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“Writer with Long Arms” gouache and cut paper by Lara Odell See page 9
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SERVING BIXBY KNOLLS, CALIFORNIA HEIGHTS, LOS CERRITOS, WRIGLEY AND THE CITY OF SIGNAL HILL
Vol. 35 No. 34
January 24, 2014
Local water officials say Southern California prepared for drought, but conservation is critical
Your Weekly Community Newspaper
Sean Belk/Signal Tribune
A long-awaited project to widen a section of Cherry Avenue from Pacific Coast Highway to 19th Street, where gridlock forms during rush-hour traffic, is expected to get underway this year after being delayed for more than a decade.
Project to widen Cherry Avenue, alleviate bottleneck to start this year after decade of delays
Sean Belk Staff Writer
State officials recently authorized the City of Signal Hill to go ahead this year with a long-awaited project to widen a portion of Cherry Avenue from Pacific Coast Highway to 19th Street, where a constant bottleneck forms during peaktraffic hours. After being held up for more than a decade because of legal, financial and procedural roadblocks, construction is expected to get underway this summer, said Signal Hill city officials during a City Council meeting last December. However, city staff noted that major roadwork won’t begin until early fall after a new traffic-signal system at Cherry Avenue and PCH is installed and operational. It has taken nearly 13 years to overcome several challenges associated with the now $6.7-million project that was first planned in the late 1990s and is now being entirely funded by state and federal grants, said Steve Myrter, the City’s director of public works, during the Council meeting. The project proposes to widen a section of Cherry Avenue that remains “substandard in width,” which has caused traffic to back up beyond 20th Street during
Signal Hill to construct dog park on former RDA property
see CHERRY page 13
Sean Belk Staff Writer
Pooches of all sizes will be able to run freely inside a dog park that the City of Signal Hill is planning to construct on a site located near a retail shopping center, an active oil field and the 405 Freeway at 3100 California Ave., just north of Spring Street. The City Council at its Jan. 21 meeting unanimously approved locating the dog park on a site that is surplus property once owned by the City’s former redevelopment agency (RDA) and will now be designated as public use.
City staff and a subcommittee of the Signal Hill Parks and Recreation Commission had sought a location for the past three years, reviewing a total of 18 potential sites, however none of the sites were suitable, said Pilar Alcivar-McCoy, director of the City’s community-services department. She said the sites posed a number of problems, including proximity to residents, oil operations, ownership issues and parking concerns. The proposed property, which is currently owned by the City, acting as the RDA successor
Weekly Weather Forecast Friday
Saturday
72°
75°
Sunday
74°
see COUNCIL page 5
Monday
January 24 through January 28, 2014 Tuesday
77°
Partly sunny
Partly sunny
Mostly sunny
Mostly sunny
Lo 48°
Lo 48°
Lo 47°
Lo 49°
79°
Sunny, very warm Lo 46°
This week’s Weekly Weather Forecast sponsored by: 4149 Long Beach Blvd. 562-424-8300
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Courtesy CA Dept. of Water Resources
This chart shows the latest precipitation levels for the Sierra Nevada Mountains, indicating that there has only been a cumulative daily precipitation of 3.5 inches of rain there since Oct. 1, which is when the “water year” begins. This level is 16 percent of normal precipitation and slightly lower than the state’s driest year on record, which was from 1923–1924. Sean Belk Staff Writer
Gov. Jerry Brown last week officially declared a “drought emergency” in California as statewide precipitation fell to the lowest level in 100 years of recorded state history. In his declaration, the governor announced a campaign for residents to cut back on water usage and for cities to voluntarily implement water-conservation measures. According to the latest state data, there has only been a cumulative daily precipitation of 3.5 inches of rain in the Sierra Nevada Mountains since Oct. 1, which is when the “water year” begins. This level of rain is currently 16 percent of normal and slightly lower than the state’s driest year on record, which was from 1923 to 1924. What’s more, forecasts for rain are dismal. The drought is most dire for parts of northern California, where farms and communities rely heavily on water supplies from the state’s largest watersheds, including massive reservoirs, such as Lake Oroville and Lake Shasta. The main goals behind the governor’s declaration is to encourage water conservation and streamline permitting processes for water transfers between agricultural entities, enabling them to bypass certain environmentalreview processes. Local water officials say that raising awareness to conserve water is critical to maintain water supplies, but Southern California is in a much better position than the northern part of the state to withstand drought conditions, at least for the near term.
Kevin Wattier, general manager for the Long Beach Water Department (LBWD), said water agencies across the local region have already prepared for the worst by investing billions of dollars over the last 20 years in water storage. A long-term drought, on the other hand, would create more of a cause for concern in the local area, he said. “Even though there’s a good chance it will be the single driest year ever, that’s not what challenges us here in Southern California,” Wattier said. “It’s a major problem for those other water utilities that haven’t invested in storage like we have here in Southern California. We have enough storage to go several years for these dry periods.” Wattier said it’s unclear what the coming months will bring, adding that most forecasts based on Pacific Ocean temperatures are inaccurate. Long Beach currently gets the majority, or 60 percent, of its water from groundwater supplies, which Wattier said are “reliable.” The other 40 percent is purchased from the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD), which imports water from the Colorado River and Northern California to supplement local supplies. MWD, however, has been able to save money by relying more on local reservoirs rather than pumping water from Northern California, Wattier said. In some cases, MWD is able to generate electricity from water that flows out of reservoirs by gravity. He said MWD currently has no plans to restrict water see DROUGHT page 11