By William Rodarmor

This article is about sewer laterals-but don't get your hopes up. It isn't about the famous underground shootout in The Third Man, or even the five lateral passes that allowed Cal to improbably win the 1982 Big Game. It's about the pipe that runs from your house to the sewer main under the street. Keeping that pipe flowing smoothly is vital for anyone who wants to buy or sell a house in the Bay Area, or even just live here. That's partly because we want to keep our creeks and Bay clean. But it's also because East Bay cities are increasingly enforcing repairs with so-called point-of-sale (POS) ordinances that are triggered when a house changes hands.

The ordinances differ in the details, but their main purpose is to reduce sewage spills and leaks, and ultimately cut the wastewater flowing to treatment plants and the Bay. New ordinances became effective recently in Kensington, El Cerrito, and Berkeley, and homeowners need to be aware of them.

 

Photo by Santiago Portilla

 

Basically, point-of-sale ordinances require that certain defects be repaired or upgraded at the time a property is sold. They cover things other than sewer lines, of course. Piedmont makes you fix your sidewalk, for example, and Berkeley uses POS ordinances to help make its homes energy tight and seismically safe.

Historically, the sewer ordinances were a response to pressure from such federal laws the Clean Water Act. Alameda passed a sewer lateral ordinance in 1989, and Albany in 1993. The Stege Sanitary District, which covers El Cerrito, Kensington, and the Richmond Annex, launched its program in 2005. In 2006, Richmond and Berkeley enacted POS sewer ordinances that became effective in August and October, respectively.

Enforcing a POS ordinance is much easier than hounding homeowners into compliance. From the city or district’s point of view, it’s far cheaper to delay an escrow than to put teams of inspectors on the streets every day.

When the Stege district adopted its test and repair program, it chose the time of a sale because upgrading a sewer line is less of a burden when money is already being exchanged and financing is readily available. The West County Wastewater District (WCWD) is drafting an ordinance, too, and is adopting similar language. The district already requires a backwater overflow device, a rule that Albany has also recently adopted. Without one, if your sewer backs up, it can back up right into your house.

FA sewer lateral is a pipe that connects the house plumbing to the sanitary sewer main that usually runs along the middle of the street or between adjoining properties. The lateral is your pipe, and you’re responsible for it.

How many feet of that pipe you have to worry about depends on where you live. In Albany and Berkeley, the homeowners’ responsibility ends at the curb line; the city is responsible for the segment from the curb to the sewer main. In Kensington and parts of Richmond and El Cerrito, homeowners are responsible for the laterals all the way to the main.

Many houses in the East Bay were built before 1950 and still have their original sewer lines. These are usually clay pipes with cement mortar joints. Over time, the pipes crack and the joints separate. (Also, some property owners illegally run outdoor drains into their laterals.) This leads to two problems. First, tree roots grow into the pipe. Eventually large root balls can plug the laterals, or break loose and clog the main sewer lines. Second, raw sewage can leak into the ground and flow into creeks and the Bay.

East Bay cities take sewer problems seriously. Since 1987, Berkeley has replaced or rehabilitated more than a third of the city's main lines, and replaced or rehabilitated 56 miles of lower lateral sewers for some 9,000 properties. The WCWD has 250 miles of main and gravity sewer lines, says district manager E. J. Shalaby. “But in addition there are about 240 miles of lateral lines. In other words, there is an entire secondary system that we don't have any control over.”

Your sewer lateral probably needs work if you have experienced backups, noticed sewage odor, or if the house is old. And if there are trees, heavy underbrush, or shrubs nearby, root intrusion is likely.

It usually costs between $3000 and $6,000 to replace a lateral line, says Shalaby, but WCWD has a “sewer grant” program for qualifying property owners. “If homeowners want to work on their sewer laterals, we will come out and videotape the entire line,” he says. “If they need to replace their lateral, we will pay 50 percent of the cost, up to $2000. They apply for the grant, and if it's approved, we simply write them a check.”

Interested homeowners should consult their city or district, as every ordinance is different. Berkeley's new law affects both people who are selling their homes or doing major remodels, for example. The ordinance is triggered if the total cost of the remodel exceeds $100,000, or it is over $50,000 and involves two plumbing fixtures. “In other words,” says senior building inspector Susan Spott, “if you do a bathroom remodel that costs more than $50,000 and you change your shower and toilet, you must abide by the terms of the ordinance.”

In Berkeley you can either do a video inspection of the line and submit the tape for review, or show a signed-off permit that shows replacement of that line within the last 20 years, or a major repair on it within the last 10 years.

