Lessons Learned About Oil Spills : Public awareness crucial to coast protection

Seven months ago, an offshore oil tanker spilled 397,000 gallons of crude off Huntington Beach. Life returned to normal on Orange County beaches this summer, but the public’s resolve to protect the Southern California coastline must be preserved.

The oil that lapped ashore in February was a signal for the entire 1,200-mile California coastline. The crucial test ahead is whether the new awareness proves to be temporary or permanent.

Government has responded reasonably well this year to the public’s new custodial attitude toward the fragile shoreline.

But there also is a competing clamor from the oil companies, and a disturbing sign in some recent polling of increased support for offshore oil drilling in response to the Middle East crisis.

The Huntington Beach experience teaches that the public must keep focused on the long view. It should now be clear that the benefits of living along the coast come at a price; we all may need to make fundamental lifestyle changes to protect the waterfront for future generations.

Since Huntington Beach was first cordoned off, and the wind rustling through palm trees carried the stench of oil, the public has had little opportunity to be heard directly.

Next Thursday, federal and state agencies will hold hearings to find out how Orange County coastal communities should be compensated for damage and disruption caused by the spill.

The courts will have to assess blame ultimately, but it’s important that the public will have a chance to comment. In the beginning, the public was the onlooker and victim; now it is being asked to participate in assessing the profound consequences of such a spill.

In the future, the public must have a hand in prevention as well as damage assessment. It must resist, for example, the temptation to use global conflict in Iraq and talk of oil shortages as an ill-considered excuse for offshore drilling.

It must understand that a host of conservation measures offer a better way to save far more oil, and then summon the will to implement them.

It’s worth noting that environmental victories since the Orange County oil spill have come in response to such public concern. The Legislature levied a $100-million tax on oil companies to pay for future oil-spill cleanups.

Congress has adopted a new law requiring new oil tankers to be equipped with double hulls beginning in 1995, and set aside a $1-billion national trust fund for cleanups. President Bush issued his executive order postponing offshore oil leases.

These things didn’t happen without a ground swell of public support. But the public must keep up the pressure to protect the environment, and it must understand how its own complex energy choices affect the future quality of life.

So we have come full circle in seven months. The very people who enjoy California beaches, in a sense, have the fate of those beaches in their hands.