Unsafe Bacteria Levels Found at Santa Monica, Will Rogers Beaches

Bacteria were present in unsafe amounts last month where storm runoff crosses two popular Westside beaches, health officials said Thursday.

Los Angeles city sanitation workers found high bacteria levels in the surf and on the sand at the mouth of storm drains on Will Rogers State Beach, near where Chautauqua Boulevard ends in Pacific Palisades, and on the Santa Monica Beach near the end of Pico Boulevard.

The Los Angeles County Department of Health Services is awaiting the results of new tests before deciding if swimmers should be warned to avoid the surf near the storm drains, a spokesman said Thursday.

Public health officials consider high concentrations of coliform bacteria a sign that animal waste is present. But more sophisticated testing is needed to determine if the bacteria came from human effluent, which can pose a health threat.

Warning Signs

The samples were taken on four days in June at the request of Los Angeles City Councilman Marvin Braude, who released the results this week and asked the health department to post signs warning swimmers.

Storm drains collect the runoff from yards and city streets, and are a major source of ocean pollution. Most local runoff flows through pipelines into Santa Monica Bay, but the two drains tested in June flow as open creeks across the sand and into the sea.

The county posted signs last summer warning beach users to avoid the runoff water flowing across the sand. But Braude complained in a letter to Robert C. Gates, the county health director, that the results showing surf bacteria levels higher than state regulators allow suggests a new threat to those swimming in the ocean near the drains.

City inspectors measured coliform levels as high as 9,400 bacteria per 100 milliliters of water, far in excess of the limit of 1,000 bacteria considered safe by state regulators. In the ponds of runoff water that form on the beach, readings as high as 14,000 bacteria were collected.

Contaminated Runoff

Storm drain runoff is at its foulest in fall, when the first big rains cleanse the streets of months of urban poisons. But state water quality officials say the drain that flows onto Will Rogers State Beach always carries some organic runoff from horse ranches, gardens and a golf course in the Santa Monica Mountains that might explain the bacteria.

The drain near Pico Boulevard has posed a recurring problem for health officials because it flows through densely populated areas to reach the beach.