Oil Spill Funds Will Benefit Beaches, Bay

Ten years after the American Trader spilled 416,000 gallons of oil, fouling 15 miles of Orange County beaches, government officials now have a plan to divvy up an $11.6-million legal settlement for a range of beach and recreational projects, including a marine education center in Upper Newport Bay.

The bulk of the money--about $8.4 million--will be used by the cities of Newport Beach and Huntington Beach for a series of projects ranging from improvements to the Balboa and Newport piers to Huntington Beach’s ongoing plans to upgrade its south beach.

“I think the biggest benefit is that we’ve received enough money to do a wide variety of projects that would appeal to all different types of users of our beaches,” said Robin Clauson, assistant Newport Beach city attorney. Work on different projects will begin after planning is completed and they receive the proper permits, Clauson said.

The plans also include $750,000 to design and begin work on a new Shellmaker Island Marine Education Center, a joint project between Newport Beach and the state Department of Fish and Game. The facility, to be opened in Upper Newport Bay, is intended to help relieve pressure on Corona del Mar’s Little Corona Beach tidal pools, whose popularity among school groups has raised concerns about whether they are being damaged by too many visitors.

“It will be some sort of education facility hopefully dealing with tide pools . . . and the impact of urban runoff on an estuarial environment,” Clauson said.

The agreement, announced this week, rings the final note in the long-running dispute over the spill, which began when the 800-foot American Trader ran over its own anchor on Feb. 7, 1990, as it moored at a now-abandoned oil terminal about 1.3 miles off Huntington Beach. The resulting leak was the worst to hit Southern California in 20 years, closing beaches for five weeks and killing more than 1,000 birds and animals.

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The $11.6 million is part of a $16-million settlement reached after an Orange County jury found Attransco, the corporate owner of American Trader, responsible for the spill on Dec. 8, 1997. The settlement was reached to avoid lengthy court appeals, and the remainder of the proceeds went to legal fees and courts costs.

The jury found that the public suffered legal damages as a result of the beach closures. Jurors valued a day at the beach at $13.19.

That financial settlement followed several others with BP America, the Trans-Alaska Pipeline Liability Fund and Golden West Refining Co. that netted $25 million to reimburse local and state agencies for cleanup costs and for programs to restore and protect wildlife habitats and establish a fish hatchery program in Carlsbad.

Under terms of that settlement, local agencies must use the money for recreation-related projects within the area affected by the spill. That restriction precluded using money for what one beach activist described as a more pressing need: establishing a broad response procedure for volunteers in the event of another spill.

“After the spill, I went down with other people eager to help out in any way we could, but we were told to get out, we don’t know what we’re doing,” said Nancy Gardner, co-founder of the Newport Beach chapter of the Surfrider Foundation.

“It’s too bad that we don’t have some of that funding to do a bit more in terms of precaution.”

Gardner said she was unfamiliar with the physical condition of the piers and boardwalks but lauded the decision to underwrite the Shellmaker Island facility.

“It’s a wonderful idea,” she said. “It will be so beneficial to schools to have an alternative [to Little Corona].”

In Huntington Beach, the money will allow the city to proceed with long-standing plans for $7 million in renovations to the south beach, said Ron Hagan, the city’s director of community services.

“[The] council approved the master plan in 1992, but we never had the money to do it,” he said. “This couldn’t have come at a more opportune time.”

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The master plan includes building new bathrooms and beach showers, sand walls along pathways and roads to reduce beach erosion, and new, wider bike trails.

“During the oil spill [cleanup], they had a lot of heavy trucks on the bike trails and that created a lot of potholes and cracks that have been a maintenance problem for us,” Hagan said.

Other projects to be funded include renovations to facilities within state parks at Huntington Beach, Bolsa Chica and Crystal Cove, and educational and public access programs under the state Department of Fish and Game and the State Lands Commission.

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Settlement Funds Beach Upgrades

Officials have settled on a plan to divvy up $11.6 million recovered in a settlement with the owner of a oil tanker that ran aground off the Orange County coast in 1990. The legal judgment will be used to fund beach and recreation projects in communities affected by the oil spill.

Newport Beach $4.8 million

Eligible projects: Newport and Balboa Pier rehabilitations; Corona del Mar State Beach concession area and restroom rehabilitation; Shellmaker Island marine education center; Ocean safety operations improvements and rescue boat; Restroom rehabilitation; Oceanfront sidewalk and street light replacement; Balboa Peninsula beach access walkway replacement

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Huntington Beach $3.6 million

Eligible project: South Beach improvements

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County of Orange $1.3 million

Eligible projects: Upper Newport Bay Regional Park improvements; Santa Ana River Beach improvements

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State Parks and Recreation: $2.2 million

Eligible projects: Huntington State Beach picnic facility; Bolsa Chica State Beach campfire center and lifeguard headquarters rehabilitation; Crystal Cove State Park visitor center exhibits.

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State Fish & Game and Lands Commission $6.5 million

Eligible projects: Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve access, education and interpretive projects; Coastal and marine education programs; Public access improvement projects

Source: California Attorney General’s office