Ice chair hodges are ready.

Okay.

You're the vice chair.

I don't whether you have a meeting chair.

That's right.

Yeah, pastors.

Okay.

I'll like a call this uh meeting to order and uh we'll do that for it.

Oh I fled allegiance to the flag, the United States of America.

Yeah, public for which is SaaS, nation, under God, individuality and business for all.

Commissioner Chair de Green.

Commissioner the Green.

Yeah, yeah.

Commissioner in a different meeting.

Commissioner Gandora, excuse Commissioner Gill.

Yeah.

Commissioner Johnson.

Commissioner Zilda.

Yeah.

And Vice Chair Hodges.

Here.

We have a problem.

And um I go over the topics.

Yeah, yeah.

Um discussion on the beginning of a process to establish Albany accounting grey water standards and recommendations requests on the coming range.

Um about outside commissioner vegancy or district one.

So follow up with this for discussion.

So I asked to have that go on the agenda because we had talked about a little bit when we were working on the ordinance.

And then also when we were talking about on site wastewater treatment systems and in Sunole, there was a lot of concern about nobody wanting to hook up to a central system because they wanted to make sure the water stayed on their property and preserved their trees.

their house and um and we talked about a little bit when we're working on the ordinance which gosh is 10 years now and eight years and um then we decided we we couldn't deal with at the time and we put it off till later and i and i think that you know with people needing to preserve the water on their property because of the lack of rain and the lack of water and the population growing I think for us to be thinking ahead we should probably talk about gray water and what we can do to promote gray water and to make it so that people design their homes and their properties to accommodate gray water and so that's why I'm throwing it out there as a discussion item that I know that it probably involves more than this environmental health it probably involves the building department but I think we can work together yeah yeah um so if you want I can um just uh put up some slides that I just did together I'm not an expert in the gray air breaks but I can uh just throw some stuff up there so if we can start some discussion um I I do want to say that I think it's uh I'm I'm in favor of it um the state has a requirement for counties to develop and submit something called a throughout resiliency plan and every county has done it except our county um and it is to address the very things that a lot of people that you know come to on type wastewater system commission people that live in uh unincorporated areas have wells are going dry that's they need to haul they are hauling water people are hauling water um and then so you know this is real this is happening and um I've been sounding the alarmed uh to get uh our county uh agencies it's a big task force it's not something I can do by myself and have actually been met with silence for five years um and I sounded the alarm again uh last month and started to get a little bit of movement I think it's interesting I want to bring this up because um we had uh hearing that the board of supervisors had a hearing on the um say project which is a camp in um or is it pole canyon I forget I don't think oh can you and there were a lot of you know lots of uh reasons and and I I sat on that hearing that lasted for six hours and there was a lot of you know talk for all kinds of reasons but one of the things that was vocalized on that was that people were concerned about their wills and people were concerned about their will swim so this um this falls into that right it we are in a drought state uh and it's not getting that and so how do we start shifting that momentum from kind of standard you know we're just gonna treat everything as sewage uh and uh not conserve water and so funny when you said you know start thinking about how people develop uh properties it goes hand in hand with uh having gray water systems and then having drought uh tolerant landscaping all the things that are important so uh I'm absolutely willing to uh be part of this conversation but I haven't got a whole lot of um I haven't gotten a lot of emphasis or a lot of response in this call to you know 40 public uh 40 departments saying we are required by the state to have submitted this plan two years ago and we haven't even started one um and we missed money uh that was available by the state to do some of the work um and we missed money uh to uh provide to constituents for buying holding things um so maybe this is another way to bring this in um and certainly there you know there would be uh if it I'm hoping we've seen a few emails coming in but um it would be a good place to there's a task force right that gets created uh of you know zone seven and Alameda County water district and just a million different staples right and so somebody from Bonnie it might be something you're interested in jumping on at some point in time I certainly will be on it but I I think it is I think it ties into the to this conversation um and I think it's easy for those of us that do not live uh in countries country that has a septic system for a well to not think much about it right but um it's pretty important uh and it was clear to me listening and being on that hearing that um that it is happening there there are people talking about it so if you want this isn't a formal presentation I'm not an expert I kind of threw it together right before I came here because I thought it might help with some discussion uh you guys want to see it yeah all right um share so it's you know it's um it's not a polished presentation and it is can I actually writing up as comments for the board I know that I get mail sometimes uh the lady

Um share.

So it's you know, it's um it's not a polished presentation, and it is can I ask there's a new writing of any comments for the board.

I know that I get email sometimes uh the lady who uh puts on like raywater classes and mass programs.

Yes, um forget her name.

Laura Allen, Laura Allen.

That's it.

Yeah, some just only requests, yeah, yeah.

So it might be to kind of check with her, see what other counties as far as ordinances, yeah.

Um have done.

Um it's um she's a great resource, right?

Yeah, she is, and I'm gonna give I'm gonna hand these out.

Uh again, these aren't they're they were not included as but it's I read that you need to adjust them to them up.

Um these are this is an Alamini County Water District back seat, and then this is uh gray water back sheet for Bayery water and conservation agency.

And you'll see a lot of uh links.

I mean, from this one on seven page to uh other counties like has uh a pretty uh big uh at least they have a website, right?

And other counties we do not so uh haven't just um half opening pop open this uh because I think it gives a good uh starting discussion.

I think those are big vaccines.

Um it's not these okay.

So that's so it's what's up, yeah.

Okay.

There it is.

Okay, so um it's California does have uh graywater standard, uh, some gray, you know, some some gray water standards in the um California building standards, the current standard code is 2025, came effective January 1st, 2026.

I don't actually have a copy of it, um, but uh uh graywater standards are in the um plumbing code section, which we think is part five.

Um and so one thing you know, we'll want to do is get um copy of the plumbing code.

