Imperial Beach mayor's EPA superfund request for Tijuana sewage crisis denied

IMPERIAL BEACH, Calif. (KGTV) – The Mayor of Imperial Beach was not pleased with the response she got from the EPA.

“So, March 14, I received this later from acting [EPA] regional administrator Cheree Peterson,” Mayor Paloma Aguirre said.

Her letter to new EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin had requested a reconsideration of a Superfund designation for the Tijuana River Valley amid the sewage crisis.

But, sometimes, despite your best efforts, things don’t go how you had hoped for.

“While EPA has been involved in some of these proposed actions and plans to continue this engagement, the report doesn’t contain new information that would warrant changing EPA’s Superfund-related decision as stated in our Jan. 3 letter,” Aguirre read from the letter she received from the EPA.

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“They were pointing back to their rejection last time we submitted the request... That they didn’t find there was any new information that they could base a second look on,” she said.
The EPA's letter denied Aguirre's request to Zeldin, in which she asked him to reconsider designating the Tijuana River Valley as a superfund site.

“This is a public health ticking time bomb. We cannot afford to continue to have empty promises or statements that say, you know, ‘We understand and we’re with you,’ but no real action,” Aguirre said.

The EPA’s Superfund program is tasked with cleaning up some of America’s most contaminated lands and responding to environmental emergencies.

This isn’t the first time local politicians have asked the EPA to step in.

ABC 10News was there last year when County Supervisor Terra Lawson Remer stood side by side with Aguirre and other leaders in the South Bay asking the site to receive a superfund designation.

That request was denied, leading to the later letter and request for reconsideration.

As far as this latest rejection, Aguirre isn’t turning the page. She’s tearing it.

“My thought to this letter is... I’m tired. I’m tired of the empty promises,” Aguirre said as she ripped the letter in half during the interview.

Below you'll find the EPA's rejection letter that Aguirre tore up in our interview:

Earlier, Zeldin did acknowledge the need to get involved. On March 8, he wrote on X, “I was just briefed that Mexico is dumping large amounts of raw sewage into the Tijuana River, and it’s now seeping into the U.S. This is unacceptable.”

But what comes next, time will tell.

“We need to make sure we are protecting the health of South County residents. And that, right now, I don’t feel like I can trust neither the county nor the EPA to do that,” Aguirre said.

An EPA spokesperson sent ABC 10News the following statement on Tuesday after we asked if there was any more context on the reconsideration request in Aguirre’s letter:

“EPA found that the Tijuana River Valley was not eligible under the law. EPA continues to collaborate with all other involved agencies on both sides of the border to actively monitor of the situation. We are gravely concerned by the situation and appreciate the Mayor contacting us.”