Former Homeowner Blamed for Water Contamination

A former homeowner who rigged a piping system to steal recycled waste water so he could irrigate his backyard in Calabasas may be responsible for contaminating the drinking water supply serving as many as 1,600 homes and two schools, officials said Friday.

Investigators are unsure how many homes received the tainted water. No health problems have been reported.

“It could be 1,600 homes; it could be two,” said Arlene Post, a spokeswoman for the Las Virgenes Municipal Water District. “We don’t know what the extent was. We believe it was minimal, but we’re taking every precaution.”

Ken August, a state health department spokesman in Sacramento, said an initial round of tests showed that no harmful bacteria were present in the drinking water supply as of Thursday morning.

He said results from a second set of samples, taken Friday morning, would not be available until today.

Water district officials believe that the owner of a home on Bluebird Drive had illegally installed a pipe to tap into a public irrigation line that was carrying reclaimed sewage water for a nearby greenbelt, Post said.

The homeowner, who was not identified, has since moved, Post said.

The contamination was triggered when new owners moved into the house and an unsuspecting landscaper on Wednesday opened a valve on a bootleg pipe that diverted water from the public irrigation pipe to a potable water pipe in the home’s backyard.

Because the backyard sprinkler system was not operating at the time, the treated water flowed into the home’s drinking water system, which connects to the water system supplying 1,600 homes.

The water in the public irrigation pipe comes from the nearby Tapia sewage treatment plant, and is treated in three stages. It is considered safe to drink in small amounts.

As a precaution, residents of all 1,600 homes were warned Thursday not to drink their tap water until further notice.