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Friends of the Fourth
District:
As an elected leader representing several beach communities, I have
no more important priority for our public beaches than ensuring they
are safe and healthy for thousands of people who use them and enjoy
them every day. Unfortunately, the health of our beaches has been
jeopardized several times in the last few years by sewage spills –
spills that could have been significantly smaller in impact if
better communication existed between various levels of government.
It is with that in mind that I am calling for a series of reforms
this week designed to greatly reduce the negative impact a sewage
spill can have on our beaches and beachgoers. Chief among these
reforms is my call that we must create very strong penalties against
anyone or any agency that fails to take preventable action that may
minimize a sewage spill. These penalties include a first-ever call
for possible criminal sanctions or for substantial fines tied
directly to any delays in the length of time it takes for an agency
to report a sewage spill.
Sewer lines and storm water lines run near our beaches. It is a fact
of life that we can’t change. What we can change is how those lines
impact the health of our beaches when a breech or spill happens.
Unfortunately, the protocols failed on
August 8, 2006, when thousands of gallons of raw sewage spilled onto
our beaches near Ballona Creek and Marina del Rey. It was not until
12 hours later that the Los Angeles County Department of Public
Health, the agency responsible for deciding when beaches should be
closed, was actually notified. A similar spill occurred on November
3, 2001, when a pumping plant failure caused the discharge of
approximately 1.4 million gallons of raw sewage into the ocean. The
problem went undetected for almost 15 hours. An additional 12 hours
passed before local sanitation officials notified the Department of
Public Health. In both cases, unsuspecting beachgoers were walking
on contaminated sand and swimming in contaminated water. There are
no excuses for these unacceptable delays in notifying the public of
the potential risk.
The various County departments and agencies responsible for
responding to a sewage spill – Public Health, Lifeguards, Beaches
and Harbors – do a very good job responding already. However, they
cannot do their job until they are made aware that a spill has
occurred.
We must improve the communication between the various local cities
and sanitation agencies that maintain wastewater plants and sewage
lines and the County agencies who actually respond to sewage spills.
As these recent spills have shown, the County of Los Angeles can
have excellent response plans, but when cities don’t tell us of
spills until hours later, after the damage is already done, those
plans are worthless.
It is with this in mind that I am calling for a sweeping reform of
the ways various government agencies work together to respond to
sewage spills. We need a top-to-bottom review of how every level of
government reacts to a spill and their responsibilities for cleanup
and communication. Rapid communication between these agencies is
essential in the initial hours after a sewage spill near our
beaches. It is my hope that, above all, my legislation firms up
these communication channels.
Also included in my reform proposal is the importance of including
environmental advocacy groups in the communication process of our
sewage spill cleanup efforts
Perhaps most importantly though is my call for possible criminal or
civil penalties for anyone or any agency failing to report a sewage
spill in a timely manner. I am hopeful improving communication
channels will be enough to reverse the recent trend, but if it
isn’t, we need a powerful response to fall back on. Failure to
report a sewage spill is unacceptable and threatens the well-being
of anyone that uses our beaches. This simply cannot be tolerated.
We cannot afford to wait until the next sewage spill on our local
beaches to ask ourselves these important questions: how did this
happen and how can we keep it from happening again in the future? It
is time to launch the reforms we need for ensuring the health of our
beaches and the cleanliness of our ocean water after a sewage spill.
DON KNABE
Supervisor, Fourth District
County of Los Angeles
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