By contrast, Oakland doesn't have a POS sewer maintenance ordinance. When a sewer problem is reported, the city will write the homeowner about it. If a warning and a hearing don't produce results, the city may go ahead and do the work at the owner's expense. But Antey Washington, an Oakland senior construction inspector, says cooperation is generally good. “In many cases a rental property is involved,” he says, “and landlords will want to fix it so as not to impact their tenants.”

Some homeowners don't quite grasp the size of the root intrusion problem. “They call Roto-Rooter every six months, and they have to keep routing out their sewer line,” says Berkeley Hills Realty co-owner Nancy Mueller. “They might as well bite the bullet and get the line fixed properly, because they're going to have to do it eventually anyway.”

 

Albany
Public Works & Maintenance
510-528-5754
www.albanyca.org/dept/

Berkeley
Public Works
2180 Milvia Street, Berkeley, CA 94704
510-981-6300
www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/pw/sewers/uplatbro.html

Oakland
Sewer Maintenance
7101 Edgewater Drive, Bdg #4, Oakland, CA 94621
510-615-5566
www.oaklandpw.com/Page279.aspx

Richmond
Collection System Maintenance
1401 Marina Way South, Richmond, CA 94804
510-412-2001
www.ci.richmond.ca.us/

Stege Sanitary District
7500 Schmidt Lane, El Cerrito, CA 94530
510-524-4668
www.stegesd.dst.ca.us/

West County Wastewater District
2910 Hilltop Drive, Richmond, CA 94806
510-222-6700
www.wcwd.org/index.htm
www.wcwd.org/permits.htm

Fixing or replacing a sewer lateral line usually involves four main steps.

Videotape your lateral. This generally costs between $50 and $150 if there is easy access to the lateral through a clean-out device. If not, the videotaping may cost more.

Bring the videotape in for review. Review by the appropriate district is usually free. You will either get a certificate of compliance, or be told that your lateral needs to be repaired or replaced.

Make repairs if needed. If repair is needed, a permit issued by the district is required before work can be performed. Plans are usually not required, but the work must be done to code. Actual repair or replacement costs are set by contractors.

Have the work inspected. A district inspector will inspect the work and complete the job permit. You can then get the compliance certificate.

1. Be aware of what goes down the drain or toilet that can create a blockage.

2. Minimize using your kitchen garbage disposal.

3. Place baskets or strainers in sink drains to catch food scraps.

4. Place all solid waste in trash or appropriate recycling bins.

5. Avoid pouring oils and fats down the drain. They build up in the sewers, causing restrictions and overflows.

6. Avoid flushing solids such as sanitary napkins and paper towels down toilets.

For readers whose interest in sewers runs dry at the first lateral, here is something completely different: Berkeley's creative use of two point-of-sale (POS) ordinances to make the city’s homes more energy efficient and earthquake safe.

Life under RECO

The first is the Residential Energy Conservation Ordinance, or RECO, originally adopted in 1982 and amended several times since then. Before a residential unit can be sold, the seller must get an inspection and a certificate that about a dozen specific energy-conservation steps have been taken. They include such things as attic insulation, furnace ducts, low-flow water devices, weather stripping, dampers on fireplaces, etc.

The question of who must do the work-and when-is a bit tricky, and may be negotiable. In general, sellers who have lived on the property since before 1982 can pass their responsibility under RECO for upgrades to the buyer. The buyer has one year in which to do the work. Buyers who don't do the required work can't get building permits or close escrow when they go to resell the house. Also, they can’t pass the RECO responsibility to a new buyer.

Berkeley Hills Realty co-owner Tracy Sichterman explains how the ordinance is enforced: “As a buyer, you're supposed to comply within the first year, but usually no one is going to knock on your door if you don’t. The problem arises when you want to sell the house.” The City of Berkeley must have the RECO compliance form on file before the deed can be transferred, she says. “The city doesn't need to come to your house. It’s very effective.”

Seismic Tax Rebate

Berkeley's other POS ordinance is a little more carrot than stick. Berkeley is the only East Bay city that allows a portion of the transfer tax to be rebated for seismic upgrades. The ordinance is very specific, but here is an overview of how it works.

When a Berkeley residence is sold, one third of the 1.5 percent transfer tax (that is, 0.5 percent of the sale price) is held in escrow for seismic retrofitting. On a million-dollar house, the transfer tax is 1.5 percent, or $15,000, and one third of that is $5,000. That money can be rebated to the buyer when the work is done, provided that the conditions of the ordinance are met. The rebate can go to the seller if the seismic work was done after the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake and before the date of the sale. The requirements are very specific: the work must be done to code, with permits, backed up by receipts, etc. After all, the city is rebating money that would normally go to its general fund.

“It's been a very good way to get seismic retrofits done,” says Sichterman. “People have taken advantage of the credit, and even if they just do the work in $4,000 and $5,000 chunks, the individual steps add up-and Berkeley homes are getting safer as a result.”