Individuals and Clean Water

The new Santa Monica Bay cleanup plan is about as good an agreement as is possible in terms of what government can do. The real challenge now rests with individuals and businesses; a cleaner bay is most dependent on their small, individual steps.

The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board unanimously approved the three-year plan Monday after 18 months of difficult negotiations with Los Angeles County and 85 of its cities. The federal Clean Water Act requires urban areas throughout the country to adopt such a plan.

The plan is a prescription for improving the quality of ocean water by reducing the amount of trash, motor oil and toxic materials flowing into the bay from across the county through storm drains. It relies heavily on stepped-up sampling of storm drain flows into the ocean to determine the source of pollution and on education campaigns aimed at both businesses and the public at large. It also requires more hands-on steps such as periodic removal of oil, grease and debris from parking lots.

That few of the agencies or interest groups that sat around the negotiating table are entirely happy with this plan speaks to the difficulty of the task before them. The plan’s strongest critics argue further that some of the requirements are not based on sound scientific evidence.

But dispiriting and mounting evidence of public littering speaks to the real opportunity--and the challenge--this plan presents. As a society, we have grown shockingly indifferent to littering: We leave food takeout containers on the ground, we dump car ashtrays into the street, we fling soda cans onto the sidewalk even when a trash can is nearby. These bad habits, which lead directly to storm drain pollution, will be hard to change. Yet doing so could make a significant difference in water quality in the bay, not to mention the quality of life.