Lakewood : EPA Urged to Act Faster on Contaminated Water Issue

In a resolution adopted Tuesday, the City Council called on the Environmental Protection Agency to step up efforts to prevent contaminated ground water from the San Gabriel Basin from spreading south to the Central Ground Water Basin.

Lakewood gets most of its water from its own wells, which lie in the central basin.

Although the EPA has placed the San Gabriel Basin on its Superfund cleanup list, the agency’s “interest lies in finding the source of the contamination and prosecuting those at fault,” James Glancy, the city’s director of water resources, said in a report to the council.

Glancy said the EPA has not provided any money for local agencies to tackle the problem. He recommended that the City Council approve the resolution, which he said would encourage cooperative cleanup operations among Central Basin cities.

Glancy said isolated pockets of contamination have been found in South Gate, Downey and Norwalk. If the San Gabriel contamination is not cleaned up, it could migrate farther south, Glancy said.