The Responsibility of Serving onthe MSD Board and More Letters to the Editor

Having served on the Montecito Sanitary District Board in the past, I understand what may not be apparent to most residents: The decisions facing the District are far more complicated than “the slate” of candidates Wicks, Francis, and Barrett suggest in recent paid advertising, mailers, and an MJ editorial.

Today, the District faces decisions about the future of wastewater treatment that will affect Montecito for generations. This determination is, and always has been, the District Board’s job, but only after seeking and reviewing data relevant to the decision making. Whether to continue treating wastewater locally or connect to Santa Barbara involves complex engineering and financial considerations, infrastructure requirements, and long-term obligations. The District also faces many other important decisions that require thoughtful leadership. Thoughtful leadership does not originate with pre-selected outcomes before the facts and data are considered.

Voters should expect their elected representatives to understand the issues, scrutinize the facts, and make decisions they can explain and defend. They should also expect those directors to be transparent and honest with their constituents.

This election should not be a referendum on a wastewater treatment option before the necessary analysis is complete. We are electing a Board of Directors, not voting on an engineering proposal. I am concerned by factual inaccuracies in campaign materials and by candidates committing to a particular course before the relevant analysis is complete.

For these reasons, and based on my prior MSD board service, I support Rock Rockenbach and John Murphy for the Montecito Sanitary District Board. These two candidates were appointed by the current MSD Directors, which includes Mr. Barrett who is part of “the slate,” and Mr. Rockenbach is the current Board President, elected by the current Board.

Jeff Kerns
Former Director, Montecito Sanitary District

Crucial Details for MSD

Following the MJ “Voice of Village” in the matter of the Montecito Sanitary District election issue. Here is what is crucial: the trio of Wicks/Francis/Barrett is broadcasting their position of hooking the MSD plant to the city’s El Estero wastewater plant. “Let’s just do this,” they say. What’s missing are cost/feasibility and engineering studies, EIR reports, and most of all, Prop 218 votes so that ratepayers can decide if they want to pay for such a plan. It took us, Heal the Ocean, 15 years to get the Rincon project built, most of which was spent on these preliminary, required steps. The Wicks/Francis/Barrett team is misleading the public by implying it’s a snap decision. There are no concrete plans on the table, not even a start. The MSD plant has to keep running in the meantime.

Thank you!

Hillary Hauser,
Co-Founder Heal the Ocean

Response to Mr. Rockenbach’s Letter

Richard (Rock) Rockenbach, Montecito Sanitary Board (MSD) incumbent, claims that the Wicks-Francis-Barrett election campaign titled “Montecito Clean Water” has targeted him personally. Let me be clear: Our campaign has avoided using any names whatsoever. We characterize our opponents as any and all voters who believe that rebuilding the MSD treatment plant with its huge capital costs and much greater operating costs should be MSD’s first choice option.

A preference for transporting the MSD wastewater to the Santa Barbara El Estero Resource Center for treatment is an obvious, far better option, with the facts we know right now. To pay millions more for further study of a rebuild is a waste of time and financial resources. To advocate spending millions more dollars for detailed designs, engineering and permitting to meet a 30% construction engineering threshold is a bridge too far. 

Last week, Mr. Rockenbach stated categorically, “Neither John Murphy nor I have advocated rebuilding in Montecito, and neither of us has opposed connecting to Santa Barbara. We are just trying to collect the facts. We have not yet selected a long-term treatment option.” Mr. Rockenbach added, “I would rather lose an election than win one by misrepresenting the facts.”

Here are the facts, as depicted by Mr. Rockenbach as recently as the October 14, 2026, MSD Board meeting. Mr. Rockenbach’s position was to complete the design of a new wastewater treatment plant by the end of Q2 2027.  Mr. Rockenbach can’t have it both ways.  How serious is he about the “City option,” when he’s directing the GM to go full speed ahead on the new plant design in his own Strategic Plan? Here’sthe reference: the MSD District GM’s presentation of the MSD Strategic Work Plan starts on Page 56 of 102, Item 1.1, titled “Complete design of a new wastewater treatment plant.”

