TOILET WATER PROJECT BLASTED.

Byline: Harrison Sheppard Staff Writer

City Attorney James K. Hahn on Tuesday called for the suspension of a so-called ``toilet-to-tap'' project, saying the Department of Water and Power failed to inform the public about its start-up and potential health risks.

Hahn, a Los Angeles mayoral candidate, faxed a letter to DWP chief S. David Freeman calling for the project to be halted immediately.

``I just think this has been bungled from the public participation standpoint,'' Hahn said in an interview. ``I don't think we're ready to go forward.''

Hahn added that no laws were broken and he is not exerting any legal authority, but was just expressing his opinion as an elected city official, aspiring mayor and someone who drinks Los Angeles tap water.

His criticisms were echoed by mayoral candidates Antonio Villaraigosa and Joel Wachs on Tuesday. And an aide to Mayor Richard Riordan agreed there should have been more public input, but stopped short of criticizing the DWP outright.

The project, which critics have nicknamed ``toilet-to-tap,'' will start on a pilot basis, but will eventually involve treating 11.4 billion gallons of wastewater annually and using it to recharge the groundwater supply. After five years or more of underground filtering, the water would be drawn out for household use by homes throughout the East Valley and Los Angeles.

Freeman refused to comment Tuesday on Hahn's letter.

But in a recent opinion piece in the Daily News, he said a series of public meetings took place in 1991 as the project's environmental impact report was being prepared. Additional hearings were held in 1995 by the state Department of Health Services and the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board.

Freeman also said the public was notified when construction began several years ago, information has been available on the DWP's Web site, and signs were posted around the Valley with a hotline number to call for information.

However, Hahn and several City Council members have said there has been no attempt at keeping the public abreast in the past year or two, as the project was being completed and about to start pumping water.

Councilman and mayoral candidate Joel Wachs and Councilman Alex Padilla, who both represent the East Valley, last month called for public hearings on the project before the City Council.

A joint hearing of the Environmental Quality and Public Works committees is expected to be scheduled within the next two weeks, while the Commerce, Energy and Natural Resources Committee is expected to hold its own hearing at some later date.

Wachs said there was no recent public notice or awareness of the project until an article appeared in the Daily News last month.

``This is exactly the kind of issue that people have a right to make their own decisions about,'' Wachs said. ``It's their money, it's their water, it's their lives and they have to be consulted.''

Assemblyman Antonio Villaraigosa, who stepped down from the speaker's post last month to run for Los Angeles mayor, agrees with the criticism, saying when he has met with Valley residents recently, that is one of the topics that most often comes up.

``He has made his opposition to the project well known,'' said Elena Stern, communications director for Villaraigosa. ``Residents shouldn't learn of projects of this magnitude through headlines. There should have been a thorough community input process.''

Stern added that Villaraigosa also has concerns about the environmental health and safety of the project and ``until he can be assured of the absolute integrity and public safety of the project, he will remain opposed.''

An aide to Mayor Richard Riordan said that while there had been some public notification, there should have been more.

``It was a process through which the public was notified,'' said policy analyst Eric Moses. ``In hindsight, the department should have made a better effort to notify the public that this was going on line sooner than they did.''