LBPOST.com: Stimulus Funding Will Go Towards Cleaning LA River

Thursday, September 2, 2010

Stimulus Funding Will Go Towards Cleaning LA River

by Ryan ZumMallen | Long Beach News | 08.06.09 |

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Cities that drain into the Los Angeles River - causing it to be extremely polluted and the number one source of Long Beach's poor ocean quality - will receive $10 million in Stimulus funding to clean water before it enters the river, the City Manager's office announced today.

It's generally acknowledged that Long Beach's ocean water quality is so poor mainly because of the massive amount of pollutants and debris carried down from northern cities through the LA River. Litigation had been explored in the past in an attempt to force those cities to clean the water they input into the river, but was eventually dropped - mainly because it was impossible to prove that specific pollutants were coming from which cities, and because the process would have been costly. But the $10 million in funds marks the first concrete solution to cleaning up water before it's sent to the river.

Will the $10 million be distributed evenly to all 16 cities, or differently based on need? If evenly, it would amount to about $625,000 per city - which is more than enough to produce effective results. Take, for example, the City of Long Beach's efforts that were outlined in a May report from environmental group Heal The Bay, which called out Long Beach for spending $300,000 to improve the water the City sends into the river. With fifteen other cities each armed with twice that amount, how much improvement could we see in Long Beach's water quality?

Long Beahc used that money to insert nearly 2,000 SmartSponge filters into more than 500 drains citywide to strain pollutants from the water entering stormdrains, and eventually, the LA RIver and Pacific Ocean. They also inserted blue gates that prevented large debris like roots and thick mud from entering the system.

The full press release from the City Manager's office is provided below:

Los Angeles River Cities to Receive Stimulus Funds to Clean Up the LA River

The California State Water Board has awarded $10 million in Stimulus funds to help 16 cities that drain into the LA River capture their trash before it enters the LA River. The funding will be administered by the LA Gateway Region Integrated Regional Water Management Authority (LA Gateway Authority), who will distribute the funds to the 16 cities in the Gateway Region that drain into the Los Angeles River.

The grant will fund trash-collection devices that can be inserted into storm drains to capture trash. The City of Long Beach has successfully installed hundreds of these devices already using other funding sources, proving that the technology works and can be easily implemented.

"The vast majority of the trash that ends up on our beaches is generated by the upstream cities, and these funds will make a huge difference in stopping trash before it even enters the Los Angeles River. This is a great step in the right direction," said Mayor Bob Foster.

The LA Gateway Authority received the maximum $10 million grant, and this project received nearly a quarter of the total funding available for new urban stormwater projects. The $10 million grant will outfit approximately 3,750 catchbasins, or more than 40 percent of the catchbasins that currently dump into the LA River. In an average year, the City of Long Beach picks up more than 3,000 tons of trash deposited on the beach by the LA River.

�I want to wholeheartedly thank the Gateway Cities Council of Government, all of the upstream cities, and our legislative delegation for all coming together to support this regional project that will have such a positive effect on Long Beach,� said City Manager Pat West.

The cities that will receive funding include Bell, Bell Gardens, Commerce, Compton, Cudahy, Downey, Huntington Park, Long Beach, Lynwood, Maywood, Montebello, Paramount, Pico Rivera, Signal Hill, South Gate and Vernon.

Also, check out this story I wrote in June about some of the City's efforts to send cleaner water into the Los Angeles River. Hopefully other cities will take notes!

Comments

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9 Comments so far.

lbresident
This is great news. Ryan, I think it's $10M not $16M.

Ryan Z
Whoops, you're right. My apologies!

Cody
Not to be cynical... ok, I am being cynical. So not to be mean-spirited, but how many jobs will this stimulus money save or create, and for how long will they last? After all, that's the basic purpose of this money, right?

