Malibu City Official Says Lawsuit Threat Is Politically Motivated

• Environmental Groups Spring Surprise Allegations about Federal Clean Water Act Violations

BY BILL KOENEKER

While many Los Angeles County and City of Malibu officials expressed surprise and disappointment at the recent notice of intent by two environmental organizations to file a federal lawsuit over alleged Clean Water Act violations, at least one Malibu city council member said she was not taken aback by the turn of events.

Councilmember Sharon Barovsky said last week after she discovered the identity of the members of the board of Santa Monica Baykeeper, which, along with the Natural Resources Defense Council, issued the notice of intent to the county and Malibu, that she was not surprised. “It becomes less mysterious to me,” she added.

Barovsky was refering to the Baykeeper’s board of directors, which includes longtime local activists Ozzie Silna, Tami Clark, Gil Siegel, Steve Dahlberg, Luanne Wells and Linda Thompson-Foster.

As one local political observer put it, the list is a virtual “who’s who” of anti-city council activists at the helm of the board’s activities. Many were involved in defeating the council-endorsed Measure M at the polls.

Silna has denied the charge, but no one has been able to explain why the group that has been working so closely with the city and the county chose to keep the potential litigation under wraps until formal notice was issued.

Just last month, the city and the Baykeeper issued a press release in which Baykeeper officials praised the city for its efforts at improving water quality and having acquired the grant funding and the approval of plans for a storm water treatment plant to clean up Ramirez Creek at Paradise Cove.

Both the county and city are currently working on plans for another treatment facility at Marie Canyon.

The city has also been involved in a $35 million project at the Civic Center for stormwater and wastewater treatment and recently built and started operating a stormwater treatment facility processing dry weather flows at the Civic Center.

At last week’s city council meeting, City Attorney Christi Hogin addressed the city’s ongoing efforts at water cleanup.

She said, “It is a troubling and unfortunate turn of events. As you know, we are spending enormous amounts of city resources, staff and financial, to clean up the water.”

Hogin said she would look closely at the notice. “Most of the samples were taken before [Civic Center stormwater] facility went on line or the samples are from county-controlled drains,” the city attorney noted.

Hogin pointed out one aspect of the lawsuit addressing Malibu involves the accusation that the Clean Water Act was allegedly violated in specially designated marine areas just off the coast known as Areas of Special Biological Significance. Those are state designated areas.

The city has 60 days to respond to the notice of intent and spokespersons for the environmental groups, in a number of media accounts, have said they want to sit down with the city and county and get an accounting, but remain vague about what exactly they are looking for in terms of how they believe municipal improvements should be made.

Privately, some city hall observers have remarked that Malibu, in particular, has become a favorite target of environmental groups because of the media coverage that this can generate. That coverage can give groups a higher public profile that can translate into more grant dollars.

“Nobody is going to cover environmental problems in, say, Carson,” quipped one wag.