Runoff Issue May Cause Delay

Top state water regulators are suddenly putting the brakes on a long-scheduled proposal to better protect sensitive California coastal areas, angering environmentalists who fear the regulators are trying to weaken the law to protect major developers and others.

Years in the making, the proposal, called “Issue 5,” was meant simply to deal with how the public can nominate important ocean waters for protection under the state Ocean Plan.

But a week before a key Oct. 4 public hearing, state regulators have recommended a delay so they can review and develop broad new guidelines for runoff into areas like Crystal Cove State Park in Orange County.

Urban runoff--water containing fertilizer, pesticides, waste oil and other chemicals that washes into the ocean--has received increased attention in recent years as a major cause of water pollution.

Edward Anton, a top state water official, said Tuesday the delay was prompted in part by a bitter dispute over runoff discharges from Irvine Co. construction sites into pristine Crystal Cove waters.

Environmentalists who have worked long and hard on the proposal expressed dismay.

“This is a noncontroversial item,” said Linda Sheehan, Pacific region director of the Center for Marine Conservation. “To come in at the last moment . . . is really troubling.”

But state officials counter that Issue 5 is the logical area of the law to address growing questions about urban runoff, because it incorporates guidelines for 34 specific biologically sensitive areas off the coast protected under the Ocean Plan, including Crystal Cove.

Anton, acting executive director of the State Water Resources Control Board, said the agency’s staff wants to thoroughly review possible runoff into other biologically sensitive marine areas and how it is addressed in the Ocean Plan.

The delay the agency staff is seeking needs to be approved by the four board members.

“We’re the only ones who can make that call,” said Arthur Baggett, acting chairman of the board.

The move comes as lower-ranking regional regulators prepare to order a halt to runoff discharges from Irvine Co. construction sites into waters off Crystal Cove.

Irvine Co. officials say they should not be singled out because urban runoff is possibly being discharged into other sensitive areas along the 1,100-mile California coast, including Monterey Bay and Carmel.

Irvine Co. spokesman Rich Elbaum said, “We’re providing information to the state board and the regional board” about other such possible discharges. Company officials would comment on Issue 5 separately at a later date, Elbaum said

Stan Martinson, water quality chief at the state board, says the existing rules forbidding runoff into sensitive marine areas pose “a very difficult situation” for landowners who are actively discharging runoff.

“We could say, on a somewhat cavalier note, ‘You can’t do that,’ ” Martinson said. “But it seems to me we have to look at alternatives. . . . We need to have a dialogue. We need to carve out middle ground.”

Anton said the regulators might look at whether runoff should be allowed near biologically significant areas if it meets certain water quality standards, whether existing dischargers should be exempt under new, stiffer enforcement policies, and other possibilities.

“There are a lot of options,” Anton said.

The Irvine Co., regulators and environmentalists have debated Crystal Cove runoff issues for more than a year. But the latest spate of news stories and meetings came after a local activist crawled into a culvert emptying onto the beach at Crystal Cove State Park and discovered a lengthy system of 60- and 48-inch pipes leading downhill from Irvine Co. home-building sites on the bluffs above.

Both the developer and regulators say the Irvine Co. obtained all necessary permits for the pipes.

But two recent spills from the pipes focused more attention on the runoff.