John Greet
Cody: Your point is very well taken and although the statutory purpose of this program transends simply saving or creating jobs, that's the emphasis President Obama has always placed upon this program and really the only benefit he seems to ever mention. In truth, the only thing this program was ever intended to stimulate was government. The federal government aproved this program and we literally had to print the money necessary to fund it. After the fed takes its cut of the funds it created *from nothing*, they are then funnelled through State and local governments which, in turn, take their cut and fund various social programs and projects that they couldn't have otherwise afforded. Programs and projects that, in large part, are government owned, operated and staffed. What jobs are being created are, for the most part, temporary and almost exclusively government or government contractor positions. Thus, government stimulating government. If they really wanted to stimulate the economy they should have left the money printing presses turned off and simply given every single taxpayer a fair and equal credit on their next income tax bill. This would have allowed us all to keep more of the money we earn so that we could use it as we saw fit. Any such use would have, in turn, stimulated the economy in the truest sense. But, as mentioned, doing so was never the intended purpose of this program.

lbresident
It is true the stimulus package was nothing more than one great big welfare package. This is one of the very few projects I support because at least it's infrastructure.

Cody
Yeah, my question had a good amount of sarcasm to it.

Kenny
Cody/John, the government is providing funds to help clean up our water and you guys are complaining?

John Greet
Kenny: In a word, "yes". Financing the clean up the L.A. River is not something the federal government should be involved in. The list of things the federal government should not be involved in financing, but is, gets longer by the second and this is precisely why our federal government is so very bloated, inefficient and costly today. In truth the responsibility for the cost of cleaning up the L.A. River should be born by all of the jurisdictions that actually contribute to its pollution, commensurate with the level of pollution they contribute. This should be happening voluntarily but, since it clearly has not been, the County, and not the federal government, should mandate it. Those municipalities that do not comply should be fined, and heavily, until they begin to do so. We should not be financing this project in this way and to do so simply relieves contributing jurisdictions of the reasonable and just financial consequences of their persistent pollution. If, in the final analysis, it doesn't cost these jurisdictions anything to pollute our waterways, where is the motivation to stop doing so? "Why should *we* bear the costs to stop polluting the river?" they will say, "The federal government will pay that bill, so we're going to let it." This position has the effect of: 1. Allowing them to avoid the responsibility for cleaning up their own messes and, 2: Makes all of us still more beholden to a federal government that is already far too large, costly and intrusive to begin with. In my view, those who like this 'Stimulus Package' demonstrate a lack of awareness, appreciation concern, or a combination of all three, of where the funding is actually coming from. It's coming from a vacuum. It's funding that didn't exist before this 'package' was passed and the eventual costs will be borne by all of us in the form of increased federal taxes and an exploding national debt. We need to start thinking beyond ourselves, for once, and understand what the true costs are for all of this federal largesse.

John Greet
Kenny: One other point if I may; "The government" isn't "providing" these funds. "The government" doesn't *own* any funds to provide. All "the government" is doing, in this case, is printing money and then distributing it to other government entities to spend, thus "government stimulating government". This is money that we, the taxpayers, and our children and grandchildren, must eventually finance through our taxes. Thus the government "provides" nothing. It only creates programs and services and pays for them by printing and distributing money that we all must eventually finance, and usually at prices that far exceed what these programs and services are truly worth. This 'stimulus package' is nothing more than the federal government creating money that it doesn't own, distributing it to other government entities that likewise do not own it who, in turn, spend it on programs and services that they alone deem worthy and that the federal government must first, conveniently, approve of. Why should taxpayers in Montana be required to help subsidize the clean up of the L.A. River? Why should taxpayers in Rhode Island be required to subsidize the rehabilitation of the Colorado Lagoon? Why should you be required to help subsidize a "stimulus" project in Alabama? They should not and neither should you! Some are so anxious to hold out their hands for this 'stimulus' money that they are completely oblivious to the fact that it's coming out of their own wallets and purses and those of future generations.

Long Beach News

LBPOST.com Managing Editor Ryan ZumMallen keeps up on all the current and breaking Long Beach news.

Ryan ZumMallen has served as the managing editor of the LBPOST.com since 2007. He graduated from CSULB with a degree in Print Journalism in 2008 and is a member of the 2009 class of Leadership Long Beach. You can find him on various basketball courts around the city.

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