Oil Firm Vows to Drill Without City Approval : Company to Start Work on Project While Huntington Beach Council Remains Deadlocked

With an 8-month-old lawsuit officially ended, both sides of a heated dispute over proposed oil drilling in Huntington Beach claimed victory Thursday, and the oil company vowed to pursue the project despite accusations that to do so would be illegal.

Orange County Superior Court Judge Tully H. Seymour ruled Thursday that the oil company does not have to pay the attorney’s fees of the citizen’s group that filed the lawsuit.

Concerned Citizens of Huntington Beach filed the suit against the city last November, a month after the Huntington Beach City Council voted, 4-3, to allow Angus Petroleum to drill up to 60 oil wells near the residential intersection of Delaware and Springfield streets.

In January, the council rescinded its approval of the project because a former councilman was accused of having business dealings with the Canadian-based oil firm and failing to make the relationship public at the time he voted for the project.

Suit Dismissed

The citizens group did not move to dismiss the suit until June 1, however, and when it did finally file for dismissal, Angus’ attorneys insisted on taking the issue of attorney’s fees before the judge for a ruling.

Now Angus will move onto the drilling site and begin work, company vice president John C. Carmichael said Thursday. The city, he said, did not follow proper procedures in rescinding the law approving the drilling and therefore did not legally undo what it had done.

‘They’re just whistling Dixie,” said John B. Murdock, attorney for the citizens group. “They’re pretending that they’ve got an ordinance when they don’t.”

But the city may have a difficult time stopping Angus, said Huntington Beach City Attorney Gail Hutton, even though she said the corporation’s use permit “was revoked, rescinded, repealed last January.”

Council OK Needed

She said before her office can go to court to stop Angus from drilling on the 3.2-acre site, it must get council approval to do so. The council is deadlocked on the issue, 3-3, with council member Wes Bannister abstaining on the ground of conflict of interest, Hutton said.

Mayor Jack Kelly said he favors the proposed drilling because, in exchange for the 35 new wells Angus plans to drill, it will clean up 35 old ones, some of which date back to 1922, and will return the land to its owners.

Kelly added that he was “sorrowful” that the clean-up project had to come in a package that included drilling in a residential area, but “the inconvenience of peace of mind and comfort to the people in the neighborhood is temporary.”

After 18-24 months of construction, the drilling will be completely hidden, he said.

That kind of support means the project will go through, Carmichael said.

But Pamela Steele, vice president of the citizen’s group, said if the city doesn’t file another suit, her organization will.

“We’ll take all the necessary steps to stop them,” she said. “For now, we’re going to sit back and let them make their dumb mistakes. Then we’ll get them.”