Newest articles on The Sacramento Press tagged as "nestle"

Council to decide on new version of permit program

2009-12-12T00:09:08Z

The City Council will discuss Tuesday a new version of a permitting program that became part of the recent debate over the Nestlé’s company’s move to Sacramento. The city shuttered its Facilities Permit Program Oct. 27 to investigate whether the program breaks laws.

City Attorney Eileen Teichert declared recently that the FPP was being used illegally because the city was not directing builders to obtain formal building permits before starting construction work, according to David Kwong, the city’s acting planning division director.

The previous version of the FPP offered businesses -- those that worked with the city on an ongoing basis -- a way to receive quick approval for tenant improvements or remodeling of commercial and industrial buildings, Kwong said last month.

Now, Kwong is presenting the remodeled FPP. One of the main revisions is a rule for formal building permits.

“The original program allowed individuals to start work with an oral or written ‘Authorization to Start Work,’” according to a report that Kwong is presenting to the City Council Tuesday. “The revised program requires that a building permit is issued before work is started as required by city code.”

Kwong plans to start the program again Dec. 16. It will be renamed the Facilitated Permit Program. An in-depth guide to the new program will be drafted by the Community Development Department in January, according to Kwong’s report.

Read the full report on changes to the program under Item 30 at the city's website.

The link between the FPP and Nestlé

Nestlé is setting up a bottling plant in Sacramento with plans to sell tens of millions of gallons of the city’s water. The city used the FPP to approve the bottling plant.

Nestlé’s plans drew protests from a citizen’s group called Save Our Water Sacramento, which opposed the city’s approval of the plant without a public hearing or an environmental impact report.

At the same time, a conflict surfaced over whether a building permit should have been used with Nestlé’s project. City Attorney Eileen Teichert said in October that Nestlé did not break any laws as it worked to build its bottling plant. But her office declared that the FPP involved illegal procedures, Kwong said in November.

Teichert said the city acted illegally because it allowed project construction even though Nestlé and its contractors did not have a building permit.

While Nestlé and its contractors received verbal approval from the city to start building the plant, that type of approval does not meet legal requirements, according to Teichert’s analysis.

Nestlé has said it followed city laws.

Photo by Sacramento Press reporter Suzanne Hurt. Suzanne Hurt contributed to this report. Kathleen Haley is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

Nestlé Waters appeal filed

2009-11-25T07:03:42Z

Save Our Water Sacramento filed an administrative appeal involving the Nestlé water-bottling plant on Monday.

Davis attorney Don Mooney has agreed to take the case if the issue goes to court. Mooney represented McCloud residents in their six-year fight against a Nestlé Waters North America water-bottling plant near Mt. Shasta. The company abandoned plans for the plant in September.

Save Our Water Sacramento is appealing the city's designation of the Swiss company's $14 million construction project as ministerial, rather than discretionary, in an effort to win an environmental assessment of the plant. The group e-filed an appeal with the city clerk's office and sent a paper copy through registered mail.

Under the California Environmental Quality Act, a discretionary designation of a project that could possibly harm the environment triggers a requirement for an environmental assessment.

"The appeal was filed as a way to encourage the city to perform its legal obligations under CEQA without the need for court action," said lifelong Sacramento resident Loran Sheley, one of the leaders of Save Our Water Sacramento.

Attorney General Jerry Brown threatened to sue Nestlé in 2008 over an inadequate environmental review for its plan to bottle spring water in McCloud.

On Sept. 10, Nestlé Waters Chief Executive Officer Kim Jeffery said the company was building a plant in Sacramento to replace the plant proposed for McCloud.

On Sept. 14, the head of the city's Department of Utilities sent a letter to Mayor Kevin Johnson and the City Council that CEQA does not apply to the plant here because the requested building permit required ministerial rather than discretionary action.

Nestlé has said the appeal has no legal merit and that the company has followed the process established by the city.

Mooney has agreed to represent Save Our Water Sacramento if an administrative appeal doesn't lead to an environmental assessment and the group decides to file a lawsuit, Sheley said.

"We're sort of doing this as a last effort to handle the situation administratively," she said. "We feel we've done everything else."

Part II- Nestlé at the City Council: Public Discussion or Backroom Deal?

2009-11-18T14:55:05Z

Who is to Blame?
Nestlé was recruited by the Sacramento Area Commerce and Trade Organization and the Economic Development Department, one of a series of bad projects they have brought here that include the municipal waste burning incinerator and the natural gas storage facility beneath homes in South Sacramento.

The EDD worked with SACTO in secrecy to convince Nestlé to choose Sacramento over Roseville or Stockton. Since the project has been announced Johnson has been Nestlé's only public supporter. He glowingly informed us of Nestlé's arrival in the SACTO press release in July and solemnly apologized to them at the council meeting for being forced to temporarily obey the law.

He also is the connection to their sole benefactor in town, the Sacramento Metro Chamber of Commerce. Five days before the meeting, one of Johnson's top advisers, Michelle Smira, left city hall to work as a paid consultant for Nestlé. Smira is also the head of the chamber's powerful political action committee. As soon as she got on Nestlé's payroll the chamber sprang into action.

Speaking Out Against Nestlé
After Nestlé had got what it wanted in the back room, public comment on the plant was allowed. The mayor said there were 16 speakers on each side of the issue — although who knows what the accurate break down was, because a number of people speaking against Nestlé were called forward when it was the other side's turn to speak. Each side was given a total of 10 minutes to speak.

Broken down another way, each person was supposed to get 37 seconds to speak. Nestlé and their lobbyist had already been given unlimited access to the podium, but the citizens were essentially told to summarize a wide array of complex, important issues in 37 seconds or less. As it turned out, nine people spoke against it, seven for it, and one was in the middle. All but one of the people who spoke in favor of the plant had financial ties to Nestlé. Every person who spoke out against the plant was a citizen concerned about water conservation, environmental justice and a transparent public process.

Evan Tucker from Save Our Water spoke about the extreme difficulties of trying to find out information about the plant and about how much of this process was hidden from the public and the council. He also contradicted Nestlé's claim that they will use 30 million gallons of water with documents from the public records.

Tucker pointed out that the will serve letter between the Utilities Department and Nestlé's consultant estimated that Nestlé would use 215,000-320,000 gallons of water a day, or 78-116 million gallons a year, many times more than what Nestlé is currently claiming. Furthermore, he told the council that Assistant Utilities Director Jim Peifer had informed him that were no limits on how much water Nestlé would take, so the contradictory estimates were ultimately meaningless.

Nancy Price from Defending Water for Life California spoke about the mysterious private springs that Nestlé plans to truck water from and the need for environmental review to determine the kind of effects this will have on communities and the environment. Shana Meiners, a Sacramento resident, spoke about the environmental and health impacts of water bottling including greenhouse gas emissions, plastic trash, and diesel exhaust. Loran Sheley from Save Our Water brought the fact that the zoning designation for beverage bottling is over 50 years old, which means that it was created before the water bottling industry existed, before PET plastic was created, before global warming was understood, and before cities were required to do environmental review.

Nestlé and the City Continue to Break the Law
From the begining the city has avoided their legal requirement under the California Environmental Quality Act to perform adequate environmental review. We have objected to this for months to no avail and they will probably continue to ignore their legal responsibility unless someone sues them. Despite the fact that the Facilities Permit Program breaks city and state building codes, the city continues to operate that program for Nestlé's benefit. We knew about or suspected some of the illegality months ago, but most of it did not become apparent until that night. Now it is all out in the open, but that does not stop them. If anything it seems to have accelerated the process, no doubt to get the plant running before someone tries to enforce the law.

What's Next?
Many people have asked "what's next?" since the meeting. Most people assume that this fight is over since the council has taken no action. But it is not over.

