El Morro Residents Offer to Fund Sewer Upgrade

Residents of El Morro Village--294 mobile homes on state land between Newport Beach and Laguna Beach--are proposing to use $700,000 of their own money to hook up to the county sewer system, even though their leases expire in three years.

In September, officials said the community's septic tank system was failing, leaking sewage into El Morro Creek. The state Department of Parks and Recreation proposed $350,000 in improvements and said it would monitor the system until 2004, when the state converts the area to a public park.

Stuart Byer, a Laguna Beach consultant hired by the El Morro Community Assn., said the residents' proposal is preferable. "Whether families are there for three years or 33 years, they still care about water quality," he said.