(Feb. 16, 2010) -- Last week, TheDistrictWeekly.com reported on what the EPA website said was an oil spill and property owner Tom Dean advocate Mike Murchison said was a very small amount of grease on property south of Second Street, east of the Marketplace. This is on part of the property included in the land exchange approved by the City Council in August 2009 on a 5-4 vote.
In driving by the area on President's Day (Mon. Feb. 15) I saw lots of equipment -- trucks and many men working adjacent to the large pond used by many migrating water fowl and as a nesting area for resident birds...and the workers were closer than when I last saw them on Feb. 10 (details below).
The Belding's Savannah Sparrow is beginning to breed in the surrounding pickleweed. These birds depend on pickleweed for food and nesting habitat are found only in salt water wetlands.
As there are less than 5% of these wetlands left in California, the birds are highly endangered. Besides ducks, egrets and herons, White-face Ibis recently have been seen in this area.
I assume this is part of the EPA operation to attempt to clean up this site...but I wonder if Fish and Wildlife and Fish and Game have been notified of this activity during breeding season (they were closed for the holiday weekend).
The public deserves to know what is happening on this property and whether adequate precautions are in place to protect the wildlife. Councilwoman Gerrie Schipske has indicated to me via email that she will ask the City Manager to get a response to these questions.
On Feb. 10, I attended the latest quarterly meeting of the Los Cerritos Wetlands Authority, a governmental body formed in 2005 by the cities of Long Beach, Seal Beach, the CA Coastal Conservancy and the Rivers and Mountains Conservancy). The LCWA is chaired by 3rd dist. Councilman Gary DeLong; 4th dist. Councilman Patrick O’Donnell represents the Rivers and Mts. Conservancy; Mary Small is the designated representatives for the Coastal Conservancy; Mike Levitt reresents the City of Seal Beach.
At the meeting, LCWA Executive Director, Belinda Faustinos reported on the status of the various wetlands parcels, including the Hellman, Bryant, Berger and Dean properties. The LCWA has acquired 66 acres of the Bryant property at Studebaker and 2nd St., plus 5 acres of what is now known as the Edison property on the northeast corner. Because of the freeze on State Bonds, much of the anticipated acquisition and restoration of these properties has been halted.
Mary Parsell of El Dorado Audubon, asked the authority to include Audubon in their liability insurance policy so there could be guided bird walks on the LCWA property. The Board approved this.
Councilman DeLong was asked to report on the progress of the wetlands land swap with Berger/Dean and the City of Long Beach. He said the land swap was moving slowly; work is being done to assess the cost share of former owners for necessary clean-up.
When asked about what happened on the property east of the Marketplace (regarding the oil spill/grease spill), Councilman DeLong said he didn't have any information but that EPA was in charge of cleaning up any oil along with the PBCs on the property.
After leaving the meeting, Ann Denison, president of the Los Cerritos Wetlands Land Trust and I drove by the area that a Council majority voted to acquire from Tom Dean's LLC in exchange for city owned industrial zoned property. Seeing a bulldozer, trucks and a number of men near the pond east of Trader Joe’s, we walked onto the property to talk to them. One of the men confirmed there had been a small spill and we could see oil was being contained by sand bags.
This was in an area north of the large pond which is the home of many wildfowl. We were assured that no birds were involved in the oil spill and told to leave as we "were not wearing steel toed boots." Thus, we were unable to see if the birds were O.K. As we left, we saw four men donning haz-mat suits as they went into the pond to remove the boom.
I hope Long Beach City Hall is learning from this that all clean up must take place before any land exchange can occur.
At the Feb. 9 City Council meeting, city staff indicated that in part because the City couldn't afford to clean up land next to the Terminal Island Freeway, it set a relatively low value on that property in leasing it to a Tom Dean entity (and allowed rent credits that might mean no City rent revenue for several years).
Should we expect any less for the Wetlands?
What Wildlife May Be Affected By Whatever Spilled On SE LB Open Space/Wetlands, And Has City Hall Learned Proper Lessons From Required 