Further, we acknowledge that Mr. Rockenbach’s attention has recently turned slightly toward the “City option.” Interestingly, it coincides with the public announcement of our plan. It’s clear, however, that his Strategic Work Plan doesn’t include the City option; otherwise he wouldn’t be planning to go to final design of a new plant in the next six months.  Moreover, during the September 23, 2026, Board meeting (less than a month ago) Mr. Rockenbach is on record vehemently arguing that the city of Santa Barbara is looking to Montecito to bail them out of financial problems. 

Regardless of what is being said publicly, Mr. Rockenbach’s own documents are important.  For example, his proposed timeline to have Carollo study the city option, spans a timeline of two years past the August 1, 2027, expiration date of the Southland Industries contract to rebuild the plant, as pointed out to him by Director Barrett (one of my teammates) during the October 14^th MSD Board meeting. 

Mr. Rockenbach suggested that the best way to make a decision is to look at the facts. I agree; let’s look at the facts we already know: 

Fact 1: The 2023 Carollo Engineering Study. 

The debate over whether Montecito should build its own new wastewater treatment plant or ship its wastewater to the City of Santa Barbara was seemingly settled three years ago on January 15, 2023, when a joint engineering study, conducted by Carollo Engineers, Inc. for the Montecito Sanitary District and the Montecito Water District, was released. The cost for this two-year study labeled “Enhanced Recycled Water Feasibility Analysis” was $440,000 and was paid for equally by MSD and MWD. 

The analysis underscored that the localized wastewater treatment footprint for MSD would yield a relatively small water supply addition.  Because of the exceptionally high estimated cost for a relatively minor amount of water, the MWD concluded that the best option for MSD and MWD was that a plant rebuilding and recycling of its treated wastewater should be put on a hold. MWD has already secured a more “drought proof” supply from the city of Santa Barbara, i.e. from the City Desal Plant, described fully in a 50-year agreement. The best next step would be to pivot toward a regional wastewater treatment agreement with the City of Santa Barbara for a lower cost solution, shared by a wider base of customers. Case closed in favor of a regional treatment at an outlay of nearly half the current cost. 

Fact 2: The Montecito Sanitary District (MSD) Mission Statement. 

The mission of the Sanitary District is to “protect the public health and safety (not by discharging 600,000 gallons per day of effluent a short distance offshore from Butterfly Beach) and to preserve the natural environment (not by building a new treatment plant that includes no recycling of wastewater), through the collection, treatment and disposal of wastewater in the most cost-effective way (not by taking on debt of up to $100 million and increasing MSD rates – already double the rates in Santa Barbara – with a so-called “maximum” increase; compounded 14% each year until 2031). If elected, I will vote to rescind the remaining four years of compounded 14% increases at the first Board meeting after they are elected and to amend the recent rate study to delete the plant rebuild and incorporate the lower cost “City option” in a new rate forecast.

Fact 3: Why did I, Floyd Wicks, enter the race for a seat on Montecito Sanitary Board?

I have served for 10 years on the Montecito Water District Board. Our Water District customers are the same customers that are served by the Sanitary District, and I felt members of the Sanitary Board were not looking out for the best interests of our customers. Because I have spent my entire career engineering and managing water and wastewater systems, I feel a public responsibility, over the objections of my fellow Water Board members, to resign from the Water Board and run as a candidate for the MSD Board alongside a great team of Woody Barrett and Chris Francis. Our collective goal is to negotiate a mutually beneficial, regional treatment contract with the City of Santa Barbara and scrap the idea of building a new MSD plant. 

Fact 4: Is there a working precedent for a signed water/sanitary agreement with the City of Santa Barbara? 