I have some other plumbing codes, I don't think it's changed much, but uh let's just kind of talk for a quick second about what gray water is.

And grapewater seems to be called gray as in G R E Y or G R A Y.

It just depends on who the author is, or they mix it up in the same uh document.

So I'm gonna in this, it says gray water, but you'll see it on other ones as B G R AY.

Um, so the definition is that it's untreated wastewater from bathtubs, showers, bathroom wash basins, and clothes washing machines.

It is not toilet discharge, uh, unhealthy bodily waste or manufacturing waste, and that's pretty important.

Um so here's an you know another definition from the plumbing code, and I think it was 2019, but I don't think it's changed.

Um it and what's important is it does not include water from toilets.

So this is California's plumbing code, toilets, kitchen sinks, dishwashers, or soil diapers.

So some states uh allow gray water, it's my understanding to include kitchen sink dishwashers, but California does not.

Um, so it's limited again to showers, tubs, sinks, and washing machines.

Um and there are permit exceptions, so a permanent is not required for a single fixture or a closed washer system, which are called long being to landscape.

Uh, and those are uh it so no permit required if it does not cut into the existing plumbing.

So you can't modify your existing plumbing and it maintains a diverter valve and complies with the health code.

So there's there's exception.

So this is like if you're just going straight off of your washing machine, right?

With your discharge hose and it goes out to your garden.

And there's uh requirements about how uh kind of the dispersal field.

Um we can talk a little bit about that.

Any other thing.

So if you want to divert uh, if you want to divert from your sink uh or your shower or your tub, that apparently requires a permit from uh it would be Alameda County Public Works Department.

They would be the people that do this right now, right?

So uh other counties appear like it when we and as we kind of look more into this.

If we look at um like Santa Clara's um manual kind of on uh gray water systems, it appears they're much more involved uh in that.

So, you know, who should uh who knows, right?

I don't know, Donathan, that as we talk about this, you know, we can figure out who has authority and jurisdiction.

Um, I think they do mention health departments in the in chapter 15.

Um, but right now environmental health does not have jurisdiction uh to do that.

I think it would be a combination both of public works and environmental health because public works does plumbing stuff, right?

Um, and we kind of are the people that understand dispersal fields, and we're talking probably mostly what we're interested in is an unincorporated county right now.

That's what we're talking about, right?

People that have septic systems, and so how does that play in?

And so environmental health would want to be involved in that, so we make sure that the dispersal system for where water from uh gray water systems is being discharged is not impacting the uh septic system, it's not too close all of that.

I I saw somewhere in here where it had to be like so far away.

Yeah, from your well.

Yeah, and so you know, because I like to do that for my laundry.

I've thought about it a lot.

Yeah, I actually have an empty 250 gallon storage tank for if I ever get to do it because our well is right there in the backyard.

Septics in the front yard.

But if I can run it to that storage tank, which is uh to me a solution to get it away from the well and water my trees and that.

So this is the lawn or the weeds, whatever.

It's a really interesting point because when I was reading this, and we'll get to a slide that says um, they say don't store um gray water because it'll smell for too long.

Well, they say so.

I'll I'll just I'll go through what I uh what I read because they say don't store it for more than 24 hours because it has organics in it that will start to smell bad, right?

So um when you think about and all great things to talk about, right?

How do how do we utilize water better?

So we're not just wasting it, not in the ground, we can use it for irrigation, but there are some um very clear differences between uh graywater discharge and um light rain barrel uh capture.

And so I I don't know the details.

Certainly if you like right, if you're capturing rainwater and putting it a barrel, there's no restriction where you can put that, right?

If you are uh gonna divert gray water, it has to be subsurface, um, and have to be covered by mulch.

It has to be in a little bit of a, you know, it's a it's um I think it has to be covered by two inches, but I got a couple of slides I'll talk about.

So they're all things that are you know really important and to me are really like applicable to you guys that live out there, right?

Um applicable to people like me too.

I live in Berkeley.

I shouldn't be dumping all my uh water into a sewer if I can use it to irrigate my garden, right?

So I think it's I think it's time.

I'm glad we're having this discussion.

Um okay, so let's see.

Um talked about that.

Um so there's these are just like sprinkler irrigation of gray water is not allowed.

Um talked about this already, but water used to wash diapers or infection garments must be diverted through the sewer.

Grey water cannot contain hazardous chemicals, graywater cannot be used to irrigate root crops or edible crops that touch the soil.

Uh, an operations maintenance manual for a graywater system must be provided by the installer and must be transferred to a new tenant or owner for the life of a gray water system.

So that's if you have like a permitted system, right?

Uh, it's not just your laundry uh to garden.

Um there's just the these are just kind of some basic stuff about design.

You've got to have a diverter valve so that you can divert it back to the sanitary sewer if you need to.

Um the graywater must be discharged at least two inches under molch stone or soil.

Um water must be used.

This is what we're just talking about, uh Kathy.

That they say water must be used the same day it's produced, no storage tanks.

So, you know, I'm I've been I was kind of uh searching the internet and grabbing some things, and there there seems to be some conflict.

So, but it's an it's enough to get us going and think about how do we move forward with this.

And right, and and one way I mean, just to get it away from the well, yep.

The valve could stay open and then have lines going to trees.

So it still does it at the same time, yep, but it may not be able to involve it that way, it gets it away from the wet.

Yeah, is my point.

So there could be incentives about the mouth and at the same time, then how and you know, this is where um like if you're talking about a non-permitted system, ones that you don't have the permanent.

This is really where Laura Allen and her workshops uh are useful to learn about what you can do or hire somebody to help you do it, right?

Because you don't need a permit for that.

One of the things as we talk about this is our code requires, like for on-site wastewater systems that your on site wastewater system is uh has the capacity to handle all wastewater, right?

It doesn't separate out.

And so until that gets changed, or if it ever got changed, and I don't know whether it would, but if it didn't, the that there's a benefit to not putting your gray water in your system.

Well, there's pros and cons to it.

Gray water is um is oh, what's the word?

It's um it's not black water.

So it doesn't kind of need as much treatment, still needs treatment, but not as much, right?

But there's a benefit to reducing the flow, and Tim, you can chime in on your thoughts on this to reducing the flow to a system because if your system won't be used as much, right?

So the longevity of your system is extended.

If you're putting less water exempt, yeah.

A problem with that idea of that is you you pretend not to use the water in the winter, just like with the washing machine, you have to be able to divert it so that it um when you don't need the gray water.

So if you're putting the gray water out, you need to have capacity to be able to get rid of that water.

Right, and that's one that's one of the reasons why I think they one of the reasons you have that diversion valve, right?

So that in a wet weather, you move it back into your septic system, right?

So it's not you would need capacity in the centric system.

Yeah, yeah, it does matter, but it's most septic systems don't matter, but I mean it's the time point of ground for that long moisture, right?

And I think for new development, um, and on a lot of sites, having uh a system that is sized to be able to accept all the waste um is not an issue.

It's on constrained sites where it's an issue, right?

On developed existing constraint sites.

And if you've got a developed existing constraint site, we do all kinds of stuff that is not quite by, and if you've got a we have some sites that are very constrained and had failed systems, and so they do have a smaller system when I think we've done that with a graywater system diversion.

I don't know if we have or not.

Actually, but they that they're we want to be able to have this ability for people to do gray water systems, and I think there's the laundry to land landscaping, but I really want to understand what the other uh gray water diversion is to get it from your sinks, your bathtubs.

Uh I think showers and bathtubs probably produce a lot of water they do in my house.

Um more than washing machine.

Uh loops and the single source, so it didn't have to be a washing machine, you single source from your bathtub.

You could single source from your butt.

I think that's like the two inches below the surface.

I think that's the deal killed with a lot of people.

I mean, that's a permanent installation.

These are permanent installations.

So if you're going, so here's how this works for my understanding.

You don't have to have a permit for these as long as you meet code, right?

So people do whatever they want on their properties, right?

All the time.

Yeah, right.

I mean, probably everybody in this room, if me included, has done things on our property, right?

And so you can't, I mean, the goal here.

The goal here is the way that I think that you promote or you encourage people to do things uh according to a code, even if you didn't get even if you didn't have to have a permit, but you did it in compliance is when you sell your property, right?

That that's the that's the thing that if you do a lot of work on your home and you know, let's say you installed stuff, uh, you put in electrical and you didn't do it by permit, but it was two code, you're gonna have a lot better of time if you ever need to bring that to code, right?

If anybody's looking at it, so you know, there's incentive.

I think there's incentive of helping people understand what a system is, right?

So that if they do it, they know what is code compliant versus what they just are gonna decide to do.

Can't stop that, but help people understand that and and have those resources available and have people um you know it I don't know if I did we ever do a session with Laura Allen, or she I think something happened.

I wasn't I were Him for Laura for Tea, who actually came out and you did that at the meeting when you were canceling your mom was there in 2018, yeah.

So that's that's good and she did she did a great job explaining it.

And uh so that could be something that we could do, um, like have some town halls or you know, have some meetings and work with them to um you know work with your communities and get people to come so they understand that they can do this.

Um, because again, if you divert, you know, it's helping people understand what they could do without a permit and helping them understand what the right uh protocols are.

So there's reasons for this.

There's reasons why the discharge is two inches below ground, it's because of health hazards.

There is stuff that in in brain water, right?

That uh can be a health hazard.

So if you that's why they're saying don't put it on edible crops, right?

You're so you know, if you're protecting your land, you're protecting yourself, you really want to not introduce health hazards.

Um people don't care about that, but that's that's why they're there.

And I don't think so, um, like the landscape to laundry to landscape or the single uh fixtures.

They don't even have pumps in if it if you have a washing machine, the washing machine has a home pump, but that's not part of the system.

They are gravity flow out to uh actually I'm gonna ask you this.

I was reading that.

Okay, I don't know enough about it, so I'm not gonna get myself uh in trouble here.

But I was reading on probably maybe Laura Ellen's Greywater website that you want uh certain you want specific kind of tubing in your distribution typing because uh it'll claw if you don't have to have filters on.

So it's kind of like drip system tubing for wastewater systems, right?

It's special drip system.

I mean, it's special team, it's not just your irrigation tubing.

You'd have to be careful of what your admitters are, yeah.

But or do you have a catch basin for the hair in this soul that gets caught?

The gray water systems that I seem had to filter of some kind on, yeah.

Yeah, and I I have a few comments on what you're saying.

I think it would be interesting, and I mean they all would when you were I mean, graywater isn't by any means clean water, yeah.

And I don't think it's actually that much cleaner than the full scope of the full scope of sewage coming out of the house.

I mean, other than the yuck factor, I don't the toilet doesn't really add that much.

I mean, it's just it sounds yucky, but it's if you go through a any kind of a decent septic tank.

I mean, I mean, you probably some diseases they go a little bit more, but kitchens.

I mean, you said that they're not included, but kitchens are probably nastier than what comes to a toilet and kitchen safes.

I mean, and um through a bathroom, you you definitely got some water that reaches very closely, the septic tank so it I bet um the a lot of the same criteria would apply.

If you could get rid of subject tank of fluent within fairly shallow conditions, it would it would function and do stuff.

I think it's just more a maintenance and not a maintenance, but uh a management, isn't that probably we put in the foot of covers just because with a foot of cover, you're gonna get success.

And you're right, that because we discharge a lot of wastewater in Alameda County at very shallow depths, right?

