Hundreds of Anaheim Hills property owners are deciding if they will tax themselves to continue funding a groundwater pump system that has protected homes from landslides for 30 years.
The money currently funding the operation of those pumps will run out by the end of the year. The city installed the pumps after a devastating landslide in 1993 that destroyed homes and forced nearly four-dozen families to evacuate.
Homeowners in a special district created in the landslide’s area have until a 6 p.m. meeting on Thursday, July 27, to vote on the self-imposed property tax assessment. Residents in recent years have twice already voted against attempts to levy a tax.
“Something has to be done,” said Barbara Agahi, whose home suffered damage to its driveway and garage from the 1993 landslide.
The Santiago landslide happened after a series of rainstorms that winter saturated the ground, which then slipped in a 25-acre area.
A legal quagmire followed the landslide over who was to blame and it took years to reach a settlement. The city of Anaheim created the Santiago Geologic Hazard Abatement District in 1999 to maintain the pump system and seeded it with $3.5 million in funding. The city then turned control over to the residents who elect a board.
The 37 pumps remove an average of 33,800 gallons of water per day, which is discharged into storm sewers.
The district encompasses homes off of Avenida de Santiago; Leafwood, Burlwood and Rimwood drives; Georgetown Circle and several other streets on the southern end of the Anaheim Hills area.
That initial seed money will soon run out as the district now spends more than $300,000 a year on the contract for maintaining and operating the system. If the assessment doesn’t go through, the pumps could be turned off by the end of the year.
An engineering report released in July said if the district ceases to operate, the homes in the area of the landslide and possibly surrounding properties would “be in imminent…
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