Year in Review: Hermosa Beach voters forcefully reject oil drilling
Resident Jani Lange shows surfers’ opposition to Measure O during the annual Bearback Surf Contest at 16th Street in Hermosa Beach. Photo . Hermosa Beach residents went to the polls March 3 to decide on Measure O, the ballot measure that would have lifted the city’s ban on oil extraction. Voters emphatically chose to maintain the ban, with extraction opponents outnumbering supporters nearly four to one. Turnout for the special election approached 60 percent of registered voters, a figure rarely achieved even during presidential elections. The run-up to the election saw a local land-use question turn into a referendum on small-town identity. So even though outcome of the vote was decisive, the issue did not disappear. Rather, it continued to influence news in Hermosa throughout the year, spawning a pair of legal entanglements for the city and setting the tone for November’s municipal elections. Long tail Oil’s continuing influence makes more sense in the context of Hermosa’s lengthy history with crude. The city had an oil drilling ban on the books until 1985, when voters decided, 60 percent to 40 percent, to lift the ban. A year later, the city entered into an agreement with…
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