We've got dripsyslips all over the place because uh conditions are so cool for full strength wastewater.

So but if you could just get it rid of that two inches below the ground just as well, except for the times when it's not something's not right, and that's why we put a point.

Yeah, well, I think you know, I think I think the important thing, and I don't know enough about this, but the California building code is the California growth code, right?

So they've got and uh you know, you were looking at some of that, they've got setback requirements in the plumbing field code.

There is stuff that is related to this, and we're not taking on the California, uh, we're not taking on the federal code.

I'm not building retirement.

I can't.

That's the the Alameda County Public Works adopts the building code as yeah, the building code is their standard.

They've adopted these regulations, they don't have their own now.

We could look at having our own, because I think Santa Clara has adopted some more or at least a permitting process that makes it smoother.

And I think this is one thing we should look into.

We've got some references there, and we can look into it.

Is what are these counties doing that actually have a really nice website that talks about gray water?

Uh I was I I popped open uh Santa Clara's and I was like, wow, they've got a whole, they are clearly authorized to um be involved in gray water systems, and like our company where environmental health is not.

So I think we look at this, you know.

I think this is a good opportunity to see what's going on.

Is there uh how do we educate, right?

So people can be doing things.

Um and and with specific respect to people with septic systems.

How do we educate people to not impact their septic system with what they do, right?

If you do gray water system, do not be putting, you know, don't you you need to have setbacks off of your off of your leach field, right?

So I think there's uh and and I think the supervisors would be really happy if we got some training, right?

Uh got more allen in um and her group to uh hold some workshops in different locations and help people understand what they could do, and then work Connie further on what about the other stuff, the permitting for right now.

I don't think there's a lot of permitting going on with great water systems in our in uh unincorporated.

I'm sure city about well, and what are the cities doing it?

So we we're not so interested in the cities uh because this is unincorporated county, but what's going on, right?

Um so let me just roll through this a little bit more.

Like systems must follow minimum uh horizontal distances from water sources, 100 feet, but you know, you still got a lot of the stuff, 100 feet from waterways, five feet from septic tanks.

Um these are setback distances that I think are there, even they're similar in many ways to our on-site wastewater systems.

Um not quite uh they're a little bit reduced.

Uh, like you can have a you can discharge it at your property line a foot and a half off versus five feet.

Is it five feet?

Right now, yes, I'm sorry.

Um water supply wells are the same, 100, right?

You don't want to impact your water supply wells.

Uh uh streams, same thing, don't want to impact streams, sewage pits or cesspools, that doesn't even apply.

I don't even know why you would need to be off of a grid or a decimal disposal field, so four feet um off of it, right?

So you're just not so you know, I think uh I think I think there are ways to maybe have like maybe one of the things we can do is the septic mission is come up with kind of a policy.

I don't want to change the lamp or lamp documents because that's just a nightmare.

But we can change, we can have fact sheets about this and kind of uh when when people are designing their septic systems or working on we can we can have more information about how you could have this um for and you know we would we get input from everybody, but how that wouldn't necessarily make your septic system smaller, but it might make the septic system last longer because you're and you're doing the thing that we want to do with just conserved water and use that uh elsewhere.

Um let's see.

So we talked about this.

You have to have a construction permit if you make a uh any changes to your home strain, waste plumbing connected clothes washer shower.

So you are allowed to do a single uh faucet or single fixture without a permit, but you cannot change the plump.

And I'm not sure exactly what that means.

I don't know.

Um like you can't go in and so there's everything about backflow prevention right you need to make sure that your plumbing is potable water right and if you're going in there and putting connections into gray water that can go can backflow in you got a problem.

So that's what that's all about.

And again I'm not an expert I've just thought oh okay I'm gonna look into this a little bit and think about it and give a give us a good starting point.

Uh we talked about this um here's that thing that you taught we were talking about um that I read you know you can store fresh water or rainwater right for later use but they say you should not store gray water uh in pump systems with a temporary surge tank gray water should not stay for more than 24 hours so that's kind of what you're you could be it the recommendations are you could have a 24 hour surge tank right um it has nutrients and organic matter from soaps and dirts as these start to decompose they use that oxygen and water which begins to smell very bad possible to treat the gray water for storage but this is practical in most situations because fresh gray water is generated on a daily basis.

So there's lots of things to learn about gray water right it's not just I I think sometimes I think even with myself I can confuse gray water with rainwater or parts it's not it's not clean water as Tim was saying it's it's got stuff in it coming off your body in a shower it's got stuff in it.

Dishwashers they say are not using a good source of gray water because of the detergents right so if you're discharging gray water with uh detergents that are high in salt that's gonna not be good for your plants right so again I think we can come up with back seeds to help people understand types of detergents to use if you want to divert gray water so you don't kill all your plants um so they say uh find a detergent that doesn't have salt or boron in it and quite frankly I don't know what my detergent has does anybody know what their detergent has in it right we just kind of put it in our dishwasher and our stuff and let it go um or and this is kind of what you talked about Connie is this idea of development that is more than just gray water if you're gonna do greywater systems have salt tolerant plants right it's landscaping it's drought resistant plants salt tolerant plants all that good kind of stuff uh let's see and then this is the public health um don't allow gray water to pool or pond creates a habitat for mosquitoes and a place for people to contact the water sure gray water soaks into the ground and does not run off into neighbors property but places people who contact it you need to keep it on your property don't put gray water onto the edible portions of your plants uh graywater should irrigate the roots not be sprayed or dumped onto the plant itself gray water is not safe to drink and thus should not touch the part of a plant someone would eat and then this is the thing about plumbing uh do not create a cross connection with your system the gray water system should be totally separate from any potable water system uh for more complex systems that supplement gray water with either rainwater or municipal water system requires cross connection protection of an air gap so that's when the plumbing that's when you know building code and everybody comes into that you do not want to be causing an issue with your potable water supply by messing with your plumbing so um yeah just those were just things that I uh found you know that I thought okay let's talk about what gray water is and then you know what are the things we could do so my suggestion is that we work um certainly I can get my staff to work on putting some fact sheets together right that we can hand out um or uh that that we could have and and we can actually talk with uh public works and kind of talk to them about coordinating this stuff um and to me probably get some town halls or some more chops going to figure out how to do that uh so people can get educated about diverting gray water um and then on the in the bigger sense fold us into this drought route resiliency plan it is another piece the county should be paying attention to this stuff we have wells going dry we are dumping water down the sewer we are dumping you know we're using water to irrigate right and uh and there's a lot of things we should be doing and we should be paying attention and having a focus on grey water systems is a good piece of that those are my thoughts I guess I want to add to that I don't want to sound like it puts a big kabos in the whole gray water system but a gray water system isn't that much different than a septic system.