We will bring the film "Tapped" back to the Crest on Thursday at 7:00 pm. Afterward we will be taking questions and talking about the next steps to fight corporate control of our water and corruption at city hall.

Part I- Nestlé at the City Council: Public Discussion or Backroom Deal?

2009-11-18T14:54:41Z

On Oct. 26, after preparing all day and night, Save Our Water went to bed feeling ready for whatever might happen at City Hall the following evening. We were so wrong.

We expected to speak at the City Council meeting in favor of an urgency ordinance that would have required a conditional use permit for beverage bottling plants in Sacramento. The new law would have made bottlers go through a public planning process and environmental review prior to project approval.

But while we were at City Hall that afternoon we discovered the city attorney now considered Nestlé vested. The proposed ordinance would be removed from the agenda and referred to the Law and Legislation Committee, though apparently some public comment and discussion would still be allowed that evening.

The meeting that followed was shocking, bizarre and confusing. Though it is virtually impossible to capture it all in a single article, what follows is our attempt to convey what happened at City Hall that night.

Facilities Permit Program and the Development Oversight Commission
Nestlé has been remodeling a warehouse at 8670 Younger Creek under the auspices of the Facilities Permit Program, a program designed to fast-track development in the city. The FPP speeds up the building process by allowing work to start on a project before building permits are issued. At the council meeting on Oct. 27, this program was suspended on the spot, when the city attorney declared that the program was illegal under both city and state building codes. This decision was made before the Nestlé issue was even addressed.

At the time of the council meeting, the Nestlé plant was under a stop work order which prevented construction until the permitting issue was resolved. At the meeting it was stated that Nestlé had, in fact, begun construction before any permits were issued, with a verbal approval from the city.

City Attorney Eileen Teichert said, "My office was unaware of this practice of allowing $2 million worth of work to go forward with a verbal approval rather than a building permit that's required under the city's code. But we do need to discuss that confidentially with Mr. Kwong."

David Kwong, Acting Director of Community Development had stated that the Stop Work Order was initiated because of the pending ordinance which may have affected Nestlé's ability to proceed with construction. However, public records of correspondence between Kwong and the city attorney's office obtained since the meeting indicate that city staff instead issued the order because of the probable illegality of the construction that had been taking place. Additionally, other public records indicate that the staff that gave the verbal authorization did not actually have the authority to do so.

What was not raised during the discussion was the origin of this practice, which becomes clearer through an examination of the Development Oversight Commission. The commission is stacked with developers (or, according to the commission's webpage, "building industry representatives") who use the commission to develop creative solutions to the barriers posed by the existing regulations.

Kwong is an ideal person to answer the city attorney's questions about this since he also sits on the commission. In their 2005-06 Annual Report, the Commission described the FPP program as significant progress toward streamlining the permit process, which is important since, as they noted, "If there is a single concept that represents the majority of the DOC and Development Services Department emphasis over the past two years, it is ‘process streamlining.'" The FPP program was the brainchild of City Manager Ray Kerridge, who modeled the program after one he implemented while in a similar role in Portland.

Another Development Oversight Commission project that was fortuitously revealed at the meeting but has received no attention since, was "phased permitting," which Kerridge almost defensively stated was allowed by a provision of the state building code, the only time he spoke on the Nestlé issue that evening.

In their 2008-09 Annual Report under the heading "Streamlining and ‘Getting the Customer to Success,'" the commission noted that the Development Services Department initiated the new program in 2008. It turns out, however, that phased permitting is not allowed under city law, which explicitly requires that single permits be issued for projects.

Despite the fact that Nestlé had been operating under the illegal FPP program and the illegal phased permitting program, and despite the fact that they had moved forward with Phase II and III work before those permits were issued, Mayor Kevin Johnson insisted that staff find a way for Nestlé to continue building. Making the building process as easy as possible for developers makes sense to Kerridge too, who in a 2007 interview noted that he prefers to view them as customers and understands the city's mission as one of "customer service," rather than "enforcers or regulators" of the law. This reasoning, however, begs the question: if city staff are busy "getting the customer to success," by apparently any, including illegal, means necessary, who is responsible for enforcing the laws?

Vested?
Whether or not the conditional use permit on the agenda that night would apply to Nestlé rested on a determination by the city attorney on whether Nestlé was "vested" in the project.

While at City Hall the day of the council meeting, we found out that the city attorney now considered Nestlé conclusively vested. This was quite a shock since the staff report, that was published about an hour before we departed for City Hall, stated that Nestlé was not conclusively "vested" in the project until they received their Phase II permit, which was not due to be issued until Nov. 10. From a legal perspective that meant Nestlé was not far enough into the project to avoid the requirements of this new law.

When asked during the council meeting why she had reached this determination, contrary to what had been published in the staff report, Teichert explained that if the bottler, "... has received a permit from the city and has engaged in construction pursuant to that permit, that then they would not be subject to a prospective permit requirement. But rather they would be grandfathered in under the prior system.

"So we spent a great deal of time trying to track down whether or not, indeed, work was performed pursuant to a permit. And ultimately we concluded that the Phase I permit was issued Oct. 7. Even though it was issued after we believe much of the work was already performed, it indeed did meet that criteria.

"And it is not something that we would want to, I guess have to justify why work was allowed to be performed prior to the permit issuance," Teichert said.

The audience broke into laughter at this last bit. Her argument that Nestlé should be able to avoid obeying any changes in the law because they had done substantial illegal building made no sense. She did not mention that we had brought the Nestlé bottling plant to the attention of her office and the council in a Sept. 8 letter requesting environmental review and a transparent public process. We never received any response to that letter and were left to ponder what would have happened if all this had been dealt with earlier.

Special Treatment
At this meeting the mayor made lifting the stop work order his first priority. The people that came to speak about problems with building a bottling plant in Sacramento were made to wait.

Johnson ordered the city staff to go into a back room with Nestlé's representatives and hammer out a deal to get them back to work immediately. When they all came out to announce the details of their back-room deal, Kwong stated that the city was going to "dedicate all of their resources into this effort" of getting Nestlé up and running.

Nestlé would be allowed to start work the next day under a partial building permit and continue under the FPP which, earlier, Assistant City Manager John Dangberg said was suspended indefinitely.

As astonishing as this turn of events was, the most shocking bit of news was the recommendation — made by Nestlé and accepted by city staff — that city staff would travel to Nestlé's plant in Cabazon to review the site design in order to approve the site design in Sacramento.

Rather than requiring Nestlé to submit and get approved a design for the plant here in Sacramento, they agreed to allow them to get approval and permits based on a different plant in a different city. The underlying principle of the building permit process in California is that when an entity wants to engage in building activity, they apply to the local government and submit plans that are reviewed and approved by the local government prior to construction. However, during the meeting, it became clear that one reason the subsequent phase permits had not been approved was because the plans had not yet been submitted to city staff.

Rather than wait until Nestlé had submitted adequate plans before allowing construction to proceed, the city agreed to look at another plant as a substitute for plans. While it seemed understood that a plan would be submitted at some point in the future it is worth noting that in addition to violating city code, this process violates the entire spirit of the permit process. Furthermore, allowing Nestlé to purchase access to city staff is ethically questionable. Over and over again the mayor asserted that the city needed to be "fair" to Nestlé. Is it fair to allow back-room deals and trips to southern California in lieu of the plans required by law?

Continued in Part II

Group to file Nestlé appeal

2009-11-18T05:10:34Z

In a precursor to any potential legal action, a grassroots organization expects to take its next step in the fight against the Nestlé water-bottling plant by filing an administrative appeal with the city of Sacramento this week.

A Swiss public TV crew is coming to Sacramento Thursday to interview members of the group, Save Our Water Sacramento, which will re-screen the bottled-water documentary "Tapped" at 7 p.m. Thursday at Crest Theatre, 1013 K St.

