With the anniversary of the devastating Pajaro flood approaching, hundreds of residents and businesses are suing the State of California, Monterey and Santa Cruz Counties, and a host of government agencies, alleging negligence.
In at least four separate so-called “mass tort” cases filed since December in Monterey and Santa Cruz County Superior Courts, the plaintiffs allege that local authorities did not do enough to prevent the aging Pajaro levee system from failing in the early morning hours of March 11, 2023.
The resulting flood forced thousands of people from their homes in the town of Pajaro, and caused millions of dollars in damage to homes, businesses and farms. The lawsuits do not specify the amount of damages they are seeking. But a similar case following the deadly Pajaro flood in 1995 resulted in damages of well over $20 million, some of which the counties are still paying off.
“It's basically just an ongoing failure over decades to properly maintain and repair those levees despite knowing that this was going to happen again at some point,” said Emily Ruby of Greenberg and Ruby Injury Attorneys in El Segundo.
Ruby, whose parents live just outside of Pajaro in Royal Oaks, said she began meeting with residents last year at the urging of her parents, who witnessed the destruction. She said it was clear in the first meeting that people were not getting the help they needed to recover.
“We anticipated 10 to 15 people,” she said. “About 70 people showed up and they were desperate for answers. They were desperate for someone to stand up for them.”
Ruby teamed up with a Los Angeles firm that specializes in large cases, Kabateck, LLP, to file the first Pajaro-related case — and the largest — on December 22 in Monterey County Superior Court. Some 500 plaintiffs including children, parents, unhoused residents and businesses, sued the State of California, CalTrans, both Santa Cruz and Monterey Counties and their water resource agencies, and the Pajaro Regional Flood Management Agency.
The suit accuses the defendants of “failure to properly and reasonably design, construct, control, maintain, repair, (and) inspect” the levee system for years, leaving it “in a state of complete disrepair.”
At least two other cases filed since then make similar allegations. Ruby and the Kabateck firm also represent some 200 plaintiffs in a separate case filed in Santa Cruz County Superior Court over flooding along Corralitos Creek in the Watsonville area on December 31, 2022.
None of the defendants would comment on the cases, citing policies against discussing pending litigation. But despite the lawsuits’ allegations, records and public reporting show the state and local agencies have done considerable work on the levee system over the years, including emergency repairs near Pajaro just weeks before the floods.
I didn’t know if I wanted to cry, or scream. It takes you time to realize you don't have anything anymore.”Erika Moreno, lifelong Pajaro resident
Officials have also repeatedly blamed the federal government for failing to properly fund levee repairs for decades. In November, state and local officials finally signed an agreement with the Army Corps of Engineers to begin construction this year on a $600 million project to completely rebuild the Pajaro levee system, upgrading it to 100-year flood protection.
But Ruby calls all of the efforts “too little, too late.” And, she says, the complaints about a lack of federal funding are beside the point.
“We think it's really just an excuse,” she said. “When the levee was completed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, it was passed over to the local agencies and entities to maintain it. And that includes inspecting it, repairing it as needed, and maintaining it.”
Among the plaintiffs Ruby represents is lifelong Pajaro resident Erika Moreno, along with her husband and their three children.
Moreno said the family lost everything, with two feet of water flooding their home just half a mile from the Pajaro River.
Like hundreds of other residents, the Morenos heeded the emergency evacuation orders in the early morning hours of March 11. It would be another two weeks before they could return home, followed by two months of the family of five living in a trailer as they tried to piece their lives together.
“I would get a lot of people telling me, ‘Don’t worry, it's just material.’ Yes, it is material, but it's the material that took us time to get. It took us time, saving, to get that material,” she said. “It's just really a bad feeling, you know? I didn’t know if I wanted to cry, or scream. It takes you time to realize, like, you don't have anything anymore.”
Beyond the material losses, she said, is the emotional toll.
With the rainy season returning to the area, she said that her 13-year-old son is terrified.
“He wants to be inside, only. He’ll only sleep inside my room. He can't sleep by himself.”
She said the rest of the family is suffering as well.
“For me as a mother, it's not easy either,” she said. “I have to deal with my stress that I have because, of course, I'm worried. I’m worried.”
With hundreds of plaintiffs, multiple defendants, and competing lawsuits, Ruby acknowledges it could be years before the cases are resolved.
Moreno, who also went through the 1995 flood as a 10-year-old child, said she and her family do not intend to stick around. They are planning to leave Pajaro. But she said it is important to see the legal cases through.
“I think us as a community, we have to do something,” she said. “It's a way that they can hear us, that we need help here.”