When first elected to the Montecito Water District Board in November 2016, Montecito Water was in a mess – four years of drought, no water security, dying coast live oaks and dead mature landscaping. Illegal water trucks were roaming the streets of Montecito, offering private well water at outlandish prices to save endangered landscaping. The Montecito Water District was one of a handful of water districts in all of California to impose WWII-type rationing of water with financial penalties. Personal animosities between Districts killed any chances of working with the City of Santa Barbara. 

Together, we slowly mended fences, built trust, and weeded out the naysayers at MSD and MWD. We next sat down with the City of Santa Barbara to craft a MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) and negotiated a contractual Water Purchase Agreement with the City of Santa Barbara for a 50-year purchase of 1,430-acre feet per year of potable water to secure a local supply of drinking water. Today, MWD can withstand more than six years of sustained drought, with no rainfall, due to our agreement with the City and our ability to store excess water in underground reservoirs for future use. 

MWD has achieved what no one, except our water team, thought we could do – We achieved water security in a semi-desert climate. We now have excess water in storage from the City and could sell a portion of our state water allotment to reinvest in our aging infrastructure. 

MWD has not used State Water to meet its customer demands since 2019. As a participant in State Water since 1997, the Montecito Water District pays dearly for its State water allotment even when it receives no water in drought years. Over the past decade, the costs of State water have increased while reliability has decreased. 

I agree with conclusion in the Carollo consultant study. MSD should not design, finance and build a replacement plant for up to $100 million when a larger, more efficient regional plant already exists next door. MSD has it backward. Negotiate a wastewater treatment solution with the City before you design, engineer and rebuild your own wastewater plant at a cost of up to $100 million in capital costs and twice the operating costs. 

Fact 5: The State of California water and sanitary regulatory agencies, state and federal grant makers, environmentalists, and sanitary and water ratepayers who have looked at the current facts, all acknowledge that regional treatment of wastewater is far superior to rebuilding small local treatment plants like Montecito.

In L.A. County, 78 cities and/or Sanitary Districts contract with the County for regional wastewater treatment. It’s common sense. 

Closing short and shallow discharge pipes that diffuse secondary treated effluent into the ocean where tides wash it back onto the local beaches is a dreadful outcome for environmental groups such as Heal the Ocean, Santa Barbara Channelkeeper, and the Sierra Club. 

Fact 6: Economies of Scale for Regional Treatment Centers 

The fact is that the City of Santa Barbara serves 27,000 sanitary customers at half the price, while Montecito serves only 3,100 customers at twice the price, with the highest sanitary rates in all of Santa Barbara County. If Santa Barbara treats a combined 30,000 homes and businesses, costs can be reduced for Santa Barbara AND Montecito ratepayers through economies of scale and advances in energy savings from the City’s use of methane gas retrieval to power their treatment plant – a luxury Montecito Sanitary can neither duplicate nor afford. 

Fact 7: Treatment of Montecito Wastewater in Santa Barbara offers a Pathway to Recycled Water 

It’s a fact that the Santa Barbara wastewater plant currently treats six million gallons of wastewater each day, ten times Montecito’s volume, and has the ability to recycle Montecito’s wastewater. It’s a fact that during irrigation months, the City recycles some 42% of its wastewater for irrigation use. Montecito currently recycles zero of its wastewater, and its rebuilt plant will do the same, because it lacks a purple pipe system to convey recycled wastewater to its Montecito customers. 

Neither MSD, nor the proposed rebuild of its current plant, has a valid recycled wastewater component for irrigation water, or non-potable or potable use, because of the hydrology of Montecito’s small and interconnected groundwater basins and MSD’s multiplicity of local wells. Plus, Montecito Sanitary, unlike Santa Barbara’s plant, totally lacks a separate “purple pipe” distribution system. MSD Wastewater sent to Santa Barbara can be part of the recycled water already being piped by the City to the Montecito Club for irrigation, and conceivably, in the future to the Santa Barbara cemetery. 