Afterwards, group leaders will discuss plans to appeal the city's designation of the Swiss company's $14-million construction project as ministerial, rather than discretionary. A discretionary designation of a project that could possibly harm the environment triggers a requirement for an environmental assessment under the California Environmental Quality Act. A ministerial designation does not.

The California Environmental Quality Act also requires all administrative remedies be exhausted before a lawsuit can be filed, said Evan Tucker, a Sacramento resident who helps lead Save Our Water Sacramento.

"Those are supposed to exist as an alternative to litigation," he said. "We can make our case to the city as to why the decision is incorrect."

The group has been seeking an environmental analysis of the plant since at least September, Tucker said. City Councilmember Kevin McCarty asked the council last month to consider amending the city's zoning code to immediately require special permits for water-bottling plants, but the proposal was never discussed.

In a Sept. 14 memo, Marty Hanneman, director of the Department of Utilities, told Mayor Kevin Johnson and the City Council that CEQA did not apply to the Nestlé Waters North America plant because the requested building permit required ministerial rather than discretionary action.

Save Our Water Sacramento contends the plant is being built under a discretionary Facilities Permit Program and that the city has made discretionary decisions, such as allowing construction without a building permit and issuing a stop-work order to halt construction while the lack of a permit was investigated, Tucker said.

Sacramento attorney Tina Thomas and the law firm Remy, Thomas, Moose and Manley — which wrote the book on CEQA, "Guide to the Environmental Quality Act," in 1993 — has been representing Nestlé in its efforts to open a water-bottling plant in Sacramento.

Nestlé contends the company has followed the process established by the city, Thomas said.

"There is no legal merit to this," she said in an email. "We have followed the city procedures throughout this process and continue to follow city procedures. We believe we should be treated no differently than any other similarly situated light industrial company coming into town."

The group expects the city will respond formally and then set up a hearing for the appeal. The California Public Resources Code requires the city to have such a process. However, no administrative appeals process could be found in the city code, he added.

Save Our Water Sacramento is discussing representation with prominent CEQA attorneys.

Suzanne Hurt is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

The Q Balls Hold Fundraiser for Pops in the Park - November 14th

2009-11-12T19:25:10Z

Sacramento rock-n-roll band, The Q Balls, will play a benefit show on Saturday, November 14th from 4:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the Torch Club, 904 15th Street, Sacramento. The event is Free with donations taken at the door. Proceeds will go to Pops in the Park and in turn be used for East Sac and River Park parks. In 2009, Pops in the Park funds were used to leverage funds raised by the community to help restore swim pool hours cut through the City's budget at Bertha Henschel Park, Glenn Hall Park and McKinley Park. The Q Balls manager Sol Siler said: "The Q Balls are really looking forward to the November 14th gig at the Torch. All members save one were born and raised in the East Sacramento area and this opportunity to lend a helping hand to East Sac parks and Pops in the Park means a lot to the band. We're spreading the word and hope to raise some righteous bucks at the benefit." A big thank you to The Q Balls for supporting our parks!

Top Johnson Advisor Resigns To Work For Nestle

2009-11-02T08:34:16Z

Michelle Smira, a Republican strategist and consultant to mayor Kevin Johnson, resigned from her position on October 22. Below is her letter of resignation:

Dear Mayor Johnson,
It has been a pleasure and an honor to serve as a volunteer in your office, the Office of the
Mayor. The opportunity to serve as your liaison to various organizations and to meet with constituents on your behalf has been very rewarding. Thank you for this opportunity.
I believe strongly that the people of Sacramento voted overwhelmingly for you to represent us as Mayor because we wanted change. What has become apparent is that we desperately need change. I will be stepping away as a volunteer in your official office to further help promote these goals in the community. I believe that the only way to ensure that Sacramento is truly “a City that Works for Everyone” is if you are in fact leading our City. We need to change our antiquated structure and I will be there to help educate our community on the issue.

It has been a wonderful experience working with you at City Hall and I look forward to again helping in this capacity at a later date.

Thank you,
Michelle Smira

In a recent interview to the Sacramento News & Review, Smira said that she was leaving her post as a volunteer advisor to focus her energy and attention to supporting Johnson's Strong Mayor Initiative. However, Smira's political affairs firm, MMS Strategies, was hired by Nestle Waters to assist in obtaining city support for it's planned water bottling plant in Sacramento less than 2 days after submitting her letter of resignation.

Had Smira been a paid city employee, she likely would have been prevented to accept a position such as the one with Nestle due to conflict of interest and revolving door policies that attempt to create clear divisions between government, business, and personal gain.

When asked by the Sacramento News & Review about this situation, Jessica Levinson, from the Center for Governmental Studies, said, "“There are all kinds of red flags. When volunteers are used in high level positions, it’s important to make sure they pass conflict of interest provisions."

Although Smira refers to herself as a volunteer, according to a city ordnance, she would be classified as a consultant. In March 2009, Sacramento City Council approved legislation that states, "An individual may be a consultant whether he or she is compensated or is an unpaid volunteer." A consultant is defined as someone who "serves in a staff capacity" and "participates in making a governmental decision."

Attempts to reach Smira and Johnson, as well as representatives from groups opposing the Nestle Water Bottling plant, were unsuccessful. This article will be updated as new information is made available.

Nestlé can legally set up bottling plant, city attorney says

2009-10-28T05:35:56Z

Nestlé has a green light in Sacramento, according to the city attorney’s office.

The Nestlé company’s work to set up a water bottling plant in Sacramento is allowed under the city’s existing laws, City Attorney Eileen Teichert’s office said Tuesday.

It was clear at Tuesday’s City Council meeting that the City Council and city staff are on-board with the Nestlé company’s plans to bottle and sell tens of millions of gallons of Sacramento’s water.

The city had placed a stop-work order on Friday at the plant on Nestlé intends to use for its operations. The city said it wanted to verify whether Nestlé had broken any of the city’s permitting and building laws. In turn, Nestle had said the city’s decision to release a stop-work order may have been illegal.

The stop-work order will now be removed. Some of the work that was being carried out at the site can continue as soon as tomorrow, according to Acting Community Development Director David Kwong. He said the company must still follow a process and timeline with the city to start work on other tasks to retrofit the plant, which is located at 8670 Younger Creek Drive.

The city is stopping the Facilities Permit Program that Nestlé was accepted under. City staff officials told the City Council Tuesday that the permitting program is not up to date with city building codes. Councilman Kevin McCarty indicated in a phone interview after the meeting that there may be significant problems with the program, calling it a "can of worms that's being opened."

During the meeting, Shaina Meiners of Sacramento spoke against Nestlé’s water bottling business. “I am aghast that Nestlé can come in, in this very secretive way,” Meiners said.

Matt Mahood of the Sacramento Metro Chamber was in favor of Nestle’s plant. He noted that the unemployment rate in Sacramento is approaching 12 percent. Rules cannot be changed on companies mid-stream, he said.

Councilwoman Bonnie Pannell said staff did not inform the City Council about early developments with Nestle’s plans to build in Sacramento. She asked, “Why weren’t we briefed?”

The discussion at the City Council meeting changed in light of Teichert’s analysis that Nestlé did not break laws. Councilman Kevin McCarty had proposed an interim urgency ordinance to mandate special permits for beverage bottling plants in the city. The ordinance would enable the Planning Commission or City Council to examine plans to expand or build beverage bottling plants. Nestle’s plans were not considered by the Planning Commission or the City Council; the city’s current rules did not require Nestle to go through that step.

McCarty’s proposal no longer applied to Nestlé after Teichert’s legal opinion.

However, McCarty’s proposal is not dead. Instead, it will consider future water bottling plants. The proposal will be moved to the city’s Law and Legislation Committee.

Along with McCarty’s proposal, the council decided it also wanted Law and Legislation to examine the issue of tiered water rates.

Photo by Anthony Bento.