Maybe not this in this first iteration or something.

But if you could, if you if it got down to it, if you could reuse that water versus just put that into a leach field, that might be a productive way of doing that.

And then another thing is whatever's good for using the water in a property.

I mean, if you have a well and you're and you're short on water, is that going to save you?

I mean, it's it's hard to say that a little bit of water that gets used in a house is really going to make a difference and being able to have your landscape.

But the same thing would apply to people that are on public sewers that the mix of people that are on public sewers that have wells and people that have septic systems that get public water, so that those things overlap, if it's up to the cities that tend to be where there's sewers, then you would have different ways that the rules would apply.

But it isn't like it just people on the subject system to be applicable to.

Well, that's why I really think this drought resiliency is the thing that is missing here.

Uh it's all this, right?

And it and the drought resiliency plan is not just for unincorporated areas, it is for everybody.

Uh for those very reasons that you say, right?

You've got because it so we got properties in East County, lots of properties in East County that are getting well well getting water from um from zone seven, right?

And that's drawing from wells.

That's where that water is coming from.

So you might be getting piped water, but you are uh you are taking from the aquifers.

And so I hear what you're saying when you when you say, well, the little minute amount that you're gonna generate in your house, right?

And put it up that is it really gonna save anything?

And I think the problem with our world is, and I know it's a problem with me, I think this often is oh, it's not really gonna make any difference, but every little piece makes a difference.

Um I mean, I and I think that's what this whole drought resiliency plan is about, is every little piece makes a difference.

Well, it it does, but what I'm saying is you know, because we're gonna typical house of using 200 gallons of the house per day.

I mean, it's it's it's below numbers like that.

Yeah, so if you've got some 20,000 treatment system to save 200 gallons a day, you're just not gonna be economical alone.

Yeah, I don't I don't think it's economical.

I think it's um for me, it's you know, it's losing my garden.

Yeah, you know what?

Well, that's what I'm saying.

But that's 200 years.

My garden, I've lost it so many times and planted it on good years and then lose it again in the drought years.

I would like to divert the water and irrigate my garden when not vegetable garden, ornamental garden, yeah.

And and I don't want to get the water bill that says your water, your water usage is above average.

Your your bar is up here.

My last year it was down here.

Uh I want to be a responsible person.

I think I think that's a nice card.

And I think it's a really good point.

And you know, what you're saying is um that there are sites where greywater diversion is necessary, um, because they are so constrained, right?

These are sites of paving systems, and it does it does pan out a little bit, it does help a little bit, right?

But I think it's more what you're saying.

Is there a on properties with septic systems, right?

Just the ones I can deal with.

Um, is there uh those people?

And and this is where I do have some jurisdiction, right?

Because I I regulate your septic system.

So, you know, really trying to figure out um and and promote and encourage people to divert water for their landscaping if that's what they want.

If you don't have any landscaping, you wouldn't care, right?

If you have, I have a guy that works for me and paved his entire property with concrete.

Uh I think it's Muhammad.

Because he didn't want any great stuff, right?

To deal with.

So, you know, there are people that don't care about landscaping, but there's a lot of people that do, and it's expensive.

Um, to and so I think we have an opportunity.

Maybe it's maybe this is it.

We have an opportunity to work within our little world of on-site septic system properties to start with, to be um to help educate people about what you can do with grey water that will help you save money on your water bill and be uh you know, kind of uh pro uh pro-earth versus what what you're saying, Tim, which is right, is it doesn't make sense to have two different systems that have a lot of components, right?

So um I think it really has to we have to kind of give that opportunity to people who want to do this and do not want to spend money on their water bill, yeah.

When you look at your uh discussion topics as uh discussion on the beginning of process to establish Alameda County rainwater standards and recommendations.

So after this discussion, how would you envision that when you envision fact sheet that uh talked about, which I guess would look like this, we put together uh rules applicable to Alameda County totally supernova or being incorporated or not, right?

Yeah, and I think one thing that we would want to do is I'd want to work with Jonathan and understand kind of uh you know, we could even look at like what is that they're doing?

Why do they have jurisdiction or why are they the ones with the website with the Grey Water, their environmental health department?

So we can kind of see what our jurisdiction is, right?

Um I'm pretty sure you're not gonna get anywhere if you have a conversation with public works on this.

Um so we can use this as an opportunity.

I'll work work with county council to kind of figure out uh Dale what environmental because environmental health doesn't just get to do anything I want to do.

Um we only get to do well, we're sold.

Um and so we can um well, we can research that.

We can start putting together some fact sheets, right?

That will be helpful to people, and we can start working on uh and we can ask uh Miley, supervisor Miley.

We can ask Howard to give some funding to put on some graywater workshops.

They've been asking us to do town halls.

This would be a great thing.

It's not just a town hall, it's hands on.

