The Seaside Lagoon will open this summer regardless of the political hurdles it faces in coming months. But it may very likely be a lagoon in name only.
The City Council Tuesday night refused to fund studies required by a state regulatory agency in order for the city to keep operating the water portion of the Seaside Lagoon facility. The council instead directed staff to assemble the total costs accrued by the city over recent years in a series of tests the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board has required – and to find out what it will cost to fill the lagoon with sand.
Councilman Matt Kilroy said that the testing requirements have become increasingly onerous and appeared to have no end in sight. He told city staff to send a clear message to the water quality control board at an upcoming Jan. 12 meeting.
“I don’t think it is unreasonable from a political standpoint to tell them the City Council is unwilling to fund that additional testing,” Kilroy said. “I think we need to draw a line in the sand.”
The most recent round of required testing would cost the city at least $100,000 over two years. At the end of the two-year testing period, the city would face not only tightened standards on Total Suspended Solids – the silt-like material that has been the source of conflict between the city and the LARWQCB – but added standards on eight different kinds of metals.
The city maintains that the water that it puts back into the ocean is cleaner than the water brought in. In a regulatory struggle that has gone on for much of the past decade, city officials have long contended that the Seaside Lagoon is a unique facility that was being held to unfairly stringent standards. The lagoon, built along with the harbor in the early 1960s, uses ocean water that is taken in by the AES power plant. The city chlorinates the water after its use by the power plant for cooling purposes, and then returns the water de-chlorinated to the ocean.
The water board at one point last year threatened the city with as much as $21 billion in fines – in accordance with the Clean Water Act – and finally levied a $21,000 fine last September.
Council members are at the end of their patience. Tuesday night they came very close to accepting one of the options presented by staff – to finally close the water feature of the lagoon. But near the end of a long council meeting they instead fashioned a motion that may effectively force the regulatory agency to close the water feature.
“I’d like them to have the ball in their court,” said Mayor Mike Gin.
Councilman Bill Brand said taking the drastic action of closing the lagoon, late at night at what was then a sparsely attended council meeting, would not be appropriate.
“I just don’t think this is the time to for us to be punting on the Seaside Lagoon,” he said.
“Call their bluff,” said Councilman Steve Aspel.
The entire council supported a motion crafted by Councilman Steve Diels that stopped short of funding further tests but instead directed staff to investigate other regulatory or possibly legislative remedies that might keep the lagoon open. But none held much hope for the Seaside Lagoon’s future as an actual lagoon.
“There is no light at the end of the tunnel,” said Aspel. “They are going to keep doing this…We can’t just keep throwing money away.” ER
