(March 12, 2008) -- LBReport.com has learned that in response to advocacy urging modification of the L.A. River to empty into the Ports instead its current artificial eastward turn that sends trash onto LB's beaches, Port of LB senior management prepared an "information only" memo for LB's Board of Harbor Commissioners to counter these arguments.

At the request of the Board, staff has since developed these points into a public presentation that challenges the river diversion proposal and instead urges stronger enforcement of existing stormwater trash/runoff rules applicable to upriver cities and the County.

1968 view. Source: Port of LB website

LBReport.com provides below the text of a February 2008 information-only Port memo (provided to us by the Port) that spells out the case against the river diversion proposal. We also provide on-demand audio of salient portions of the March 10 Harbor Commission Committee meeting at which senior Port staff presented its arguments in polished Power Point form and recommended focusing on upriver L.A. river issues.

PoLB Envir. Planning Dir. Cameron	LB Harbor Comm'ner Hankla
Images source: www.polb.com screen capture

At the March 10 meeting, Harbor Commissioner James Hankla urged Port legal counsel to seek enforcement of existing stormwater regulations (that are supposed to keep trash out of the river in the first place) and Committee chair/Harbor Commission VP Dr. Mike Walter urged Port staff to disseminate the Port's staff presentation to LB media outlets.

The issue arose following an unofficial, passionate and pointed "State of the City" speech delivered in Oct. 2007 to LB's Rotary by downtown LB businessman John Morris (Smooth's Sports Grille). LBReport.com covered the event in detail.

Mr. Morris argued (and illustrated with archival video) that LB lost two of its greatest downtown assets -- clean air and clean water -- due to Port expansion. Among the examples he cited was the diversion decades ago of the L.A. river eastward (at taxpayer expense) to facilitate Port interests and Port growth...and argued that the Port owes the City for the loss of clean water and clean air...that need to be restored.

In January 2008, Mayor Bob Foster stunned the crowd at his official "State of the City" message by indicating that with respect to water quality issues, the City would "look at a host of posible solutions" and "one option may even include diverting the mouth of the L.A. River westward, back to its ancestral path into the Port. Believe it or not -- and this really pains me to say this -- John Morris may just have it right. [Applause, some cheers] God help us all. [laughter]."

Informed of the Port's stance on his river re-routing proposal, Mr. Morris told LBReport.com that he intends to read the Port's staff memo closely and will comment thereafter.

[Mr. Morris owns and operates Smooth's Sports Grille, which is a visible LBReport.com advertiser, and routinely advertises in multiple LB media outlets.]

In February, PoLB Director of Environmental Planning, Richard Cameron, sent the memo text below to LB Harbor Commissioners. PoLB's public information staff provided it to us promptly when we followed-up on the March 10 Harbor Commission/Committee item regarding the L.A. river issue:

Date: February 6, 2008
Information Only

To: Board of Harbor Commissioners

From: Richard D. Cameron, Director of Environmental Planning

Subject: Relocation of the Los Angeles River

BACKGROUND

A proposal to relocate the mouth of the Los Angeles River from Queensway Bay to the inner harbor of the Port of Long Beach has been put forward by several individuals. The proposal appears to have two premises: (1) that the river would be put back to its "original location," roughly through Pier B into the Turning Basin, and (2) that by forcing the Port to pay for the project the City could reap benefits in terms of improved water quality in Queensway Bay and eastern San Pedro Bay that would repay what, according to the proposal, the Port "owes" the City for past negative impacts of Port activity.

DESCRIPTION OF CURRENT ISSUES

Because the proposal may receive serious consideration in political circles, staff has prepared this brief evaluation. Although the proposal's proponents do not mention costs, staff believes that relocating the Los Angeles River through Pier B would cost many billions of dollars, disrupt Port operations, and remove an important buffer between the Port and downtown Long Beach. It would (1) entail substantial modifications to the 710 freeway (because the river would have to flow under the freeway at some point); (2) require the relocation of hundreds of utilities; (3) eliminate at least some Port terminals on Pier B; (4) create large scale siltation and annual dredging liability; (5) alter the hydrodynamics of the Inner Harbor, possibly affecting vessel navigation at times; and (6) substantially degrade harbor water quality.

Regardless of the proposal"s costs and consequences, staff believes that both of its basic premises are erroneous. First, since the Los Angeles River has substantially shifted its course several times in the past two hundred and fifty years it cannot be said to have an "original" alignment through Long Beach Harbor. Until the 20th century the river sometimes flowed westward from the downtown area to empty into Santa Monica Bay at what is now Marina del Rey, and sometimes to San Pedro along what is now Dominguez Channel (and it also joined with the San Gabriel River in Long Beach, in roughly its current location, for a time). The river"s course has been artificially determined since approximately the turn of the century: the development of Los Angeles Harbor relocated the river from San Pedro to a course through the Pier B area of Long Beach Harbor, and the flooding of the 1930s prompted its relocation by the Corps of Engineers to its current alignment. In fact, the river has been in its current alignment substantially longer than in the equally artificial one promoted by the proposal.

