Oil Drilling in Cemetery Stalled by Foes : Courts: Judge invalidates Inglewood City Council’s approval of five test wells pending environmental impact report.

Opponents of oil drilling in the Inglewood Park Cemetery have won the first round in what is expected to be a lengthy battle over a project that could produce gushers of royalties for some homeowners and barrels of tax revenues for the city.

A Los Angeles Superior Court judge on Friday invalidated a decision by the City Council to allow five exploratory wells to be drilled on the eastern side of the cemetery, saying an environmental impact report must be done before drilling can be permitted.

“It’s a major victory because the council is now forced to consider environmental impacts they ignored the first time around,” said Lawrence Teeter, attorney for the Coalition Against the Pipeline, a Los Angeles-based activist group.

The coalition, backed by some residents who live near the cemetery, argued that the drilling could pose significant environmental problems, including noise pollution and disruptive truck traffic.

They also said oil extraction could cause shifting along the nearby Newport-Inglewood earthquake fault, possibly triggering earthquake activity. Judge Diane Wayne agreed that there is “substantial evidence” for such concerns.

If oil is discovered, it could bring the city revenues ranging from the thousands to millions of dollars, according to a Planning Department report. The city would get 22 cents on every barrel produced.

Many residents around the cemetery sold their mineral rights to the oil firm that won the council’s approval to drill. The Pasadena firm, Noble Oil, has since been joined in the project by a Canadian firm, Vortex Oil and Minerals.

When council members first took up the issue last December they faced a crowd that was largely in favor of the drilling, since many residents around the cemetery had a financial stake in the oil exploration.

However, once news of the decision swept through the neighborhood and reached several people who bought homes not knowing that drilling was planned in the nearby cemetery, opposition quickly developed.

Coalition Against the Pipeline, which has worked to stop the construction of crude oil pipelines through the Los Angeles area, organized the opposition, taking its case to the Los Angeles City Council.

The cemetery is close to the Los Angeles border, and Councilwoman Ruth Galanter persuaded her colleagues to adopt a resolution last month asking Inglewood to do an environmental impact report. Opponents also got help from Assemblyman Curtis Tucker Jr. (D-Inglewood), who joined the call for the environmental study.

City Manager Paul D. Eckles said Friday that he had not seen the judge’s decision and did not want to comment. John Quirk, a Glendale attorney who represents Vortex, said he did not know yet what his clients plan to do in light of the court decision.