Caltrans Foils Runoff Effort, Groups Allege

Two environmental groups Wednesday accused Caltrans of waging an aggressive propaganda campaign to sabotage a court-ordered study of treatment methods that could reduce the flow of polluted storm water from the state’s vast highway system.

Instead of remaining neutral as required during the research, the Natural Resources Defense Council and Santa Monica BayKeeper charged that Caltrans spent tens of millions of dollars in an effort to discredit an array of pollution controls designed to keep toxic runoff from reaching waterways and the ocean.

The allegation was filed in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles, where the organizations have waged a nine-year legal battle to force the giant transportation department into complying with the storm-water provisions of the federal Clean Water Act.

“Like a nefarious cigarette manufacturer, who knows that the facts are against it, Caltrans has embarked on a campaign of deceit designed to sell the unsuspecting public a pack of distortions and half-truths,” NRDC attorneys charged.

Officials at Caltrans’ Sacramento headquarters declined to comment, saying the agency has not reviewed the latest court filings. In the past they have said the department is committed to improving its storm-water programs and developing effective pollution controls.

Caltrans was ordered in January 1998 to work with NRDC and BayKeeper on a five-year study to determine the effectiveness and cost of devices that could filter highway runoff--a potentially toxic brew of oil, hydraulic fluid, exhaust particles, brake dust and metals that can harm aquatic life.

Judge Edward Rafeedie required both sides to remain neutral as they studied 38 treatment sites, including roadside strips of sand and vegetation, detention basins, vaults of compost or minerals, and simple devices to catch trash before it enters storm drains. The results are due out within a year.

But NRDC attorneys charged in legal papers filed Wednesday that Caltrans has engaged in a multimillion-dollar campaign to undermine the very methods now under consideration in the court-supervised demonstration project.

Caltrans’ in-house research has concluded that many of the treatment devices are too expensive and impractical to install on a widespread basis. The department has estimated it could cost as much as $54 billion to retrofit highways in Los Angeles County alone, not to mention the annual maintenance cost of $200 million.

Based on Caltrans’ studies, the California Transportation Commission warned in a 2002 report that the cost of treating highway runoff could have catastrophic effects on the state’s highway construction budget.

Court records state that, rather than remain neutral on the matter, Caltrans publicized its cost estimates and criticized storm-water treatment at professional conferences in California, Minnesota, Nevada, Florida and Washington, D.C.

“What we have identified is an effort by Caltrans to discredit storm-water controls at a time when the department is supposed to be reviewing them in a neutral way,” said David Beckman, an NRDC attorney in Los Angeles.

The groups want a court order forcing Caltrans to retract its own research, publish corrections in trade journals and refrain from releasing any new storm-water reports until the court-supervised study is completed.

An NRDC comparison with other states indicates that Caltrans has grossly overestimated the cost of storm-water controls, as much as 10 times for certain methods. Highway departments in Maryland and Washington have installed the controls without paralyzing their ability to build or repair roads.