Malibu delegation demands FEMA release emergency water pipeline funds Play

Malibu's congressional delegation is demanding answers from the White House as to why they are sitting on a critically needed Malibu water connection.

A federal grant has been pending for years to build one and one third miles of water pipe up Encinal Canyon Road. The idea is to connect the Malibu waterworks district 29 with the Las Virgenes Municipal Water District. This would provide an emergency water supply for Malibu should there be a problem with the only other water pipe that supplies the city.

That one pipe that currently reaches Malibu goes from Culver City across Los Angeles, through the landslide and coastal erosion zones, up PCH. It crosses several earthquake faults, landslide zones, and a beach where sand has washed away and where the ocean waves could take out the highway and the water main.

U.S. Senators Adam Schiff and Alex Padilla and Congresswoman Julia Brownley want to know why $4.9 million promised from the federal government has not been awarded for a year and a half.

FEMA — the Federal Emergency Management Agency — has been converted into a political organization by President Donald Trump. Trump himself has said that federal agencies like FEMA will reward his backers in red states and withhold money from blue states that voted against him.

The elected officials say the Encinal interconnection is essential to protect the reliability of drinking water and fire flow in western Malibu.

FEMA gave the award to L.A. County in December 2024. But the senators say FEMA has prolonged the processing of the award.

The senators and congress member say 23,000 people in the area urgently need the two-way pipeline connection between Malibu and the 101 freeway area.