Staff reporter Suzanne Hurt contributed to this report. Kathleen Haley is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

Mayor clashes with city staff over Nestlé decision-making

2009-10-27T20:12:53Z

Mayor Kevin Johnson said the city’s order to halt construction work at the plant Nestlé plans to use for a water-bottling operation is bad for business in Sacramento.

Johnson has praised the jobs that Nestlé will bring to Sacramento, while Councilman Kevin McCarty opposes the plant's plan to bottle and sell water from the American River. Councilwoman Lauren Hammond has also raised concerns about Nestlé's plans.

The city’s Community Development Department placed a stop-work order on Friday on two phases of construction at 8670 Younger Creek Drive, the plant’s site. The city is checking to see whether Nestlé broke any of the city’s permitting and building laws. Nestlé said it has not violated any laws. In fact, Nestlé is saying the city may be taking illegal action with its stop-work order.

Read staff reporter Suzanne Hurt's Oct. 26 story to learn more about the details of the stop-work order.

Johnson told reporters at his Tuesday press conference that he was concerned that the city is “changing the rules” with Nestlé as it carries out plans to set up the plant.

“What concerns me is we can’t create an environment where we do not look like a city that’s friendly to business,” Johnson said. “We’ve got to create a business climate that makes sense."

Johnson pointed out that he was not informed of the Community Development Department’s decision to release a stop-work order. “I didn’t get briefed on this work order that was stopped,” Johnson said. “I didn’t hear about it until sometime yesterday.”

Photo by Anthony Bento.

Staff reporter Suzanne Hurt contributed to this report. Kathleen Haley is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

Metro Chamber: Nestle plant followed rules--Council must let business go forward

2009-10-27T19:26:39Z

By Linda Cutler, Chair, Sacramento Metro Chamber Board of Directors

The discussion about the new Nestle Waters bottling facility is actually about Sacramento’s commitment to job creation and the process and rules by which businesses come to our city.

The Sacramento City Council will consider, Tuesday, Oct. 27, a measure related to this plant that will have a serious and far-reaching impact on the jobs and business climate in Sacramento.

We have a set of rules that govern how companies coming to our community must conduct business. These rules come in the form of zoning, building permits, utility fees, water use and the like. These are rules that are determined through a very open and public process and they are rules that every business must follow.

The city also has a plan that includes taking into account water needs for residential, government and industrial uses. Nearly every business, whether it is a bottled beverage company, a car wash, a restaurant or a widget manufacturer, uses water to produce its product or service. That plan includes water availability for new businesses to purchase without impacting the water already flowing to other businesses and homes.

So how does Nestle Waters’ new plant fit into this? First, the company followed all the rules, and it did not get any special treatment with respect to the rates it will pay the city for water. Nestle leased existing space from a local property owner and applied to the city for the permits and utilities needed. In short, the company has followed the process just as the many other beverage bottlers such as 7-up and Coca Cola did when they came here.

Now, some members of the Sacramento City Council are working to change those rules mid-stream by tossing aside the council’s entire review process in an effort to force a new law that would either delay or completely stop this plant from moving forward. That should be a frightening proposition to anyone interested in job creation and business development in our community. The signal it would send to other businesses is: Come to Sacramento at your own risk. The city council, at the prompting of special interests, may decide it does not want your business here even after you have leased a building, put millions into retrofitting it and begun to hire people.

And, this decision could have a major impact on the availability of capital for new projects. Why would a bank lend money to a business when the political winds could derail the project mid-way through construction?

Nestle has received more than 2,200 job applications in just in just two months. The company has already hired 11 people and has a local contractor and his crew working to retrofit the building it leased. And Nestle has invested more than $3 million into this facility already, with another $11 million to follow.

So if the city council takes action to stop this plant from moving forward, council members will have to explain not only to those 11 people and the contractor why they will be laid off, but also explain to the other 2,200 people who are looking for work why they are closing off an opportunity to bring jobs to this community.

By making the process of opening a business a political one, the city council is saying that it will pick and choose businesses and jobs depending on its political whims. This is a precedent our community simply cannot afford to set unless the council is ready to take responsibility for hanging that closed sign on the Tower Bridge.

City halts Nestlé work

2009-10-27T02:48:16Z

A $14 million retrofit of a proposed Nestlé water-bottling plant has ground to a halt after the city of Sacramento issued a stop-work order while investigating whether the work began before the company had legal authorization from the city.

Late Friday afternoon, the city's Community Development Department issued a stop-work order for Phases II and III shortly before an interim or "urgency" ordinance request was added to the City Council's agenda for Tuesday night. The council is being asked to consider amending the city's zoning code to immediately require special permits for beverage bottling plants. The meeting starts at 6 p.m.

On Monday, City Councilman Kevin McCarty and officials from the city's Community Development Department were trying to determine when Nestlé Waters North America began interior renovation of an industrial warehouse being leased for a new water-bottling operation.

"We're still assessing all the facts," said David Kwong, acting director of the city's Community Development Department. "We're trying to make sure there's nothing being done out of the ordinary."

Legally, construction cannot begin before a start-work authorization or building permit is issued, he said.

A building permit for Phase I was issued Oct. 7, but no start-work authorization has been found, Kwong said, adding that a start-work authorization was issued for Phase II the same day.

"I don't know if there was an authorization to work for Phase I," he said.

Phase I included foundation work and moving walls, Kwong said. Phase II involves work on water and drainage lines and other operational needs. However, the company's description of the work to be done appears to overlap in the two documents.

Nestlé maintains the company has not done anything illegal.

"Nestlé Waters is in compliance with the city's building and permitting laws," Brendan O'Rourke, the company's supply chain director and national director of natural resources, said in a written statement. He arrived in Sacramento on Monday to help respond to the unfolding situation.

Phase I construction is complete, the company said. Nestlé began work two months ago and is halfway through renovation of the plant at 8670 Younger Creek Drive, Chris Kemp, Nestlé's Sacramento plant manager, said Wednesday.

"To date, the company has invested more than $3.7 million into this plant in form of permitting fees, construction costs, due diligence payments and costs associated with the movement of equipment from other Nestle Waters plants to Sacramento," read an e-mail from Nestlé on Monday.

The stop-work order may be temporary. A draft ordinance was still being finalized by the city attorney's office late Monday afternoon. The draft goes to council members before being made public, said Amy Williams, spokeswoman for the city manager's office.

The council ought to carefully consider commercial requests to bottle and sell city water, said City Councilman Kevin McCarty, who requested the item be placed on the agenda and later posted a story about his decision.

"Water is increasingly one of more most precious and valuable resources," McCarty said Monday. "My proposal would mandate a further dialogue on all future water-bottling facilities. I think it's an important discussion to have."

Changing the process now would be "troubling," O'Rourke said.

"We have followed the city and state laws throughout this process, invested more than $3.8 million into this facility and hired people to work, all based on the the current law and it would appear that this is an attempt to change those laws midstream," he said. "We find that prospect troubling not only for this plant, but for any business looking for certainty in the siting process."

Nestlé also questioned the legality of the stop-work order. The company said the stop-work order may not be legal because the city already had issued a start-work authorization for Phase II.

"The city has not provided any evidence to support this stop-work order despite the rules that require they do so within 24 hours," said O'Rourke.

The city gave Nestlé preliminary authority to start work on Phase II, but that doesn't give the company the right to continue the work. In addition, no building permit was issued for Phases II and III, said Sheryl Patterson, senior deputy city attorney.

"We do have the right to issue a stop-work order when no building permit has been issued," she said.

An interim ordinance, which would not require review under the California Environmental Quality Act, would give the city time to consider a formal amendment to the zoning code. An interim ordinance requires a super majority or two-thirds vote of the council, to pass, Patterson said.

Nestlé has paid the city $65,000 in permitting and application fees. The company also agreed to hire local contractors and has committed to paying them $600,000 for their work.

