SAN DIEGO -- The state of California filed suit Thursday to stop the Padre Dam Municipal Water District from continuing construction of a reservoir and pumping station on an Indian burial site on Lakeside's south side.

The suit was filed by the state Attorney General's Office, and joins a legal effort by the Viejas Band of Kumeyaay Indians to prohibit construction of the water project near Lake Jennings Park Road and Old Highway 80.

Attorney General Jerry Brown filed the suit in his capacity as attorney for the California Native American Heritage Commission, which declared the entire site an officially-sanctioned Native American cemetery and ceremonial ground.

The commission called on the water district to halt further desecration of the buried remains and to work with the Viejas Band to find an alternative location for the project.

Brown's office filed the lawsuit in San Diego Superior Court after the water district continued constructing the water facility despite a temporary restraining order against it won last week by the Kumeyaay, the tribe said in a statement.

A spokesman for the Padre Dam Municipal Water District could not be reached for comment.

A hearing is scheduled July 24 before Judge Judith Hayes in San Diego Superior Court to determine if the temporary restraining order should be made into a permanent injunction.

Qualified Native American monitors and archeologists hired by the water district in 2007 warned that the two-acre site had burial remains on it, and recommended the district avoid disturbing the earth there, according to a statement from the Kumeyaay.

The tribe maintains that those archeological reports were not disclosed to its members, or the general public, before the project was approved by the water district.