The proposal's second premise is likewise based on faulty assumptions. First, the contention that the Port owes the City for past impacts does not seem to have any clear nexus to the actual proposal. Setting aside the Port"s benefits to the City, region, and state, the fact is that relocating the river would not alleviate the negative impacts that Port operations do have on air quality, public health, and traffic, and since the Port has had negligible adverse impacts on water quality in San Pedro Bay, it is unclear how the proposal would redress a past wrong. Furthermore, the proposal does not address the degradation of harbor water quality that would result. Through its Coastal Act and Tidelands Trust-mandated stewardship of the natural resources entrusted to it, the Port of Long Beach, working with local, state, and federal agencies, has made great strides in improving water quality and marine habitat in the harbor. Diverting the Los Angeles River into the harbor would undo decades of environmental progress.

Second, even if the proposal were warranted, the Port has no authority to undertake or to fund a relocation of the Los Angeles River. The river is under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Los Angeles Flood Control District (an arm of county government). Neither of those agencies would benefit from such an action, and any degradation of the flood-carrying capacity of the river would conflict with those agencies' mandates. In addition, the Tidelands Trust restricts the use of Port funds to projects that promote "commerce, navigation, and fisheries;" relocating the Los Angeles River as a means of redress for past wrongs would conflict with the Trust unless a clear nexus could be established.

Third, since Long Beach Harbor is not the source of the pollution in the Los Angeles River, relocating the river to the harbor would not solve the pollution problem. The Los Angeles River drains an area of over 800 square miles, most of it within this nation"s most populous metropolitan area and much of it paved. The pollution the river brings to Long Beach comes from the activities of several million people in more than 30 cities and communities along its 50-mile course. If the river were diverted, trash and debris carried by the river would still flow through the harbor and would still end up stranded on the city"s beaches. Diverting that pollution is not the answer; instead, the most effective way to deal with water pollution, as every agency and virtually every environmental organization acknowledges, is through source control. An example is the City"s storm water program, which the Port is a part of, that is aimed at reducing pollution entering rivers and streams by controlling the sources of pollution. The billions of dollars the river"s relocation would cost would be much more effectively spent on source control measures upstream and throughout the watershed.

Staff believes that the proposal not only ignores, but by diverting Port revenues, jeopardizes the Port"s benefits to the people of Long Beach and all of California. Any proposal to spend very large amounts of the Port"s money should keep those benefits in mind: in Long Beach, nearly 30,000 trade-related jobs, $4 billion in sales of goods and services, and tens of millions of dollars in Tidelands Trust funds, sales taxes, and possessory interest taxes to the City"s coffers; in Southern California over 300,000 jobs and nearly $50 billion in sales; and nationwide roughly 1.4 million jobs, nearly $150 billion in sales, and $2.5 billion in customs revenue.

RECOMMENDATION

Staff recommends that the Port continue to work with the County, the regulatory agencies, and upstream stakeholders to promote and implement source control along the Los Angeles River by actively participating in ongoing planning efforts. More particularly, the Port should approach the Mayor of Long Beach about forming a Mayor"s Task Force, with the Port as a key member, that will aggressively pursue source control upstream through a comprehensive program that includes clear goals and metrics, progress monitoring, and regular reporting.

Recommended by:

Robert Kanter, Ph.D.
Managing Director of Environmental Affairs and Planning

Approved by:

Richard D. Steinke
Executive Director

On March 10, Port Environmental Planning Director Cameron addressed the Harbor Commission's Enginering and Environmental Committee with a polished Power Point presentation that reiterated points in his Feb. memo...and recommended focusing on L.A. River water quality via (among other things) L.A. County's National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) regulations that are supposed to require upriver cities, and the County, to prevent trash from getting into the river in the first place.

Mr. Cameron called this approach more logical and cost effective than attempting to redirect the L.A. river...and said at several points that the NPDES approach offers a "fair share" solution. Mr. Cameron added that these requirements are in place right now and offer an opportunity to work the Mayor and other city departments on the issue.

Harbor Commissioner James Hankla amplified these points in a Q & A and colloquy with staffer Cameron...and went further by urging Dominic Holzhaus, the Port's City Attorney legal counsel, to look into ways to ensure greater enforcement of the existing NPDES requirements.

Committee chair/Harbor Commission VP Dr. Mike Walter then wrapped up the item...urging Port staff to make the information available to media outlets, adding: "I'd like to suggest that we make this report available to the media...We'd like to have them have that because this seems to surface every time there's a big rain storm or something, and I'd like to put this to rest."

To hear these comments/colloquy with Harbor Commissioner Hankla and Harbor Commission VP Walter, click here.