Here's some ways that for those of you on septic systems, it might um might breathe a little more life into your aging systems because you'll put less into it.

Um, but it gives you a way to uh reduce your water bill and keep your plants growing in your property.

And to me, those seem like a good start, Natal.

Yeah, and then we figure out that then we go from there.

Connie, does that sound like a good start, David?

It does.

And and I'm not sure what words I gave to Natalie or whether it was the same words.

I I just think it's it's something that we need to look at.

I think the climate is getting warmer and warmer.

I think water is gonna be more of a scarce resource, and I think we should be planning for whatever it is that we need to do.

Yeah, and then it's not for everybody, but it's some people.

Right.

Well, it would be a really good, and so the other count capital on our jerseys, then we're gonna uh um I would ask you guys, your commissioners ask your um your supervisor um talk to them that this is important and that uh see if they could you know find a tiny pocket of money uh to uh uh like hire because Laura, you know, Laura Allen's a business, she's gonna want some money.

So maybe you guys could you know do a little bit uh and it's not a lot.

We can find out from Laura, um, you know, what what that would cost.

Um I remember when she first started doing it, she would ask for phones, you know, wanting to do it and have people come there and put something together.

So wouldn't it be cool if we could get her to come out here, right?

Um and come to, and I think that would kill, I'm not gonna say kill two birds with one stone because I did four things.

Um it would accomplish two things, which is one is the supervisors have been asking us to do kind of town halls and go out into the community.

So this would be a great way to do that.

It would be so uh action items.

We're gonna work with county council.

Uh you guys can boach this subject, we can too, but you could roach this with your supervisors.

Um, and we could um maybe I'll cast you to reach out to Laura uh Allen and find out like what you can just gauge her interest in doing this and coming to us instead of us going to her, right?

And and what would that cost?

Because we're not talking a huge amount of money here.

Um we are gonna put some fact sheets together.

Um and then the fourth thing, I knew there was a fourth thing.

Um I'm gonna keep pushing on this drought resiliency plan, and I'm gonna look you into that.

Because we can we can flip out what the state requires, we don't have the sense of our county requires.

Yeah, I don't Alameda County doesn't have much.

Alameda County's guidance.

We have no guidance.

We don't have one.

There's no guidance.

So we could start by trying to, that's why I think we can start by trying to get guidance by doing it on site wastewater system property rule, right?

Um, because that's that's actually I think where we can get some leverage with public works eventually, because I think there was one system where we're talking about and they realized they don't know anything about leech fields and all that, so they would want to defer that to us.

So I think it's a good way to open up the the conversation with public works.

Um why public works and not the building on oh well uh it is the building part of the parts okay.

I think that that was I was okay.

Um yeah, because I think if we can come up with a little uh I think I think that's the best way for us to get traction is create our own little process, right?

And then as we move into that, then start having you know open that up with uh public works on how do we expand this to these other systems, right?

And get a policy code because if we can figure out because the the leach field, the mulching area, I think is the same requirements pretty much for it and whether you need the construction permit or not.

The other ones maybe have some other components in it.

So if we could figure that out, come up with our guidance that and we've done it with Norm do this.

We have a couple of sites where we've done this.

Um Robert's pools, they have that uh discharge area where they are uh doing their pool discharge or something.

I don't know what it was, wasn't their backwash, maybe it was um the other thing is um we have an example, it's the mosaic project, but the other mosaic project has this giant design document.

They did a big design document, and they were proposing to divert uh gray water um to for uh for conservation to be good stewards, right?

With the ability to put it back, you know, switch it and put it back into the system uh when water when the ground is too saturated that it can't, you know, when you don't need it, uh so when you don't need it to irrigate.

So we have some examples.

I I'm gonna I'm gonna work on some stuff.

Um, but I would really like maybe if we could make this as an agenda item for next uh commission meeting to you guys go to your commissioners, bring it up, right?

We'll do some work uh and we'll come back and see if we can kick something off here.

Nice job, thank you.

Yeah, that and this thing.

Thank you guys.

I think I think this is this is good.

But I would like to work on this, and I feel I just want to say, I know this is off topic, but uh it's this kind of topic that sometimes I think I don't have a want to talk about another topic.

Uh, but it is this kind of topic that is a good topic to work on, right?

And uh and it comes kind of on a little bit of a success, what I think is a success with downtown Synola, maybe moving forward with some community kind of system management for downtown Snow, which has been how long have we been talking about that?

Forever.

Right.

So when we get kind of a dedicated group of people that think something is good, I think you know we can we can make some targets with okay.

Thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

Oh I'm sorry, that's still that's unless you're in that do you want to ask if there's any public comments?

Um I see two people online, okay.

Um probably us.

Oh, is that are we gonna talk about the district one?

Yeah, no, maybe public.

She's saying we she got someone calling in to speak, right?

Uh I just wanted to check that there's no one online.

You just open it up.

Like, does anyone online want to speak on the item?

I don't know.

Yeah, yeah.

Um good job because it could be much uh aren't we skipping the basic yeah?

Yeah that is on your that's on your agenda.

That's the next argument.

Yeah, yeah, but they wanted public input on the discussion topic.

Oh, I got it.

I thought we were backing up, but there isn't any, right?

No public comments online.

Sorry, that's so the person who is on the floor isn't there, you know?

It's probably in the attorney from him.

It's probably the rest of Robert's.

Oh yeah, they're not raising our hands.

We can move on to the next item.

It's the district one vacant six.

Could we talk about the district one vacancy?

Yeah, we need to talk about vacancy.

Is there somebody that's been nominated?

Or are to me to help Albert?

Um, we've been reminding them.

Um you've asked them to fill this position, letting them know that it is vacant and we're not getting it.

So I don't know.

Um I'm not quite sure.

So I'd like to actually think about commissioners in general.

