WATER SUPPLIES CLEANER; EL NINO RAINS WASH OUT SALT.

Byline: David Greenberg Daily News Staff Writer

Lost in the floods, sewage spills, erosion and property damage is some good news about El Nino - cleaner drinking water.

Despite damage totals now estimated at $88 million countywide, water conservation experts said the 33 to 64 inches of rain that fell on different parts of Ventura County from November through the present is flushing salt water from underground aquifers back into the ocean and stabilizing upper county groundwater supplies.

``The inconvenience of all that rain was more than offset by the improving water quality in the aquifers and the increase of water in the aquifers,'' said Steven Bachman, the United Water Conservation District's groundwater resources manager. ``There are some areas now that are usable that weren't before.''

Speaking to 40 water wholesalers, farmers, and city and county officials at a breakfast meeting in Thousand Oaks on Thursday, officials warned, however, that there is more damage to come.

Pacific Coast Highway from Point Mugu to Malibu, Highway 33 in the Ojai area and other roads cutting through hilly areas are expected to be bombarded by periodic landslides soon while a possible drought could occur over the next two winters, according to Dolores Taylor, a senior county hydrologist.

``We'll be seeing landslides all summer long,'' she said. ``It takes a long time for the water to percolate to the deeper layers of the slopes. They lose their strength when they get saturated. The layers just slide off because there's not enough friction to keep them stable.''

Water levels have risen from 40 feet below the ground to 10 feet in the Montalvo Forebay, the major recharge area of the Oxnard Plain, he said.

The plain serves Camarillo, Oxnard and Port Hueneme.

Because Oxnard, Port Hueneme and two Navy bases are situated on or near the ocean, the groundwater has traditionally contained far too much salt for it to be consumed or used to irrigate farms.

Some of the northern areas now contain groundwater that may be used when mixed with water from the Santa Clara River, which the conservation district sells wholesale to those communities, Bachman said.

Thousand Oaks and Simi Valley rely solely on the state's water supply, while Moorpark uses a mixture of state and groundwater supplies.

If the aftermath of the last El Nino winter - 1982-83 - is any indication, the county can expect a drought in the coming years, officials said.

``The El Nino of 1982-83 pushed the storm tract north,'' Taylor said. ``The result was very dry winters. The rain essentially stopped in January of 1984. And it rained below normal in the following year.''

In the 1983-84 winter that followed El Nino, Thousand Oaks, for example, absorbed only 9.3 inches of rain - all but a half-inch from October through December 1983.

Less than 11 inches of rain hit the city the following winter - far below the average of 15-26 inches.

The drought lasted from 1984 to 1991, when it was broken by the so-called ``miracle March'' storms, which dumped eight inches of rain on Thousand Oaks, 13 inches on Ventura and 18 inches on the Matilija Dam area - the Ventura River north of Ojai.

``We've had a lot of wet years,'' said Bachman, adding that a new drought begins in the county about once a decade. ``We are overdue for a drought.''

Since November 1997, 33 inches of rain fell on Thousand Oaks and 64 inches on the Matilija area.

The plentiful groundwater supply in the west county could have a positive effect on its eastern neighbors should a drought occur, Bachman said.

The high groundwater levels could compensate west county users for one or two dry winters, meaning they would need to rely less on the state supply - leaving more for east county users, he said.