Nestlé applied for a building permit through the city's Facility Permit Program in order to make tenant improvements, including underslab plumbing, demolition of existing partition walls and construction of new ones.

Questions also are being raised over whether it was correct to use the Facility Permit Program in this instance. "The Facility Permit Program facilitates a rapid approval process for tenant alterations and improvements of commercial and industrial facilities: minor tenant improvements, including maintenance, repair and minor alterations; and major interior tenant improvements and remodels. This includes tenant improvements to new and existing structures," according to the city's Web site.

"I'm not sure if it all adds up," McCarty said.

Suzanne Hurt is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

Let's Make Smart Decisions Regarding the Commercial Use of Our City Water

2009-10-26T20:42:08Z

By Kevin McCarty, Sacramento City Council, District 6

With California in its third year of drought, the City of Sacramento’s water conservation strategy includes busting people who flood sidewalks.

Since June, we’ve been telling residents they can water landscaping on only three specific days per week and there is to be no watering between 10 a.m. and 6 p.m.

Last year, the City Council decided to ban bottled water at its meetings. We did so in recognition that plastic water bottles are littering the world and the precious water they once contained is often wasted.

That’s why I was surprised to learn that the Nestle Waters North America Co. is moving forward with plans for a water bottling plant in my council district at the Florin/Fruitridge Industrial Park – a plant with the potential to intake more than 81 million gallons of city water yearly. Another 20 million gallons would be trucked in to the plant from springs in El Dorado, Placer, Tuolumne and Napa Counties.

Tomorrow night, Tuesday October 27th, the city council will discuss whether we need an urgency ordinance requiring special permits for water bottling facilities.

These plants pay a flat rate for city water. We also need to discuss whether there should be a tiered water rate for commercial facilities.

Across the nation, attempts to site water bottling plants have been dogged with controversy. In Glenn County, residents in the Orland area are fighting plans for a Crystal Geyser plant. In the Shingletown area of Shasta County, a San Francisco investor has been attempting to acquire water for a bottling plant. He refuses to say who his client is. In Flagstaff, Ariz., the city rejected plans for a Nestle plant last July.

In 2003, Nestle announced plans for a bottling plant in McCloud on the flank of Mount Shasta. McCloud residents once again proved Mark Twain’s adage: “Whiskey is for drinkin’. Water is for fightin’.” The fight raged for six years before Nestle finally gave up.

We owe it not only to Sacramentans -- but to residents of our Central Valley where fields are fallow for lack of water -- to have a thorough public airing of the issues involved in the siting of a water bottling plant here.

Among the issues is the basic question of whether this product necessary? Shouldn’t people who feel the need to carry around a water bottle have one that is refillable?

We also need to explore:

Whether there are better uses for our water?
Whether we need ordinances to prevent Nestle from taking even more than the projected 81 million gallons annually if they find a market for it?
Why the city has not developed an environmental analysis of the plant’s impact on water supplies.
The extent of the water bottle litter problem in our community.
A request by a group of citizens called Save our Water Sacramento to impose a moratorium on beverage bottling plants in the city.

Nestle would make extreme profits with Sacramento water at a time when we are trying to preserve it. At current rates, they would pay the city about 65 cents per 100 cubic feet of water, or 750 gallons. That works out to a payment to the city of $186 for the 215,000 gallons of water taken on an average day. By the time that water is bottled and put on a grocer’s shelf, the consumers would pay more than $2.1 million for those 215,000 gallons—a profit margin of roughly 10,000 percent!

And we would still be busting people for flooding sidewalks.

Discussion grows over Nestle water bottling plant

2009-10-26T04:53:25Z

Discussion over a Nestlé water-bottling plant appears to be growing in Sacramento, as the Swiss multinational prepares a facility for operation and new hires begin work.

The Sacramento City Council, which was not involved in the decision to approve the plant, will discuss the issue publicly for the first time after a request two weeks ago by council members Kevin McCarty and Lauren Hammond. They asked the council to consider an emergency ordinance requiring a special permit before Nestlé Waters North America begins bottling city tap water and spring water at a plant in South Sacramento.

Such a permit could "trigger" an environmental analysis of this and future facilities, McCarty said Wednesday night at Crest Theatre, where he and 165 others watched "Tapped," a documentary on the bottled water industry.

Save Our Water Sacramento, a group formed last month to oppose the plant, also is seeking a temporary City Council moratorium on beverage bottling plants in Sacramento.

"Ultimately, Save Our Water wants to see the Nestlé plant stopped," said Midtown resident Jenny Esquivel, a leader of the organization.

That group and others have begun raising questions and concerns about the plant and the bottled water industry. Primary concerns include the lack of an environmental impact study and information about the operation, impacts of extracting and bottling a potentially unlimited amount of water, and the commercialization of a natural resource, representatives said.

"Nestlé just got kicked out of McCloud. The final nail in the coffin was when the attorney general sent them that letter demanding they do a proper, more rigorous environmental review," Esquivel said. "Rather than do that, what Nestlé did was pick up that project and move to Sacramento.

"It's not like those environmental issues disappear," she said.

Attorney General Jerry Brown threatened to sue the company in 2008 over an inadequate environmental review of its plan to bottle spring water in McCloud, near Mount Shasta. On Sept. 10, Nestlé Waters Chief Executive Officer Kim Jeffery sent a letter to the McCloud community announcing that the company was abandoning the project.

"Earlier this summer, we were able to secure a new facility in Sacramento to serve our customers in Northern California," he wrote. "As a result, and after conducting a thorough analysis of our business operations in the region, we have determined that the Sacramento plant production will replace the production we expected in McCloud and therefore we do not have a need to build a new facility in McCloud.”

Several companies bottle water in Sacramento, where water is "ridiculously cheaper" than other areas of the country because of the city's location at the confluence of two rivers, McCarty said.

Nestlé continues retrofit, hiring

Supporters point to the financial and economic benefits the plant could bring. Nestlé plans to spend $14 million to retrofit an industrial facility at 8670 Younger Creek Road and to create 40 new jobs, said Jim Rinehart, the city's economic development manager. That doesn't include equipment costs, he added.

In addition, Nestlé is using about 16 construction workers to modify the 214,000-square-foot building and install equipment for two production lines, plus contractors and skilled tradespeople to make the facility operational, according to Rinehart and a company Web site.

The warehouse was nothing more than four walls, a ceiling and a floor when Nestlé's lease began two months ago. Crews are halfway through building warehouse docks, reinforcing concrete flooring to support heavy equipment, and building a front office, lab, and areas for manufacturing, chemical storage and shipping, said Chris Kemp, a project manager who has overseen manufacturing and quality assurance at Nestlé facilities since 2002.

The amount of tap water bottled by Nestlé would not be limited by the city. Nestlé has reported different figures for the amount of water that would be bottled each year. The company has told the city's utilities department that it would "consume" 250 acre feet — nearly 82 million gallons — as well as 78 million to 117 million gallons a year, and bottle that under its Pure Life brand. Consumers would pay about $111 million to $166 million for that amount of Pure Life water.

Nestlé expects to bottle 30 million gallons of Sacramento tap water in 2010, Kemp said. Existing water pipes could bring 250 acre feet of water to the warehouse if operations were run 24 hours a day all year, he said, adding that's expected during peak months, but not the rest of the year.

Nestlé can't say how much Sacramento water it'd use annually after the first year, Kemp said, adding only sales will determine that.

In this state, water isn't just critical to all life. It's also big business.

"California runs on three things: energy, information and water," said Richard Howitt, a UC Davis water economist who said the amount of city water Nestlé wants isn't considered large. "A million gallons sounds like a lot, but in the grand scheme, it's really not."

