Local News in Brief : $60,000 Pump for Beach

County officials are installing a $60,000 underwater pump to reduce a high bacteria level that since October has forced the closure of Marina del Rey’s only public beach.

The beach, dubbed “Mothers’ Beach” because its shallow waters are popular with parents of small children, was closed along with other beaches on Santa Monica Bay when a sewage spill from the Hyperion Treatment Plant fouled the waters. The Marina del Rey beach is the only one that did not quickly recover.

The pump, which will be switched on April 8, will mix deeper, clean water with air and force it toward the beach at the rate of 1,100 gallons a minute. County officials said that adding oxygen to the water will reduce the high bacteria count below state safety limits, possibly enabling them to open the beach by late April.

Officials are still not sure of the source of the pollutants that have allowed the fecal bacteria to thrive, and critics say the county is treating the symptoms of pollution without correcting the cause.