Los Angeles herald., 1892-06-09
THE oUrFALL ON US AGAIN.

THE OUTFALL ON US AGAIN.
The council yesterday took the first
step in the new effort to secure the con-
struction OF an outfall sewer to the sea.
We understand that it has been de-
termined to fix the Goth OF July as the
date when the election will be held for
our people to vote ''yes" or mo" on the
proposition to issue $500, 1000 Of bonds to
meet the estimated cost of this public
work. 1t is useless to conceal the fact
that this proposition will meet with a
great deal of opposition. not
because our people are in
sensible to the necessity Of a
practicable,plan to dispose Of the sewage
of this city, but because many of them
believe that a more economical and
equally as effective plan can be de-
vised for that purpose without building
a sewer clear to the ocean. 1t will be
the duty of those who have assumed the
affirmative of the outfall sewer PROPOSE
ton to show that they have adopted the
best plan available, and that the plan
heretofore proposed, to erect works at
some suitable point outside the city to
deodorize the sewage and dispose of the
fluid for irrigation and fertilization, is
not practicable.
1t has been shown, however, that the
latter plan is now in successful opera
ton in many European cities, and that
in those cities the sewage becomes
source Of revenue instead Of expendi-
ture. It will devolve upon the advocates
Of the outfan to show why plan that
works successfully and proftably else
where would not work equally az salts
factorily here. There are great bodies
of unproductive lands below this city
that could be made valuable by its fertil-
ization with the sewage Of this city, and
the HERALD has always contended that
it would be willfnl and objectionable
waste OF a valuable material to dump it
into the ocean.
The strongest argument we have
heard in favor OF an outfall sewer is to
the effect that, even if we had defecat-
ing works and sewage farm near the
city, we could only dispose of the sew
age to cultivators during the dry months
and therefore during the rain season
we would have to make other DISPOSE
ton of the sewage. Ii it is true that
the waste lands would not take the sew
age all the year round, why is it that
the purified sewage during winter could
not be turned into the Los
Angeles river? We are told that
the people along the river who use its
water would enjoin us from doing SO,
and that the courts would interfere at
all points to protect the people on the
line of the river from what they would
deem pollution of their stream. There
is good deal in this. and perhaps after
the question has been considered in all
its bearings and shapes, we shall be
forced to come back to the first PROPOSE
tion and solve the problem by carrying
an outfall sewer to the sea.
At this point, however, we are again
confronted with difficulties. The pretty
town OF Inglewood and the lands of Mr..
Freeman are on the line which the en-
gineers have selected for the outfall to
cross. To reach the sea the sewer must
pass through these lands. and their
owners have shown that they intend to
exhaust all their rights in the courts be-
fore they will permit the city to
make their locality the center OF
great system of distributing sewers to
carry sewage to the lands south of the
Centinela, the owners of which landa, it
is said, are willing to take it and pay for
it. The city has already scored vic
tory against the Tnglewood objectors in
one of our courts; but the latter say
that they will fight the outfall until they
themselves fall into the last legal ditch.
This, of course, means delay and ex-
pense. The machinery of the law is so
various and intricate, and the outcome
is always 90 impossible of forecasting,
that it would be the act of wisdom on
the part of the city to delay taking any
irrevocable action until it had either &C.
cured favorable decision in the court
OF last resort, or had made some satia-
factory arrangement with the people
who now stand in the way of the work.
In the meantime full and thorough
discussion of the subject in all its lights
and ramifcations will enable our people
to see clearly how they ought to vote
when the election takes place.
EVER since the advent of Mr.. Leeds
to this coast, the position OF state rail-
road commissioner has been made one
of painful uneaEe. Before he came it
was a delightful sinecure. The board
met once month, smoked few fra
grant Cubanas, and adjourned to take a
junketing trip--euphemistically recorded