Globally, the company used 10.82 billion gallons of water in 2006 and sold $10 billion of water under different brand names in 2007, according to a report from Food and Water Watch in Washington, D.C. Nestlé sold at least $997 million of water in this country in 2007, making it the top bottled water company here.

Groups Oppose Water's Commercialization

Food and Water Watch and other organizations are fighting the commercialization of drinking water, which occurs when water that is free or accessible at a very low cost through a government treatment system is instead bottled and sold at market price.

"It's not just happening in Sacramento and California. It's happening all over the country and all over the world: A corporation like Nestlé is beginning to get a stranglehold by setting the price for water," said Ruth Caplan, past chairwoman of the Sierra Club's water privatization task force. "So people who can afford the price will get the water. And people who can't afford the price will have to choose between water and food, and that's really about life and death.

"Many of us believe water is a fundamental right for people and nature," she said.

When asked for Nestlé's response to the concern that access to water is a human right, Kemp said the company doesn't have any water rights in Sacramento.

"The city plans for the growth of residents and businesses. We feel we're part of that growth in the city of Sacramento," he said.

Concerned residents such as the people who formed Save Our Water Sacramento have sought information about the plant since the city and the Sacramento Area Commerce & Trade Organization announced Nestlé's plans in July. Group members said they were given the runaround after asking for specifics about jobs and other logistics, so they began requesting public documents, Esquivel said.

The company has filled 11 of the 40 jobs expected to be created by the plant. Seven hires are local residents, including two plant managers and a lead mechanic, and the other four transferred here, Rinehart said.

The four who already worked for Nestlé include Kemp, who plans to move here permanently to manage the plant; a logistics manager; a controller; and a mechanic with ties to Northern California. Two others on the plant management team — a technical operations manager and a female quality assurance manager — come from cities 30 minutes north or 60 minutes south of Sacramento, Kemp said.

"We can't restrict our hiring search to candidates in a given Zip code or a given city," he said.

The 11 hires will have started working by Monday and will help set up the facility. Nestlé will hire an additional 29 people, whose permanent positions will begin Nov. 30 or Dec. 7.

The plant is targeted to begin operation by January and is expected to require 100 trucks per day in the peak season, generally May through Labor Day. Fifty trucks a day will suffice when there's less demand. Seven to 10 seasonal workers are expected to be hired during peak times, Kemp said.

Neither Nestlé nor the city's Economic Development Department would disclose the rate paid to lease the building from Buzz Oates Real Estate Co. Taxpayers will benefit from possessory interest taxes, a tenant's equivalent to property taxes, and sales tax on the water, because Sacramento is considered the point of sale, Rinehart said.

Groups concerned about the plant and the bottled water industry say the lack of information from Nestlé is one of the company's and industry's primary problems. City Department of Utilities staff did not respond to requests for information about the city's water sources.

But according to the department's Web site, 85 percent of the city's water supply comes from the American and Sacramento rivers. The other 15 percent comes from underground aquifers.

Food and Water Watch is sponsoring a California bottled water bill, AB 301, recently re-introduced by state Assemblyman Felipe Fuentes. The measure would require water-bottling businesses to report the amount of water bottled each year, the source of the water and the location of each extraction point, and for the information to be available to the public through the state Department of Public Health.

Bottling water raises concerns

Water is a natural resource that should be managed sustainably, said Mark Schlosberg, western regional director for Food and Water Watch. Water from aquifers, where rainwater is stored underground, can recharge some streams during dry spells. Aquifers also provide water for springs and wetlands. A limited amount of water can be pumped from aquifers before their levels drop, he said.

Pumping systems take water that falls to the ground in Northern California and distribute that to the Central Valley and Southern California, Schlosberg said.

"In California, water's very connected," he said. "If you have a lot of these little straws coming in and sucking up water, it can add up to a lot. Also, this is a time when we're asking everyone in California to conserve water."

People have a right to know how the extraction of that much water during a continued drought may impact the Sacramento River Valley, Sacramento residents and wildlife, as well as the water rate residents will pay, said Schlosberg and Caplan.

"There has to be CEQA review of these sites," Caplan said, referring to the California Environmental Quality Act.

Nestlé's plans were announced in July. Last week, Mayor Kevin Johnson said he'd prefer to have information on such facilities before they're approved by city staff.

"When Nestlé can take water -- our water -- and sell it at a price, that’s a little bit concerning to me, just in general. What are those parameters in what they can and cannot do?" he asked at a press conference. "And... do they have caps in terms of what their limitations may or may not be? Those are two concerns that the public is bringing forward, and I think they’re very valid."

Nestlé has followed all Sacramento regulations, gotten the required permits and provided the city with requested information, said Kemp, adding that a full environmental impact report was not required.

Mass production of the water bottles that would be required to hold even 50 million gallons of water, transportation of those bottles and the trash they'd create also troubles people alarmed by the growing industry.

Save Our Water Sacramento estimates that 800 million half-litre water bottles would need to be produced to hold 50 million gallons. Kemp and another Nestlé spokesperson disputed that number. After agreeing to provide the company's estimate, they later said that wasn't possible.

More than 400,000 barrels of oil would go into making that many bottles, according to Save Our Water Sacramento. Americans drinking bottled water in 2006 disposed of more than 30 billion bottles in 2006, 86 percent of which go to landfills rather than being recycled, according to Food and Water Watch. That group estimated that 7.86 billion bottles could have come from Nestlé.

The safety of drinking bottled water also is a growing concern, according to these groups.

Tap water is regulated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and state and local governments, and is rigorously tested in government-certified labs. There is little to no government testing of bottled water, which is regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, according to Food and Water Watch.

Researchers are studying chemicals used to make water bottles and other products. Phthalate, often used in soft plastic bottles, has been shown to leach into bottle contents and to increase the risk of cancer and to cause liver and reproductive problems, according to these groups. Often used in hard plastics to make five-gallon water jugs for offices, Bisphenol-A, or BPA, is an estrogenlike chemical which studies are linking to a host of problems in children and adults, including decreased sperm counts, accelerated puberty, aggression, hyperactivity, and increased risk of heart disease and diabetes.

Bottled water consumption has increased in the last decade but there hasn't been the political pressure to ensure enough federal funding to maintain municipal water treatment systems, said Caplan and Schlosberg. Nestlé executives have said projected problems with the breakdown of the water infrastructure have led to a very positive climate for bottled water, Caplan said.

"They're banking on people not wanting to drink tap water. That's their whole business plan, as far as I can tell," Caplan said. "People have been brainwashed into thinking bottled water is safer."

Photo by Eric Whalen. Sacramento Press reporter Kathleen Haley contributed to this report. Suzanne Hurt is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

Mayor in favor of Nestlé water bottling plant

2009-10-07T16:34:52Z

Mayor Kevin Johnson spoke favorably about the Nestlé company’s planned water-bottling plant and addressed other local issues at his weekly meeting with reporters on Tuesday.

Nestlé water bottling plant

Johnson praised Nestlé’s plan to set up a plant to bottle and sell water from the American River, saying the plant will create jobs.

“I knew that this would bring about 40 to 60 jobs in our community and that’s a good thing,” he said.

Johnson also said he wished he could have been more involved in the process of bringing the plant to Sacramento, but noted that the city manager’s office has jurisdiction on the issue.

But Councilmembers Kevin McCarty and Lauren Hammond disagree. They said they want the City Council to get involved in the issue. McCarty has called Nestlé’s plan “a sweetheart deal.”

Mayor praises “the soup guy”

Johnson had sympathetic comments for Daniel Pont, the owner of downtown’s La Bonne Soupe, who became ill and was hospitalized following the county’s closure of his restaurant. Sacramento County health inspectors cited cockroaches as the reason Pont’s soup and sandwich shop was shut down last week.

Pont plans to reschedule another county health inspection and then open the shop again early nex´t week, Johnson said. “If you have not been [to La Bonne Soupe], I would encourage everyone to go,” Johnson said, referring to Pont as “a treasure in our community.”