Marcos has not been here for a couple of times, correct?

So there is been here for like two earthquake.

Oh, so just the last two.

I think it was the time before when I was still here.

Yeah, but we had one since you won't here.

So there is rules about like how many you are supposed to miss before you get replaced.

So I think I don't know what those rules are.

Okay.

So maybe I know I'm not supposed to run this meeting, but I'm gonna ask.

I are you guys still are you all still interested in being on this commission, right?

That that's the first question.

Or are you like feeling like I don't want to be on sometimes I think I don't want to be because nobody ever comes the subject sometimes is boring except for tonight.

I enjoyed this, and I think there's a lot to be gained by books.

So that's gonna keep me interested along the okay.

So and maybe that's something for us to think about.

Yeah, because we don't have interest.

So how do we make this?

How do we I'm here for two years?

What probably what can we do in two years?

You can do things when I'm gone, but I have a lot of NMT, right?

So I think we think about these things, right?

And this is a great one.

So if that like pulls you in, and if that's what we focus on, because nobody else has anything to say, then let's put all our energy, you know, whatever else comes up.

Um yeah, absolutely.

I knew that you would not be urine, right?

Yeah, yeah.

A good group of people, Tim.

I wake up in the morning and say think about septic system all day long.

So what's one nine and four million?

Okay, so then let's make this if let's make this something that we feel like we're we're really doing something at.

And this is so right now, we have a topic, right?

Who's very topic?

And if we can think of other topics, so I think Pawnee, you're gonna have a success story for us at some point in time.

I hope so.

I hope so too.

But that could be something also then that we could try.

I'd also like to another another topic of things we could try to move, of which we just have none.

Um Paul, it's it's relevant to you, right?

The step systems getting some of these alternative.

So um City of Oakland has adopted policies that allow you to allow them to put in small diameter pipes that connect to a sewer, and everybody has a tank on their property, right?

And um they're slowly getting people off septic systems, right?

And and because people want to, so it's in it's instigated by the property owner or uh a group of people on a uh street.

Um, if you get off of the septic system and you can do it in a reasonable manner, right?

You have so much more free use of your property, right?

So much more free use of the copy.

So that's another thing because we have had success in that one.

We should start identifying and start trying to do those that your your neighborhood, the neighborhood where where you're is it your daughter or your son?

They've moved.

They move.

Oh, you're there.

Okay, your neighbor back in the so that neighborhood.

There's another, there are other um streets.

I think it's that one on 6th Street.

There are other streets where there are nothing but failing systems right on the tree.

Um, and there's nothing they there is no place to replace them, and they are just bumping into that group, right?

There are opportunities like to so instead of like chasing people down because I don't have any interest in doing that, right?

See if we can move some of these policies based on our success.

Let's see who we could try to entice.

What other like CD SAN?

Can we get CD SAN to adopt a policy to allow this, right?

Uh we did it with City Open and they didn't want to do it.

We we were successful, so we actually have a policy that and norm uh Questa helped a lot.

Um so you know we could do that too.

That could be a cool thing, right?

So greywater, that community systems.

If we get some success here on this, those are things we could work on that would be interesting.

Yeah, right, it's photo okay.

Yeah, he's yeah.

Sorry, it's just uh any member without the proof of push and excuse absences from resuccessive right now.

So we write that same okay, okay.

So that doesn't slide by here.

So um then how do we get him talk to your commission, check back to talk to howard?

Tell him you need another commissioner.

How could one district?

Oh, you're in one too.

I'm not I don't represent one, I represent two, but your house went to two when he took over our district.

So there's a vacancy now, so you can take the papers of district one.

Is there somebody else in district two?

Well, it makes sense if you live in district one and there's a vegan district one, take that spot and that solves that problem.

Then district two will have who's the border supervisor for district two.

So Marquez.

Yeah, yes, well, why don't we try that?

Why don't you go into that and we get I mean Marquez is um I have a help with her a lot, but I think she's a very reasonable person.

She's something I please ask, uh, and let her know.

Um, and let's get Burger appoint somebody so that we have somebody in district two, and then you're on district one, which I think it should be because that's up to help you.

It is so I guess we could say meet this right and say again, we need this.

This is vacant.

Uh Commissioner, we have a commissioner that's representing district two, but lives in this in your district, and we're recommending that she be the commissioner for your district, and we get uh Marquez to uh I bet they'll go for it because one knows you're here for him.

If you're here for him, you know him, he knows that you're involved in septic systems.

It's not like you're somebody that's not um, and then we bring Marquez and go, let's try it.

I'll shoot it, I'll shoot an email over if that's if you're willing to do the okay.

All right, I think that would be good.

Um and then maybe we'll yeah, that sounds good.

Okay, so be dreaming up all the things that you think would be real cool if you want to separate.

I think we have some, I think we have I think this one is gonna be good.

Uh let's let's stay engaged then and uh we're only meeting two times a year, so it's not a four with a right.

We were talking about doing four, but we're not doing the door, unless we want to, right?

Unless we're having tests.

So much fun.

Yeah, right.

And it's something that doesn't sleep.

Yeah, pounded through it for so long.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Send us the information on the drop resilience.

I will absolutely we're talking about how many fittings.

I will send it to you all as a BCC, so that you see what it is.

Um how many systems in it?

I don't think they do because it the Oakland Hill.

I mean, Hayward Hills are in district four, it looks like so City of Hayward City City.

City if they were just district two, yeah.

City Hayward City Hayward has some unique city because all the problems.

District two used to cover some old to partisanal.

Yeah, that's all.

I mean is it also possible to no, you need to have if there's a board of supervisor and they have uh a septic system in their district, they need to have a commissioner, right?

So we can stick to it goes to them to that's kind of the logic of having two out of this group one.

Everybody else is just one.

