Heal the Bay Blog

Earth Month is coming and you might’ve already done the beach cleanups, you might’ve told your friends where all those cigarettes butts they throw on the freeway end up, and you might’ve even come to visit our Santa Monica Pier Aquarium to learn about the marine life we all seek to protect in the Santa Monica Bay.  But are you ready to take your enviro stewardship to the next level?  Come join us to kick off Earth Month this year like it’s never been done before: with the ultimate environmental project! 
 
Join us this March 30th at 3PM in South L.A. for a community celebration of our latest “greening” project, the first of its magnitude for Heal the Bay: a park that, once built with the help of a $1.3 million State Parks Grant that was just approved, will recycle urban runoff water. To learn more background on this project, read this recent blog post.
 
WHAT: Celebration of the WAYS Literacy & Fitness Park

WHEN: Wednesday, March 30, 3pm

WHERE: McKinley Ave &  E. 87th St,  FREE parking available on side streets

WHO: Heal the Bay, our South L.A. partner Wisdom Academy for Young Scientists Charter Elementary School, and Councilwoman Jan Perry, among others.

WHY: To announce and celebrate the award of a $1.3 million Statewide Park Development and Community Revitalization Grant to develop this multi-purpose environmentally-friendly park and learn about how it will work once it’s built.  Come to hear the inspiring story behind how this project rose from the ground up to generate community action to beautify and protect the environment of our city.

City, county, state and federal budget crises are the dominant issues facing government, business and the public.  In what has become an annual event, elected officials and administrations scramble to balance budgets by coming up with policy ideas that save pennies but are more than a pound foolish.

At the federal level, cutting back EPA’s budget by up to 30% has nothing to do with fiscal prudence.  If the House was as serious about major cuts as it is about rolling back environmental protections, then eliminating tax loopholes, agribusiness and oil and gas subsidies, and reducing defense spending would be part of the dialogue on the Hill.

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I spent last week at the EPA’s National Beach Conference in Miami, where I gave a couple of presentations, learned about the latest in beach water quality research, and heard from EPA on the upcoming criteria for measuring water quality.

EPA’s criteria haven’t been updated since 1986, and the new rules are required to be completed by the end of 2012 under a Consent Decree with the NRDC.  With the recent completion of a comprehensive research plan, EPA staff members have all the information they’ll use to develop the new criteria.

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Yesterday, the Santa Monica Pier Aquarium, the west end of the Santa Monica Pier and surrounding beach lots were closed due to the Tsunami Advisory (canceled at 8:20am today) issued for the Southern California coast due to the 8.9 earthquake in Japan.

Tsunami Advisory Info

• A Tsunami Advisory was in effect for the coastal areas of California from the California-Mexico border to Point Concepcion, California.
• A Tsunami Advisory means that a tsunami capable of
  producing strong currents or waves dangerous to persons in or very near
  the water is expected.
• Significant, widespread inundation
  is not expected for areas
  under an advisory. Currents may be hazardous to swimmers, boats,
  and coastal structures and may continue for several hours after the
  initial wave arrival.

Japan Earthquake Info

• At 9:46 PM Pacific Standard Time on March 10, an earthquake with
  preliminary magnitude 8.9 occurred near the east coast of Honshu, Japan. (Refer to the United States Geological Survey for official earthquake parameters.)
• This earthquake has generated a tsunami which could
  cause damage to coastal regions in a warning or advisory.
  Estimated tsunami arrival times and maps along with safety rules and other information can be found on the WCATWC web site.

The Aquarium staff  worked closely with Santa Monica Harbor Patrol to monitor the situation and get up to date guidance and information.

As such the following changes were made to yeasterday’s Aquarium schedule:

• Public hours: 12noon – 5pm today (Friday, May 11)
• Two field trips that were scheduled for Friday were cancelled.

Note: regular Aquarium public hours resume today, Saturday, May 12.

Other tsunami-related updates during Friday, May 10, for Santa Monica:

• Updated 12noon: Beach parking lots were reopened.
• Updated at 4pm: While swimmers are being warned about potential
  strong currents, the police are no longer cautioning people to stay away
  from the beach or the pier.
• Updated at 4pm: The Santa Monica Pier reopened
  Friday afternoon, with pedestrians and cars streaming down the bridge.
  The tsunami advisory is still in effect in Santa Monica, according to
  NOAA.
• Follow general observances and updates at Santa Monica Patch.

As the father of an 11-year-old daughter, I end up going to a lot of movies that would never make my must-see list.  This weekend, I was one of the many parents that took in “Rango.” I actually enjoyed the film, and I couldn’t help but be struck by the similarities between my life and this latest animated feature from Nickelodeon.  As life goes on, the parallels between art and life are easier to find, but “Rango” hit pretty close to the mark.

Over 25 years ago, as a master’s student at UCLA, my field work focused on the behavioral ecology of lizards.  I know… kind of a shock for a water guy. The field site for my research on lizard escape behavior (a major theme of the film) was in beautiful Desert Center — a remote outpost off Interstate 10, halfway between Indio and Blythe. The connections between Desert Center and the fictional town of Dirt in the movie are eerie.

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There was an oil spill Tuesday morning just north of Faria Beach in Ventura County. Officials responded to a camper who saw hundreds of gallons of oil seeping onto the beach. At this time, the source of the oil is still unknown although it is believed to be coming from the oil fields nearby. 

More information.

Photo: lsgcp via Flickr

Enough is enough.  Although Heal the Bay generally only uses litigation as a last resort, we do have our limits.  On Tuesday, Santa Barbara environmental group Heal the Oceans and Heal the Bay filed a lawsuit against the State Water Resources Control Board for its failure to implement Assembly Bill 885, which required the Board to develop regulations for on-site wastewater treatment systems. AB 885 was authored by former assembly member Hannah-Beth Jackson in 1999 and Gov. Davis signed it into law in 2000. The bill required the Board to develop regulations for the siting, permitting and operation of on-site wastewater treatment systems, or OWTS, by 2004.

The regulations took aim at septic systems, which pose a serious threat to water quality at several famous beaches up and down the coast.  After seven years of patience and a decade of regulatory negotiations with the state, county health agencies, OWTS experts and local government representatives, the environmental groups involved felt that they had no choice but to sue the state to ensure that the law would be implemented. Coast Law Group filed the suit on behalf of the organizations.

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