Hearing Sought on Sewage Exemption

The Los Angeles County Sanitation Districts asked the Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday to hold a hearing on its recent decision to reject the districts’ bid for an exemption from tightened federal sewage treatment standards.

The sanitation districts said a hearing is needed because the federal environmental office’s Dec. 21 decision “was not supported by the facts.” For more than a decade, the sanitation agency has sought a waiver from a requirement that it intensify treatment of the waste water being pumped into the ocean from its massive sewage plant in Carson.

A staff expert with Heal the Bay, a Santa Monica environmental group, criticized the request, saying it would slow efforts to clean up ocean waters off Los Angeles County. But an official with the sanitation districts said his agency merits a hearing because it can prove its waste water is not harming marine life.