These San Diego kids grew up with the sewage crisis. They want more people to know about it.

Eric Camberos used to walk along the Imperial Beach shoreline with his mother every weekend, collecting seashells and venturing into the water. Their family spent years living a couple of miles from what’s known as the Saturn Boulevard hotspot.

But when water pollution levels in the Tijuana River Valley rose significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic, the two stopped going to the beach altogether.

He didn’t return until last month, when he took part in a youth cleanup at La Jolla Shores.

“We have grown up with these conditions,” Camberos said. “We have noticed that these are what we have been born into, and we know that this has to change.”

The high school junior is part of a recently formed coalition called the Youth Circle. At the Imperial Beach Library this week, the group moderated a discussion on the decades-long Tijuana River sewage crisis with Camberos, county Supervisor Paloma Aguirre and Tijuana Estuary Foundation researcher Jeff Crooks. 

“The degree to which they’re engaged is wonderful and it’s horrifying,” Crooks said of the students. “It is this double-edged sword of, we need this, but they shouldn’t have to do it.”

Youth Circle is supported by the Institute for Public Strategies and the Tijuana River Coalition. It brings together high school and college students across the county who are leading efforts on addressing the sewage.

Eleventh grader Vivian Zhang, who conducts research on air quality through the UCSD Youth Climate Advisors program, said it is important for young people to join these conversations so they can better support the community in the future. 

”We all know there’s a big sewage crisis at the border, but we don’t know the specifics of the politics and the ecological side,” Zhang said, “so just bringing in those perspectives is really important to dive deeper into the issue.”

Some Youth Circle members will travel to Sacramento next week for California Ocean Day to lobby for state legislation that would update air quality standards for hydrogen sulfide, commonly known as sewer gas. The group will also push for the Saturn Boulevard hotspot to receive Proposition 4 funding. 

Camberos and his family ultimately left Imperial Beach after his grandmother’s health worsened. They believe the pollution was exacerbating her respiratory issues. Now living in Otay Mesa, he said his grandmother is doing better.

“A lot of the lawmakers that I’ve spoken to in Sacramento, they either don’t know about the issue or they don’t understand the extent of the issue,” Camberos said. “We’ve had people that almost, I want to say, brush it off because Sacramento is so many miles away from San Diego.”

Next week will mark Coronado senior Sean Wilbur’s fourth trip to the state Capitol. He helped found his school’s Stop the Sewage Club in 2023, which leads advocacy trips to Sacramento, after the Coronado Junior Lifeguards program he was part of was canceled because of unsafe water pollution levels. 

Wilbur said while there’s a long way to go, they are excited to already have some support from the highest levels of government in addition to local recognition of the issue.  

“If we pull a hundred levers and maybe one of those is just half of the solution, and then another one is just a quarter of the solution, at some point they’re all going to compile and we’re going to see some real change,” he said.

As they consider their next steps after high school, the students’ motivations are largely drawn from growing up with the Tijuana River on their doorstep. 

Wilbur plans to study mechanical engineering and political science in college, carrying on advocacy work in Sacramento. Zhang wants to continue studying and conducting research on environmental issues. Camberos said he is interested in politics and government and hopes to work more with the Institute for Public Strategies, inspired by relationships he formed through local advocacy. 

“As devastating as it is, this issue does allow us to come together,” Camberos said. “It allows us to build community, and that’s something that in spite of the crisis, I have really grown to appreciate.”

Brisa Karow is an independent journalist living in San Diego. Previously, she lived in Flagstaff, Arizona, and ran the Northern Arizona University student newspaper. She is part of inewsource’s San Diego Documenters program and regularly reports on local government throughout the county.