Oh no, this was two.

Yeah, just one of the finding.

That's another thing.

If um, so there are some interesting things, and and Marcos has an interesting if we could ever move it, right?

He's he lives in this community up above UC Berkeley, right?

And there is all these houses like these little lots and pipes thinking out of the side of the hill.

Um and Marco, like it's a problem, right?

But everybody just stays very quiet.

And there's a it's a city of Oakland Sanitary Sewer that actually could access these properties, but because it's City of Berkeley properties, but there is this is something interesting to like say, let's solve this problem.

They they're you know, lafco, all the people that are, you know, instead of so if we worked on documenting, like this is a problem, right?

So we could actually solve some things for people instead of just because they can't develop, they can't, they can't develop these lots, they can't uh it's a nightmare.

Um that's another one, and he's done a lot of footwork kind of with uh city of Berkeley and City of Oakland, and like we could actually try to make some things happen here.

So easy.

No, he's more easy.

Yeah, it is a bus.

It is so wildcat's a little bit, I think further, yeah, it's it's a little bit further.

It's um it's an interesting place, but we could, you know, one of the things we could do to make this more likely is we could have a commissioner bring their topic and say this is a thing I want to work on because they're actually interesting things, and we could work on doing that and think how those can move to other communities as we go forward with success stories.

And we've got five things we can work on.

So um next time that we do this, I think when we ask for some topics, we can say what is your topic, you got a topic, right?

I know you do.

Um we've got this topic about graywater.

Uh Marcos has this topic about uh this weird perch and these we have these isolated pockets throughout our county that we can't get hooked up to sanitary sewer, even if the sewer is right there because they're not in, you know, and so you know we have a boundary.

Yeah, it's the boundary, right?

Yes, so this would be something interesting to like Happy Valley is one of them.

Happy Valley is bringed by sewers, yeah, and they got like problems, right?

And they've kind of been going on and on.

It'd be cool if we could maybe like work on getting some of those things solved.

Have we identifying the problem areas?

Do we have a map?

We have the problem areas.

Remember, Tim, the one we worked on when I first met one of the first projects I met, you got a young woman that bought that house in Rivermore.

Yeah, it's a failed system, and she rallied that whole street to get in in that case, they got it panics.

Um maybe it was definitely no so it was different, like he had he had a failed system, and her property was like nothing but failed failed city, right?

Um, and she like rallied the troops, and uh they ended up having a vote, and it ended up getting the annexed, but they howbert like no Hagerty uh gave a lot of money to contribute to that.

So there's some cool things we could talk about that would be like things that might be useful to people that live in an unincorporated county.

So let's do that.

I'm I feel a little bit of um motivation to achieve in the English, yeah.

For all reach you, okay.

And we'll see if we can get somebody from our kids and see if we can switch a vote.

Well you're you're a remnant from when we were in one.

I mean, when I was I mean, one moved into you.

Yes, yeah, it almost seems as we got redistrict, you should have just was admission to smoothly through one.

Well, I asked him about it, but he had already met Tim.

Oh fell in love with Tim.

So okay.

Well now Jackie's on, so here you go.

Okay.

Right.

And at least uh 20 miles apart.

Yeah, okay.

So yeah, I don't know.

Um if somebody else who's got some root um put uh exciting uh over the order.

Oh yeah, yeah.

I will say one thing that we can talk about one of these times is we're going to really talk about the main spot portals.

Uh and we will be able to demonstrate that at some time.

It's it's meant to be a lot of work, but I think it's gonna be really good.

Um so at some point is huh?

It's um it's the port, it's the it's the website that the building department uses in the planning department uses for all permanent applications.

So we've been building out our portal to it or on site wastewater system so applicants can it's transparent and you can see where it is.

So that should be happening in the next um six months, and we can bring that in and demo that, and you guys can see that.

That those are interesting things to uh that's supposed to screen line and it is um one with hope.

I guess it it should make it more than that for a lot of years.

Yeah, yeah, right.

It's it's integrated, it it makes it more transparent um so that the person that has submitted the application can see online where it is, who's who it is stuck with.

Is it stuck with building department?

Is it stuck with environmental health?

Uh it automates um responses so things don't get lost right now.

So many things are done through emails and just so I think efficiency-wise, it's gonna it's gonna help and it's gonna make it more transparent, and so it'll be interesting to see as we do that, right?

What um and that'll be interesting for you guys if you're representing your constituents if you hear is it working, is it not?

Uh we're spending a lot of time on it, that's for sure.

Trying to so that's that's something that we'll bring to you guys uh when we get it in test mode or something.

Well the building department has it online now.

They have it online and they they we work on it, but we don't have a way for it to come to us, so uh it's always you're depending on building department referring things to us, and it's not it it needs to be a much better system where everything is coming through us that has to do with septic systems, then the thing that Kathy should do is if you've got a building department application before a planning and you on on site resource system, you've been working really hard to get those guys to not accept the application until they've come to environmental health to understand what what's going on with septic system because people have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars getting way deep into uh entitlement and building and then come to find, then they refer them over and say you've got to get approved by environmental health, and it causes a lot of so trying to get it in the front end so that we can work with people and make that a more efficient question.

How's that working out?

It's working way better.

Yeah, it's working way better.

Because that is the thing you need to know, right?

If you're gonna you're gonna do we got properties that are developed like 12 bedroom houses every into the property, and then there'll be one tiny little corner for the septic system, right?

And it's if it if you come to us first, you gotta identify where you're gonna put it.

It it's a better thing, it's just better all the way.

Okay, sorry.

Oh, journalists.

Yeah, or attorney.

Oh, yeah, no, I'm really public online anyway.

So we don't have to ask.

Yeah, you're gonna thank you.

Thank you for helping us.

Thank you guys, thanks to me.