Seattle’s public transportation

When Johnson attended the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Seattle last week, he scoped out the city’s downtown scene. Johnson is observing the downtowns of various cities to gain ideas for revamping Sacramento’s downtown.

He said he admired Seattle’s use of public transportation in its downtown. Johnson pointed out that Seattle’s downtown features buses, a monorail, light rail, a subway system, Amtrak and other transportation methods.

“It just shows you when cities do it right, how pivotal public transportation is and the role of pedestrians,” Johnson said.

Photo by Anthony Bento.

Kathleen Haley is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

Bottled water foes may join forces; AG to consider review

2009-10-05T06:33:53Z

A group of residents trying to stop Nestlé from opening a water-bottling plant in Sacramento plans to join forces with other Northern Californians fighting the same battle elsewhere.

Meanwhile, California Attorney General Jerry Brown will consider whether to request a copy of the plan for a division of Nestlé, the world's largest food company, to bottle and sell spring water and an unlimited amount of city tap water taken from the American River every year.

NestléWaters North America plans to open a plant here after losing a six-year fight to bottle glacier-fed spring water near Mount Shasta. Brown threatened to sue the company over an inadequate environmental review for its plan to bottle spring water in McCloud, southeast of Shasta, in July 2008.

An area resident notified the attorney general's office about the Swiss company's plans for Sacramento Friday, Sept. 25. The deputy attorney general who worked on the McCloud case will soon meet with Brown in the matter.

"The attorney will discuss with the attorney general whether to request a proposal and take it under review," said Dana Simas, spokesperson for the attorney general.

Concerned over potential environmental impacts, a group called Save Our Water Sacramento has begun contacting residents battling commercial plans to take water in other areas to the north.

"I think that we do need to work together," said Davis resident Nancy Price, a member of Save Our Water Sacramento and West Coast coordinator of the Alliance for Democracy's Defending Water for Life campaign.

They've already reached out to residents of Shingletown, outside Lassen Volcanic National Park. There, a group called Local Water Stays Local is fighting an unidentified bottling company they suspect is Nestlé, said Dick Rullman, the group's president. That group has hired an attorney and will use all legal means "to prevent the depletion of the Shingletown, Inwood, Viola and Manton natural water supply for commercial use," according to their website.

"It's definitely a sore number up here," Rullman said.

Nestlé sells bottled water under many different brand names. Water bottled in Sacramento as Arrowhead Mountain Spring water will be trucked in from Lukens Spring in Placer County, Sopiago Spring in El Dorado County, Sugar Pine Spring in Tuolumne County and Arcadia Spring in Napa County, according to Chris Kemp, a long-time employee of Nestlé Waters North America who has been tapped to manage the Sacramento plant at 8670 Younger Creek Road. That plant, according to a local public relations consultant hired by the company, may already be undergoing interior renovation.

Nestlé may use water from other springs the company gets access to after opening the Sacramento plant, said Dave Palais, Nestlé Water's natural resource manager for Northern California and the Pacific Northwest, in a phone call.

"Yes, that's conceivable if the spring is licensed by the state department of health and passes their requirements," he said, adding that Nestlé is not pursuing spring water in Shingletown. Nestlé discussed buying water from a private property owner five or six years ago, but lost interest after hearing about future development the company believed might contaminate the water, he said.

Shingletown residents tell a different story. Nestlé tried to buy a big ranch with a large spring in the area, but the owner wouldn't sell to Nestlé, said Rullman, whose group believes a San Francisco Bay Area investor is trying to buy water from another property owner as a "front" for Nestlé.

Save Our Water Sacramento, made up of area residents interested in social and environmental justice, is now seeking a Sacramento City Council moratorium on beverage bottling plants in the city. Members of the group said they are worried partly because Nestlé's use of American River water would not be limited in any way, which has been confirmed by city employees.

In statements prepared for the public and the press, Nestlé says it will initially bottle about 30 million gallons of city water annually. However, in memos to the mayor, city councilmembers and a Nestlé consultant, city Department of Utilities Director Marty Hanneman indicates the company and its representatives have told the city Nestlé estimates it would use either 250 acre feet — or nearly 82 million gallons — a year, or 78 million to 117 million gallons a year.

Operating in Florin Fruitridge Industrial Park, Nestlé would initially pay less than $.71 per 100 cubic feet of water, or 748 gallons. City-treated tap water would be used for the company's Pure Life brand. Nestlé estimates it would extract 215,000 gallons of water on an average day, peaking at 320,000 gallons a day, according to one of the memos.

At .71 cents per 748 gallons, Nestlé would pay the city $204 for 215,000 gallons and nearly $304 for 320,000 gallons on peak days, which would come out to roughly $74,500 to $111,000 a year.

A local grocery store charges consumers $4.49 for a 24-pack of half-liter bottles of Nestlé Pure Life water. At .374 cents per litre, consumers would pay $304,754 for 215,000 gallons and $453,587 for 320,000 gallons of Pure Life water. Consumers would pay roughly $111 million to $166 million for a year's worth of Pure Life water at these rates of production. That, of course, doesn't factor in costs to run the plant, make plastic bottles and truck water to stores, or retail mark up.

Last year, Nestlé had $109 billion in sales, according to the company's 2008 financial statement.

The company has also said it would truck in 20 million gallons in spring water to be bottled in Sacramento each year.

The Sacramento plant would be one of the first — if not the very first — Nestlé water-bottling plants in the country where both spring and tap water would be bottled, said Price, who has helped community residents fight bottled-water battles in other states.

Around the world, corporate giants like Nestlé are going into communities to buy up and profit from their water, Price said. National groups like the Alliance for Democracy, which is working to end corporate domination in the United States, maintain that public access to clean water is a human right that must be protected for people and the environment.

The secrecy which has surrounded Nestlé's plan in Sacramento appears to be the way the company operates in all the communities where it seeks to buy up the water, said Sacramento resident Evan Tucker, a leader of Save Our Water Sacramento.

That group also believes the spring water Nestlé plans to bottle here may come from Shingletown, an area 20 miles long running along the Shingletown Ridge on State Route 44, between Redding and Mount Lassen. However, they don't know for sure, Tucker said.

The Shingletown group Local Water Stays Local is currently fighting a private property owner's attempt to sell nearly 300,000 gallons of water a day from Crook Springs, via a well on his property near Highway 44. In July 2008 — the same month the attorney general threatened to sue Nestlé — the developer, who lives in a different county, applied to the Shasta County Board of Supervisors to expand a use permit for that well from 26,000 to 288,000 gallons a day, according to Rullman and a permit amendment document.

"Big money has dollars signs in their eyes," said Rullman, a highway worker who's now retired.

In 1992, despite protests from local residents, the county board approved the original permit for use by a "mining operation" and classified water as a mineral, Rullman said. By law, only one person, an adjacent property owner, had been notified before the plan was approved. That person alerted other residents in 1992 and again in 2008 when notice of expansion plans went out.

Retirees such as Rullman and a long-time attorney and other folks living in the "nooks and crannies" along Highway 44 have been forced to spend money, time and energy fighting the expansion. More than 700 people lined up outside the Shingletown Store and backed up highway traffic to sign petitions against the expansion, he said.

"When it comes to somebody (coming) in and (talking) about taking all the water — we can't exist without water. So people get up in arms," Rullman added. "Nobody wants this up here."

The developer maintains that his well takes ground water from an aquifer. But the people behind Local Water Stays Local believe it's an underground stream that feeds Battle Creek, which is a tributary of the Sacramento River, as well as the Coleman National Fish Hatchery for Chinook salmon and steelhead, and that he has no water rights to it.

They're meeting with the head of the State Water Resources Control Board's water rights division Oct. 14 to determine if that agency has jurisdiction in the matter, Rullman said. His group has also contacted the deputy attorney general.