Fact 8: Sending Montecito’s wastewater to Santa Barbara for treatment could potentially lower the cost for both Santa Barbara and Montecito ratepayers. 

Sending Montecito’s wastewater to the Santa Barbara El Estero Resource Center for treatment will cost less for ratepayers, and not only in terms of the estimated capital costs to rebuild a new wastewater plant on the current site. A new rebuilt treatment plant will still use the same short and shallow outfall that dumps 600,000 gallons a day of secondary treated wastewater a short distance offshore from Montecito beaches, unless MSD chooses to invest up to an additional $100 million to rebuild a longer, deeper and safer discharge pipe, like the City already has. 

It’s a fact that operating costs for sewage treatment in Santa Barbara are half the cost of treatment in Montecito because of economies of scale. Treatment costs are spread among 27,000 homeowners and businesses in Santa Barbara; treatment costs in Montecito are spread across only 3,100 homes and businesses. 

As Mr. Rockenbach suggests, the decision to rebuild the MSD treatment plant or send our sewage to Santa Barbara is a cost-benefit decision that will last for decades. It needs to be made now to save millions in the “build a new plant here” option. Our team of Barrett, Francis and Wicks will make the right decision, without the need for more and more studies and without the need for a compounded 14% annual rate hike for the next five years! 

Floyd E. Wicks

Devon for City Council

We are surprised and impressed these days, and in this environment, when someone steps up to run for public office. It is all the more impressive when a superbly qualified candidate puts herself forward and into the fray.

The candidate who continually surprises and awes us is Devon Wardlow for District 4.

Devon is a homegrown Santa Barbara native who, as a five-year member of the City’s Planning Commission, has worked on all of the issues important to us and hasn’t backed down against current horrifying attacks and odds.

Devon is the most qualified candidate who understands the priorities of her neighbors and the entire community. Her résumé tells us all.

We sincerely hope the residents of District 4 elect Devon; we only wish we could vote for her directly.

Sincerely,
Beryl & Neil Kreisel

Olympics Aspirations

While the 2028 L.A. Olympics will be a great thing for the city, there are undoubtedly some major problems that can occur if not responsibly handled during the Olympics. One of the biggest problems that may develop is a huge amount of plastic trash all over the city and the surrounding area and eventually leading to an increase in microplastics all over the world with this global event.

I recently went to a Jack Johnson concert at the Santa Barbara Bowl where they have committed to using reusable plastic cups during events, which I thought was very aspirational. This seems like a realistic solution as opposed to that of using single-use plastic bottles and cups at the Olympics, which would create metric tons of litter and waste. This could be one step in eliminating single-use plastic at the Olympics. 

I hope that Santa Barbara could be an example for L.A. and the rest of the world in the upcoming Olympics.

Matthew Sax

Thoughts on RSO

And the Oscar goes to… Councilmember Kristen Sneddon!

When the rent stabilization ordinance (RSO) was on the consent calendar recently, ‘actress’ Kristen Sneddon made a motion to set the rent cap at 3%. After a multitude of meetings with housing providers, all saying 60% of CPI was too restrictive, she didn’t make any such motions during previous opportunities.

Hearing from critics that this RSO is too restrictive and it’s hurting her mayoral campaign, she tried to make a pivot that was pure theater. Councilmembers Friedman, Jordan, and Rowse all said this proposed change could have happened months ago.

Her angle – she can tell voters that she listened and tried to compromise. It was too late to make that move without creating legal liability, something she has not shied away from in the past. There was nothing sincere about the motion. She amended and moved to adopt the ordinance in its original form. It passed. 

It was all theatrics meant to benefit her bid to become the next mayor of Santa Barbara. Do we really want a mayor that manipulates governmental processes for her benefit, or do want true, responsive, transparent leadership as demonstrated by Mayoral Candidate Eric Friedman?  

Michele Carbone,
mom and pop housing provider