California Town, Water District Fined for Sewer Spills Into Bay

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says the city of Oakland and a water district are being fined $350,000 for allegedly allowing sewage water to flow into the San Francisco Bay.

The EPA says in a statement Tuesday that Oakland will have to pay more than $220,000 in fines for the violations between September 2014 and June 2017. The East Bay Municipal Utility District is being fined $134,000.

The EPA says the penalties are also for violating the terms of a 2014 agreement that required them and other East Bay cities to invest $1.5 billion over 21 years to upgrade their aging sewer systems.

The EPA says that since 2014 about $80 million has been spent to rehabilitate 100 miles of sewer pipe in a 1,500-mile-long sewer system.