In rural communities where Nestlé or other companies bottle spring water, offers to create jobs often win people over. Nestlé said the Sacramento plant would create 40 jobs.

"They come into a town where the economy's shot, like McCloud, and they promise 'em jobs, and the peoples' eyes are as big as saucers," he said. "When water sources run out, the companies move to another location. They'll pull water out of here until the water runs dry and all the trees die, and no one will have anything to drink."

Suzanne Hurt is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.

Councilmembers voice concerns over Nestle bottling plant

2009-10-01T03:47:35Z

Two Sacramento city councilmembers are raising concerns and voicing skepticism about the Nestle company’s plan to set up a plant to bottle and sell water from the American River.

Councilmembers Kevin McCarty and Lauren Hammond are advocating for the City Council to get involved in the city’s negotiations with Nestle, which so far have been managed by city staffers.

Nestle Waters North America’s plan to set up shop in Sacramento early next year is drawing attention. A group of citizens created "Save Our Water Sacramento" to oppose Nestle’s plans. The group is calling for the City Council to set a moratorium on beverage bottling plants in Sacramento.

The company noted in a statement that it plans to start operations by bottling 30 million gallons of Sacramento water annually at a Florin/Fruitridge industrial park site. Nestle would buy the water from the city on a yearly basis. But a city staff memo dated Sept. 14 points out a different figure — it says the Nestle plant would use 81 million gallons, or 250-acre-feet of water annually.

McCarty said he is concerned about the project’s environmental impacts and said the proposal sounds like a “sweetheart deal.” He criticized city staff for giving him a “weak response” on the project’s details. He said he’s now going to engage in “further exploration to get to the bottom of this,” adding that he wants to have a thoughtful discussion on whether the project makes sense.

Hammond has also entered the debate, saying that city staffers need to look to the City Council for public policy direction before entering into an agreement with Nestle.

Hammond and McCarty are running against each other for Assemblyman Dave Jones’ seat in 2010.

A Sept. 14 memo from Utilities Department Director Marty Hanneman notes that Nestle’s planned use of 81 million gallons per year is “less than .2 percent of the city’s current demands.” Hanneman said the project does not fall under California Environmental Quality Act requirements.

Assistant City Manager John Dangberg responded to McCarty's criticism, saying that Nestle is not obtaining special water rates from the city. The company would pay the same water rates as any other water user in Sacramento, he said. The company is also going through the permitting process with the same requirements that other entities face, and is not receiving special incentives, Dangberg noted.

The company's proposal meets conditions under city requirements that allow it to apply for a building permit without going through the City Council or the Planning Commission, he said.

Meanwhile, Chris Kemp, Sacramento Plant Manager for Nestle Waters North America, said the company is taking all legally required steps in setting up its plant.

“We look forward to working with the members of the city council to provide them with information about our company and operations as we become an employer and neighbor in the Sacramento community,” Kemp said. "We are complying fully with the permitting requirements of the appropriate city, state and federal governmental authorities.”

Kemp said the public is invited to ask questions about the project at the “Ask Us” section on its website.

Kathleen Haley is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press. Staff Reporter Suzanne Hurt contributed to this report.

Nestle wants Sac's water

2009-09-29T06:59:26Z

Sacramento residents are taking first steps into the water justice movement in an effort to stop Swiss company Nestle from bottling and selling city tap water.

About 60 people and one dog packed a tiny Quaker church in a Midtown office suite Monday night to discuss growing concerns over Nestle's plans to open a water-bottling plant in Sacramento and to bottle an estimated 82 million gallons of water from the American River every year.

One of the group's biggest worries is that Nestle's use of the water would not be regulated or limited in any way. While city employee and Nestle's public relations team estimates are tens of millions of gallons apart, the actual amount of water Nestle may bottle each year would be unchecked, according to city staff and activists.

"It's clearly ridiculous to give someone unlimited access to our water in the third year of a drought," said Sacramento resident Evan Tucker. "We could stop it."

The water would be taken directly from the municipal water system. The bottled water would then be trucked to stores and sold to consumers, including those in Sacramento and elsewhere in Northern California.

The group also expressed concerns with the lack of transparency they say has accompanied plans for Nestle's bottled water division, known as Nestle Water, to begin operations at a Florin Fruitridge Industrial Park site early next year. The city has not sought public input or performed an environmental analysis of the plan's expected impact.

"The city and Nestle have tried to keep this a secret," said Tucker, who led the meeting. "We're trying to do what we can to get the word out."

The group, which has organized under the name Save Our Water Sacramento, includes people who have worked for social justice, human and civil rights and the environment. Monday night, they discussed the initial steps they're taking to seek a Sacramento City Council moratorium on beverage bottling plants in Sacramento.

Save Our Water Sacramento and its allies are also working to bring the new movie, "Tapped," to the city, Mt. Shasta and Orland, where another water-bottling fight is raging, in the next few weeks, said Nancy Price of Davis, who has helped community residents fight bottled-water battles in other states as a social and environmental justice issue. Price works with Alliance for Democracy's Water for Life campaign.

Nestle is planning to open a plant in Sacramento after a failed, six-year battle to bottle spring water in McCloud near Mt. Shasta. Nestle had sought to open a plant a few miles from water-bottling plants operated by Coca-Cola and Crystal Geyser, owned by a Japanese pharmaceutical company. That effort failed after Attorney General Jerry Brown threatened to sue Nestle over an inadequate environmental review in the summer of 2008.

Nestle's attempts to build water-bottling plants have been fought from McCloud to Denver and Maine. Residents of Shingletown, a mountain community outside Lassen National Park, are currently fighting a water battle involving an unidentified bottling company they suspect is Nestle, said Dick Rullman, president of Local Water Stays Local.

They've hired San Francisco attorney Rachel Hooper of Shute, Mihaly and Weinberger — the same attorney who successfully fought Nestle in McCloud.

Nestle's stated plans for Sacramento include bottling 20 million gallons of spring water from an unidentified source, Tucker said.

As such an old city, Sacramento has "very, very senior water rights" in California, said Carmichael resident Betsy Weiland, who has worked on other water issues such as protecting the American River.

When asked whether city employees have given Nestle permission to bottle and sell the city's water, Tom Zeidner, a senior development project manager with the Economic Development Department, said, "Nestle's is setting up its plant in an existing building in an area that's zoned industrial or manufacturing. They have satisfied zoning standards. As such, they are going in there and establishing a plant under 'development by right.' "

The area is zoned for industrial use of water, he later added.

The permits they need to install equipment and do work on an existing building are "minor enough" that Nestle doesn't need to go through any other regulatory body, such as the planning commission, Zeidner said.

Nestle has told the city about 250 acre feet — or nearly 82 million gallons — of city-treated American River water would be bottled each year. That represents .02 percent of the city's current water demands, he said, adding the city does not regulate how much water an industrial water customer uses except to impose drought restrictions when needed.

There are no current drought restrictions on industrial users, although there are outdoor irrigation restrictions, he added.

Nestle would pay the industrial rate, said Zeidner, who didn't know what that rate is.

The city determined that the California Environmental Quality act doesn't apply to the project, he said, based on CEQA guidelines, section 15002i, which state:

(i) Discretionary Action. CEQA applies in situations where a governmental agency can use its judgment in deciding whether and how to carry out or approve a project. A project subject to such judgmental controls is called a "discretionary project."

(1) Where the law requires a governmental agency to act on a project in a set way without allowing the agency to use its own judgment, the project is called "ministerial," and CEQA does not apply.

(2) Whether an agency has discretionary or ministerial controls over a project depends on the authority granted by the law providing the controls over the activity. Similar projects may be subject to discretionary controls in one city or county and only ministerial controls in another.

Suzanne Hurt is a staff reporter for The Sacramento Press.