Laguna and San Clemente Mayors Head East to Lobby Against Drilling off Coast

Representatives of a coalition of Orange County cities are going to Washington Monday to lobby for renewal of a one-year moratorium on oil and gas exploration off the California coast.

Laguna Beach Mayor Bobbie L. Minkin said Thursday that if a ban on oil leasing is not renewed by Nov. 15 the coastline will be left “completely unprotected.” She said a tentative accord that collapsed last month would have opened up 150 offshore tracts but protected the remaining 98% of coastal waters from drilling until 2000.

“If that moratorium expires, we will have nothing,” said Minkin, who leaves early Monday for her second lobbying trip in as many months with San Clemente Mayor Robert Limberg.

New List Being Prepared

Interior Secretary Donald P. Hodel, however, has said it would take at least 18 months after the drilling ban expires to prepare for new oil lease sales. Hodel, who rejected the tentative 150 tracts chosen with members of the state’s congressional delegation, contended that less than 15% were likely to produce resources. He said last month that his staff was preparing a new, more productive list, but none has been unveiled so far.

When they travel to Washington, Limberg and Minkin will be representing their own cities as well as Huntington Beach and Newport Beach--the original coalition that was formed against federal plans to open 54 square miles off Orange County to drilling.

57,000 Signed Petitions

The Orange County officials also will be armed with copies of more than 57,000 anti-oil-drilling signatures on foot-high stacks of petitions, plus letters of support from dozens of local leaders, including state Sen. Marian Bergeson and council members from more than 20 cities.

Limberg and Minkin are expected to join forces in the nation’s capital with elected officials from the north San Diego County cities of Oceanside, Carlsbad and Del Mar, a Laguna Beach council member said.

Minkin said the group will be lobbying members of the House and Senate appropriations committees, which will consider whether to extend the current ban. The proposal is now included in a continuing resolution--set to expire Nov. 15--to finance federal government operations.

Last month, Minkin and Limberg were among six coalition leaders who went to Washington to lobby for the removal of Orange County coastal tracts from the tentative agreement. Instead, they watched the agreement crumble following an acrimonious closed-door meeting with Hodel and California’s congressional delegation, which split over the compromise.

However, their efforts were partly successful. Rep. Leon E. Panetta (D-Carmel Valley), one of the leading congressional negotiators, drafted a legislative agreement that would replace the Orange County tracts with nine-square-mile tracts elsewhere.

Minkin said Thursday that Panetta’s bill, which has the support of both California senators and a majority of the congressional delegation, is the best hope for protection of California’s coastal resources.