San Diego is accelerating efforts to shore up the city’s aging dams, including moving up construction of the new Lake Hodges Dam from 2031 to 2029 and committing to comprehensively evaluating the eight other city dams by 2028. The goal is to determine whether a $1 billion estimate of total repair costs is accurate, deciding which dams need the most work and weighing which projects should be prioritized over others. … Because the dams and the attached reservoirs play a crucial role in storing the city’s drinking water, costs for the renovations and rebuilds will be passed on to the city’s water customers. The evaluations include assessing the dams for seismic vulnerabilities, structural deficiencies and flood risk — how many people’s lives would be in jeopardy in the event of a partial or complete dam failure.

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