gallon leak on Merced Drive, Porter said, was due to a corroded saddle and rusted bolts. “This was on something newer,” he responded to Vice President Steve Boydston’s question about how old they were. “It was almost like a defective saddle. We have saddles many years older. Every service line has a saddle connection – there are a lot of them out there. It was unusual for this to happen.”
Porter also presented information on three Category 4 spills of 50 gallons or less. For one on Highway 173 and one on Alpen Drive, LACSD was able to recover all the spill – 15 gallons and 40 gallons respectively. But they were unable to recover any of a 45-gallon spill on Apache Trail in Rimforest as it was on the front side of the mountain; “It would have been dangerous to try to get down and clean it up,” Porter told the board.
Garin Vartanian, attending online, asked Porter how they ascertain the volume of sewage spilled and what puts LACSD on notice a spill was happening.
“We give it our best estimate,” Porter said, adding they have visual charts to use. They also use the reporting time – from when they get a call about a spill to when they stop it.
LACSD will get calls from the public about a spill coming out of a manhole. “We use CCTV to verify where it is and what kind of repair needs to be made,” Porter said.
In his monthly report on water delivered, Brooks said consumption in June 2024 was up 5.3 percent compared to June 2023 (144.94 acre-feet compared to 137.56 a-f). Water delivered through the first six months of 2024 is nearly identical to 2023 – 500.44 a-f compared to 497.92 a-f.
Well production is slightly down, Brooks reported: 17.43 a-f in June 2024 compared to 24.33 a-f in June 2023. Water purchased from CLAWA is up – 31.78 a-f in the first six months of 2024 compared to 7.96 a-f in 2023. LACSD is purchasing additional water to blend with lake and well water in an effort to reduce the amount of PFAS in the treated water.
Recycled water delivered to the Lake Arrowhead Country Club is up over 2023 – 62.66 a-f in 2024, 34.82 a-f in 2023. Last year, Brooks noted, LACSD did not start delivering recycled water to the country club until June. “We started delivering three weeks ahead this year,” he said.
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