It's the area of land that's drained by a particular body of water. For instance, if the rain that falls on your yard ends up in the Los Angeles River, you live in the Los Angeles River watershed. A watershed can also be called a drainage basin. You can find a map of the Sun Valley watershed at Home and an illustration of a generic watershed on the Watershed Education page under Resources

   The Sun Valley area drains to, or is a tributary of, the Los Angeles River. Chronic flooding has made the 2700-acre subwatershed the focus of an innovative watershed management project directed by the County Department of Public Works. Rather than relying on a traditional storm drain, the project aims to solve the problem using sustainable practices with multiple benefits - retaining rainwater in basins, letting the ground absorb the rainwater to increase underground water supplies, increasing recreational opportunities and reducing stormwater pollution.

   As in most of our heavily urbanized area, about two thirds of the ground in Sun Valley is covered by hard, or impervious, substances. They keep rainwater from soaking into the soil, so it runs off over the pavement instead. The area is also quite flat, and stormwater takes longer to move through than it does in hillier sections. In other parts of the city, storm drains help carry the water away, but there are no major drains in the Sun Valley watershed. Even a moderate rainfall quickly overwhelms the few minor drains, and rainwater backs up on streets and in low-lying areas.

   Los Angeles voters passed a bond issue in 1970 to finance 286 priority storm drain projects throughout the County. A drain for Sun Valley, labeled Project 9250, was not on the priority list, but it did appear on a list of supplemental projects. Because all the available funds were expended on the priority projects, it wasn't possible to build any of the supplemental ones.

   Storm drains represent a single-purpose approach that deals with an effect rather than a basic cause. A storm drain could solve the immediate flooding problem. But it would not address other problems associated with stormwater runoff, such as water pollution, nor would it deal with the basic cause of all the problems, which is unsustainable development.
   Urban runoff is now the nation's largest uncontrolled source of water pollution, and storm drains carry it straight into streams and the ocean. Local infrastructure agencies are under increasing pressure from state and federal regulators to find and implement more effective ways of addressing flood risks and water quality problems.

   In a word, it's about sustainability - controlling floods and solving other urban environmental problems in ways that don't harm the environment or deplete resources that future generations will need. For instance, capturing stormwater for reuse and absorption by the ground would make an asset out of a liability and reduce our thirst for water from other parts of California and the West.
   It's also about interagency cooperation. The city, county and state agencies that deal with the environment currently work independently, though many of the problems they address are interrelated. The Sun Valley Watershed Stakeholders Group is an important step toward improving coordination and communication among agencies that manage the watershed. It will help us make the best use of human and financial resources in implementing the Watershed Management Plan.

   If you live in Sun Valley, or are otherwise concerned with the quality of life there, you're in charge.
   The County of Los Angeles Department of Public Works is responsible for flood control throughout the county and is taking the lead on the Sun Valley project. However, as members of the Sun Valley Watershed Stakeholders Group, other agencies, elected officials, civic groups, businesses, nonprofit organizations, and individuals are also involved in the decision-making process.
   The project's first phase, the preparation of a Watershed Management Plan for Sun Valley, is underway. A consultant team is working to develop several alternative scenarios and to perform public education and outreach tasks. Solid community support will be essential to the successful implementation of the Plan, so we're looking for your ideas and participation.

   That will depend in part on which of the alternatives proposed by the Watershed Management Plan is adopted. Pilot projects are already being planned though, and construction on some of them could begin as early as Winter 2002. They'll provide a measure of flood control, as well as other benefits, such as increased recreational space and community beautification. Completion of all the structural elements of the Plan is expected to take 10 to 12 years, but strong community support could help speed up funding and shorten the timeline.
   A storm drain, on the other hand, would provide only flood control benefits, and only after completion. That would take about 8 years.

   One task for the consultant team that's preparing the Watershed Management Plan is to identify each of the plan's benefits and match it with the benefiting agency. For instance, one element of the plan might be the retention and use within the watershed of all greenwaste. That would be an enormous benefit to the City of Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation, which presently has to pick up the waste (in the green cans), carry it to a transfer station, process it into mulch and redistribute it throughout the city. So the Bureau, like any agency that would benefit from some aspect of the plan, could be expected to provide funding proportional to its benefit.
   For its part, the County Board of Supervisors has pledged to set aside funds annually for the next several years to provide financing for the Sun Valley project. The total set-aside will approximate the estimated cost of constructing a storm drain to control area flooding.
   By filing grant applications, individual stakeholders have been and will be able to contribute to project financing. Recent state and local bond issues for watershed enhancement and park construction and improvement include Propositions 12 and 13 (2000) and Proposition 40 (2002).
   There would be no special assessment of taxpayers to pay for this project.

   Make your ideas and concerns known through civic groups such as the Sun Valley Neighborhood Improvement Organization and the new Neighborhood Council. Express your support for a sustainable flooding solution to your elected representatives and to the media. Attend the town hall meetings that will be held by the Stakeholders Group in the coming months, learn about the issues and alternatives and share your thoughts. Read the quarterly Watershed Events newsletter, and talk to your neighbors about the benefits of a multipurpose approach to managing the Sun Valley watershed.
   At least some of the alternative scenarios offered in the Watershed Management Plan will likely include actions that can be taken by individual property owners. We'll provide that information as it becomes available. In the meantime, you can take a look at the Home Forester Worksheet pages on this site.
   And you can always help protect the health of your watershed by reporting spills, illegal discharges and odd-looking or odd-smelling runoff in the streets (1-888-CLEAN LA).

   Most of the available information, including copies of the newsletter, is right here at www.sunvalleywatershed.org. If you have questions the site does not answer, contact
Angela George at the County of L.A. Department of Public Works or David O'Donnell at TreePeople: