Water board grants Boeing more time

Earlier this week, Boeing was given some wiggle room when it asked the state water resources board if it would ease limits on the amount of pollution that water runoff can contain at its Santa Susana Field Laboratory site.

The pollution water runoff limits were originally established by the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board in permits that were issued in 2004. The permits were revised and had more stringent standards applied to them in January and March of this year.

The four-member state water resources control board decided to uphold some provisions contained in the permit, but also ordered the regional water board to give Boeing an appropriate amount of time to come into compliance with the limit.

The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board will decide in May 2007 on the amount of time Boeing has to come into compliance.

“I am troubled and surprised with the board’s decision. They indicated a mistrust of the regional board’s discretion by reversing their ruling, and then they turn around and tell the regional board that the time period is up to their discretion. What kind of a mixed message are they trying to send?” said Elizabeth Crawford, the founder of rocketdynewatch.org. “The state board is protecting the process rather than protecting the public.”

According to Crawford, the board also prevented her from reading public transcripts to the board that were compiled by residents whose children are suffering from retinal glastoma, a rare form of cancer that only affects in every 1.5 million babies under the age of five.

“Boeing is arguing at these meetings that there is no public outcry because no one attends the meetings in Sacramento, but it’s incredibly difficult for people to make it all the way up there,” Crawford said.

Boeing asked the board to extend the amount of time that the company has to come into compliance with numeric limits set by the permit because of the Topanga Fire, which ravaged approximately 2,000 of the 2,850 acres of the field laboratory, according to Blythe Jameson, a spokesperson with Boeing.

The destruction of natural foliage made it difficult to prevent runoff from escaping the site.

“Often when there is a new permit, entities are given a period of time to get their practices in order. It’s going to take time to get an effective program into place,” Jameson said.

According to officials with Boeing, a compliance period was not granted when the permit was issued.

Jameson was not able to comment on the exact amount of time Boeing was requesting, but stated that programs such as re-vegetation, which helps to eliminate excess runoff, can take up to four years to implement.

According to Jameson, the permit added or changed about 186 water runoff limits and required the company to test 10 additional outfall areas.

“Some of the limits that were set are exceedingly lower than some drinking water standards,” she said.

The company is currently being investigated by the U.S. attorney general’s office to see if they have violated clean-water standards. The company’s records detailing its pollution discharge between 2001 and 2005 were subpoenaed by the attorney general’s office in November of last year.

Critics charge that pollutants have escaped from the site over the years through water runoff. They also believe that these pollutants, as well as radiation from nuclear testing, have lead to multiple cases of cancer among employees and nearby residents.

The Santa Susana Field Laboratory was built in 1948 by North American Aviation and purchased by Boeing in 1996. It consists of 2,850 acres in eastern Ventura County. Over the years, it has been used as a test site for experiments involving nuclear reactors, highpowered lasers and rockets.

“We will continue to do everything we can to implement our best management practices. Compliance is our objective, and we look forward to working with the agencies,” Jameson said.