ENCINITAS — While approving execution of an up to $800,000 contract to catalog the city’s underground drainage system, Mayor Bruce Ehlers included two additional requests to negotiate with the engineering firm performing the work.
The first proposal was to see whether San Diego-based Rick Engineering Company, now known as Rick, would consider moving up the project timeline at no extra cost to the city — “just at least try,” Ehlers said.
The other was to implement a “red flag” system that would alert city staff when significant pipe damage is discovered during the assessment, rather than after all work is completed.
Encinitas owns and maintains a stormwater drainage system of approximately 65 miles of underground pipes, 1,789 structures and more than 4,000 pipe segments, according to city documents. The system, installed by the County of San Diego, includes components that are more than 75 years old and pipes that predate the city’s incorporation in October 1986.
The city has experienced numerous stormwater and drainage issues citywide over the years, including regular flooding in Leucadia and, more recently, a large sinkhole along Lake Drive in Cardiff-by-the-Sea in 2023. In many cases, the resulting property damage has led to litigation with the city, some of which is ongoing.
The contract — about $750,000, with a roughly $50,000 contingency — was unanimously approved by the City Council, with the two negotiation points included. The work calls for a comprehensive inspection and analysis of the city’s entire stormwater system and is expected to take 18 months if no changes result from further negotiations, according to city documents.
Ehlers said the urgency stems from a desire to proactively identify and repair the aging system to avoid a costly, potentially dangerous sinkhole or other consequences.
Dan Nutter, the city’s director of engineering, said negotiations with Rick could allow the city to generate reports 3 to 5 months faster, at about a 25% increase in cost. In addition to inspecting every foot of the system with cameras, Nutter said the modeling and risk-assessment portion can also take significant time.
Nutter said that the wastewater division within the utilities department completed a similar modeling project that took more than a year.
“Every task associated with the condition assessment is pretty darn involved,” Nutter said. “Because of the iterative process with staff, with our public works team, it’s just lengthy.”
Deputy Mayor Jim O’Hara first raised the idea of a “red flag” model in which sufficiently large repairs would trigger an immediate response.
Councilmember Joy Lyndes agreed with the early-notification concept.
“We will want to know what they’re finding and whether there’s anything that rises to us needing to address immediately because we are concerned about it,” Lyndes said. “We want to know as soon as possible and we can take action on it by setting some money aside.”
Councilmember Luke Shaffer said he wants the city to know exactly where problems exist so it “can start getting in front of the bigger budget issue” related to the entire system ahead of the fiscal year 2026-27 budget cycle.
Nutter said the issue ultimately comes down to funding and that “red flags” are inevitable because “these pipes are old, especially our corrugated metal pipes.”
Voids in the system — where stormwater leaks out of pipes and into surrounding sediment, often leading to sinkholes — are of particular concern, Nutter said, noting that corrosion typically begins after about 30 years and coastal climates can be especially harsh on such infrastructure.
“I guarantee you we’re going to be seeing voids and anytime we do, it’s a cause for concern that we want to address immediately,” Nutter said. “Frankly speaking, I don’t think we’re going to be able to address every single one, just because of funding. So we are going to try to address what we see as the most high priority of those.”
Any such issues beneath major arterial roadways would be considered high priority, Nutter added.
“I want it done faster,” Ehlers said. “It’s a time bomb out there. We’ve already seen them start to fail.”
