Skip to main content
BelowGrid

Who pays for the sewer lateral in Covina, CA

Which part of the pipe is yours

your buildingproperty linesidewalkstreetmain
The thick length is yours.

If something’s wrong

If a repair needs a permit or an inspection

  • Before work on the pipe · Permit

    Who issues it:
    City of Covina director of public works
    What it covers:
    any excavation or encroachment in any highway, which includes the entire width of the public right-of-way

    Covina Municipal Code section 11.08.030 provides that every person, except as the chapter otherwise provides, "is required to obtain a permit from the director before" doing any of a list of things, including "Making or causing to be made any excavation or encroachment in any highway". The chapter's highway is not only the road: the term "includes all or any part of the entire width of public right-of-way". The City's sewer code, borrowed from the County, puts the house lateral under the street on the owner, so this is the permit an owner needs to reach their own pipe.

The repair rule in full, with its sources

No rule on file here is specific to selling, buying, remodelling or adding a unit; that does not mean none exists.

Who to call first about the sewer lateral

BelowGrid has no first-call guidance on file from Covina about the sewer lateral.

Covina: official site(opens in a new tab)The documents this answer is built on

Who is responsible for which part

Covina borrows its sewer rules from the County and then says the answer in its own words. Section 13.50.010(A) of its municipal code adopts "the Los Angeles County Code, Divisions 2 and 3 of Title 20, as amended through and including August 1, 2007" as the City's sanitary sewer and industrial waste code, and section 13.50.040 rewrites the County's maintenance section as the City's own: "All house laterals, industrial connection sewers, septic tank outlet connections to STEP system, and appurtenances thereto shall be maintained by the owner of the property served in a safe and sanitary condition". Inside the adopted County text, a house lateral is "that part of the sewer piping within the street or right-of-way which extends from the property or sewer right-of-way line to a construction with the main-line sewer" - so the length the code puts on the owner is the run under the street. The City's Public Works Department tells homeowners the same thing in plain words.

The property owner
The whole lateral, from the house to the main, the part under the street included. The City's sheet on tree roots and sewer laterals says "Homeowners are required to maintain the lateral from their home, to the main sewer line, typically located in the street, which includes the portion that may be located within the City right-of-way (under the roadway, parkway tree, and sidewalk)", and that maintaining it "includes keeping the lateral line flowing and free of debris such as tree roots." Its diagram marks the end of the owner's length at the main: "Homeowner's responsibility for the sewer lateral ends here at the sewer main." Section 13.50.040 puts house laterals on "the owner of the property served", and the adopted County definition places the house lateral between the property line and the main-line sewer. Neither the code nor the City's sheet says who keeps the joint where the lateral meets the main.

What else is worth knowing

Nothing splits the lateral between the City and the owner, and tree roots do not change that. The City's Public Works page says an owner's duty "not only includes maintenance of the sewer lateral itself, but of the surrounding environment such as nearby trees and their root systems", and the City's sheet adds that "Parkway trees will not be removed solely for roots in sewer laterals." Section 13.54.040 requires everyone discharging to the sewer to use lateral maintenance procedures that "minimize the passage of FOG, debris, cut roots and similar materials to the main line sewers", and bars interference with the director's access to "house laterals extending from the main line sewer and the right-of-way boundary or property line". Where the main runs in a sewer easement rather than in the street, the County definition starts the house lateral at the "sewer right-of-way line" rather than at the property line. The adoption is frozen at the County text as amended through 1 August 2007; the County definition of a house lateral dates from 1964 and so is inside it, and the owner's duty is the City's own 2008 text. This answer is for property on the City's public sewer. Los Angeles County Public Works' own map of its sewer maintenance districts also takes in two small areas inside the city, together about 0.4% of its land, so the public sewer there may be the County's Consolidated Sewer Maintenance District's rather than the City's. The line would not move: the County's own code, section 20.24.080, also puts all house laterals on "the owner of the property served", and its definition of a house lateral is the one quoted above.

Sources

Covina Municipal Code chapter 13.50, Sanitary Sewers and Industrial Waste

Also quoted:

Checked

What the rules say

Most relevant if you are selling or buying

No rule on file here is specific to selling or buying; that does not mean none exists.

Also in force here

  • Before work on the pipePermit
    Who issues it:
    City of Covina director of public works
    What it covers:
    any excavation or encroachment in any highway, which includes the entire width of the public right-of-way

    Covina Municipal Code section 11.08.030 provides that every person, except as the chapter otherwise provides, "is required to obtain a permit from the director before" doing any of a list of things, including "Making or causing to be made any excavation or encroachment in any highway". The chapter's highway is not only the road: the term "includes all or any part of the entire width of public right-of-way". The City's sewer code, borrowed from the County, puts the house lateral under the street on the owner, so this is the permit an owner needs to reach their own pipe.

    What to do: Before digging in the street to reach a house lateral, ask the City of Covina Public Works Department for a permit under chapter 11.08, what deposit or security will be set, and whether the plat can be waived for a lateral repair. Ask first when the street in front of the property was last paved, overlaid or sealed: within five years of paving or overlay, or three of a slurry or chip seal, the dig needs an exemption. Where the excavation is necessary to preserve life or property, it may go ahead first, with the permit applied for no later than the next business day.

    Why this matters

    A recently paved street may be closed to the dig. Under section 11.08.035, once a street has been constructed, reconstructed or paved by the City, under a City contract or under an encroachment permit, "no pavement cutting or excavation will be permitted for a period of five years after the construction has been accepted by the city council", and for three years after a slurry seal or chip seal. The director of public works or the city engineer may grant an exemption, among other reasons to "provide for emergency repairs to subsurface facilities" or to "provide for underground service connections to adjacent properties". Section 11.08.220 requires "a cash deposit or other adequate security, as determined by the director", with no figure in the code, and the issuance and inspection fees are set by City Council resolution. Before digging, section 11.08.360 has the permittee search the records of underground facilities and notify their owners nearby - through the one-call system for its members, and directly for the rest - "at least 48 hours prior to the time of the proposed excavation, exclusive of weekends or legal holidays": notice to the utilities, not to the City. When the work is done, section 11.08.330 requires the permittee to "so notify the director in writing on a form prescribed by the director". Section 11.08.100 lets the director waive the plat "When excavations are made for service connections or for the location of trouble in conduits, cable or pipe, or for making repairs thereto". In an emergency, section 11.08.040 allows "such excavation as may be necessary for the preservation of life or property if the person making such excavation applies for a permit no later than the next business day."

    Current wording dates from · Checked

    Covina Municipal Code section 11.08.030, Permit

    Also quoted:

What this page cannot tell you

  • No assistance or grant programme has been reviewed for this jurisdiction yet.
  • No sewer service territory has been mapped for this area, so BelowGrid cannot say who serves an individual address.

Who governs and serves this area

Jurisdiction
Covina (municipality)
Sewer service
No map of sewer providers is held here. BelowGrid cannot say which sewer provider serves an individual address.

How this compares to neighbouring cities

2 of the 8 nearest cities draw the line somewhere else. Each authority publishes only its own rule.

Distances are approximate, in a straight line between the places’ centres.

Compare the rules city by city

Your other pipe: the water service line

The drinking water line coming into your property is a separate pipe, run by a separate authority, and who is responsible for it is decided separately. Your sewer lateral is yours to the main; your water line stops being yours at the meter.

Who owns the water service line in Covina

Nearby cities and further reading

Look up a specific address

This page describes what applies to properties in Covina in general. To see which authorities serve one address, and what records exist for it, search for it.

Search for an address