Rep. Vargas Introduces Bipartisan Legislation to Protect and Rehabilitate the Tijuana River Valley
San Diego, CA—(September 18, 2017) Rep. Juan Vargas (CA-51) and Rep. Darrell Issa (CA-49) introduced the Tijuana River Valley Comprehensive Protection and Rehabilitation Act of 2017 (H.R. 3795). This bill would develop a comprehensive protection and rehabilitation program for the Tijuana River Valley area to ensure that sewage, trash, and sediment no longer flow from Tijuana into San Diego County.
“Sewage from Tijuana has been flowing into the Tijuana River Valley, into beaches in San Diego County, and our communities for too long,” said Congressman Juan Vargas. “This legislation will help rehabilitate the Tijuana River Valley and rebuild the infrastructure needed to prevent future spills.”
“The impact of these continuing spills will be felt for generations to come, unless we take action to stop it now,” said Congressman Darrell Issa. “Allowing the sewage and wastewater to flow up into San Diego County not only hurts small business and our tourism-reliant economy, but also poses serious health consequences for local communities and the border patrol agents who have been harmed in their ability to secure our border by the on-going contamination. Solving this problem will only come with strong bipartisan and international cooperation. I’m proud of the work Juan and I have put into this bill to ensure that it gets cleaned up and that we take preventative measures to ensure it never happens again.”
H.R. 3795 develops a coordinated program—including federal, state, local and Mexican agencies and departments—to provide technical assistance for the conservation, stewardship, and enhancement of physical infrastructure in both the United States and Mexico to prevent flooding and wastewater, sewage, trash, and sediment spills in the Tijuana River Valley. Through the direction of the Army Corp of Engineers, the Secretary of the Army will produce a feasibility and technical assistance plan to update the wastewater infrastructure to prevent flooding of sewage, trash and sediment into the Tijuana River Valley area. Once a plan is finalized, the Secretary will be able to provide grants for infrastructure projects on both sides of the border.
The bill also creates a Transboundary Waterway Alert System to monitor, warn, and protect United States residents from undue and avoidable harm from wastewater, sewage, trash and sediment spills and flooding for each major waterway along the U.S.-Mexico border. This alert system will ensure that updated and timely information on all water testing results and sewage, trash, and sediment spills is easily and readily available to the public and government officials online.
Vargas represents California’s 51st Congressional District which includes the southern portion of San Diego County, all of Imperial County and California’s entire U.S.-Mexico border. Vargas was first elected to the U.S. House of Representatives in 2012 and is currently serving his third term in Congress. He serves on the House Financial Services Committee.
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