Beach Report Card - California Coastkeeper Alliance

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the major source of contamination for LongBeach beaches, the city’s investigations haveresulted in the discovery and repair of leakingor disconnected sewage pump lines and improperlyworking storm drain diversions. Thecity has also implemented an innovative pilottechnology to disinfect runoff in the stormdrains. Ultimately however, most Long Beachwater quality will be directly tied to rainfallamounts and runoff volumes from the Los AngelesRiver. Unfortunately, as discussed laterin this report, the Los Angeles Regional WaterQuality Control Board did not take Heal theBay’s recommendation for a tight compliancetimeline in the Los Angeles River BacteriaTMDL to ensure that Long Beach beaches donot remain impacted for many years to come.Instead, the TMDL allows 25 years to complywith water quality standards in both dry andwet weather – far too long for Long Beachresidents and visitors to wait for clean water.Santa Monica Bay Total MaximumDaily Loads (TMDLs)Every beach from the Ventura County linesouth to Palos Verdes was mandated to meetstate beach bacteria health standards 100% ofthe time during the AB411 time period (April1–Oct. 31) by July 15, 2006 and only three allowableviolations during the winter dry period(Nov. 1–March 31) by July 15, 2009 orface penalties. In addition, the first winter wetweather compliance point passed in 2009;specifically the TMDL requires a 10% cumulativepercentage reduction from the total exceedanceday reductions required for eachjurisdictional group. Marina del Rey’s Mother’sBeach and Back Basins had a compliancedeadline for summer and winter dry weather ofMarch 18, 2007 and Los Angeles Harbor (InnerCabrillo Beach and Main Ship Channel) passedthe compliance deadline for both the AB411time period and winter dry and winter wetweather on March 10, 2010. The 100% compliancerequirement for the AB411 time periodmeans that all of these beaches must be safefor swimming every day for the seven monthsfrom April through October. In the winter dryand winter wet time periods, beaches are alloweda specified number of exceedances inorder to account for reference conditions.These requirements are within the fecal bacteriaTMDLs for Santa Monica Bay, Mother’sFIGURE 4-6Percentage of Grades by Time Periodfor Long Beach7132747202053AB411: April-October (15 locations)33WINTER-DRY (15 locations)720Santa Monica Bay. Photo: Joy Aoki202013DRY WEATHER (15 locations)100WET WEATHER (15 locations)KEY:Numbers in BOLD indicate percentages36
FIGURE 4-7Percentage of Grades by Time Periodfor L.A. County (excl. Long Beach)877FIGURE 4-82010-2011 Los Angeles County Water Quality and Seven-Year Average 2003-2010 (in percentages)AB411 (92 locations)7-Year Average (94 locations)DRY (87 locations)7-Year Average (85 locations)159WET (87 loc.)AB411: April-October (77 locations)7-Yr Average (85 loc.)66722WINTER-DRY (72 locations)8637DRY WEATHER (72 locations)18356076211314WET WEATHER (72 locations)KEY:Numbers in BOLD indicate percentagesBeach and Los Angeles Harbor.Unfortunately, the compliance deadlines havecome and gone and many of Santa MonicaBay’s beaches like Surfrider Beach, TopangaState Beach at creek mouth, Redondo MunicipalPier, Mother’s Beach, Dockweiler State Beach atBallona Creek mouth and inner Cabrillo Beachstill frequently had elevated bacteria concentrationsabove the TMDL limits. While some citieshave made noticeable improvements in identifyingand rectifying sources of ocean pollution,measures to fix chronically polluted beacheslike Dockweiler State Beach at Ballona Creekmouth, Cabrillo Beach and Surfrider have beeninadequate. (For more information on the beachbacteria TMDLs please see “Beach Report CardImpacts 2010-2011” on Page 61.)Clean Beach Initiative (CBI)Projects UpdateAvalon BeachFour years ago, a $4.5 million swimmer healtheffects study included Avalon Beach as a researchlocation due to its perpetually poor waterquality. The Avalon study was completed in2010 and the paper should be released beforethe end of 2011. Also, researchers from StanfordUniversity and UC Irvine completed sourcetracking, fate and transport, and modeling studiesthat demonstrated that sewage contaminatedgroundwater is a major source of beach pollutionat Avalon. Researchers also found humanenteroviruses using molecular methods.In September 2008, the SWRCB and the cityof Avalon completed a grant agreement forProposition 13–Clean Beaches Initiative (CBI)funding for the Avalon Bay Water Quality ImprovementProject. This project’s goal was toinspect, repair and/or replace approximately370 residential sewer laterals; and to installmonitoring wells along Avalon’s main beachesand at inland locations. Once the temporaryfreeze of state funding for the project ended,the sewer repair portion was completed lastsummer. Despite completion of the project,water quality at Avalon Beach has remainedpoor. A major sewer infrastructure replacement,which includes privately owned sewersystems, is imperative for Avalon to come offthe Beach Bummer list. Recently, newspapersreported that $11 million would be spent in thenear future on tourism amenity improvementswith a long-term spending price tag of up to$100 million, yet inadequate attention has gonetowards the necessary sewer system overhaul.In contrast, if chronically-leaking raw sewagewas found on a beach on the mainland, localhealth agencies would have closed it as requiredunder AB411 and there would be intense37
Page 3 and 4: Heal the Bay is a nonprofit environ
Page 5 and 6: Heal the Bay’s21st Annual Beach R
Page 7 and 8: Executive SummaryHeal the Bay’s 2
Page 9 and 10: TOP TEN BEACH BUMMERSBEACH/COUNT Y
Page 11 and 12: conventional analytical methods, an
Page 15: IntroductionHeal the Bay’s first
Page 18 and 19: dards (AB411) and recommended by th
Page 20 and 21: The disparity between dry and wet w
Page 22 and 23: California’s Dry WeatherHonor Rol
Page 24 and 25: Cabrillo Beach harborside. Photo: J
Page 26 and 27: Heal the Bay advises coastal beachg
Page 28 and 29: San Diego CountyFIGURE 4-1Percentag
Page 30 and 31: More on the Tijuana River SloughWhe
Page 32 and 33: tored during the AB411 time period.
Page 34 and 35: or cut back on their ocean water qu
Page 38 and 39: public pressure to upgrade the sewe
Page 40 and 41: a continuous schedule for seven day
Page 42 and 43: ability of sand to filter and infil
Page 44 and 45: Santa Barbara CountyThe County of S
Page 48 and 49: San Mateo CountyThe County of San M
Page 50: Background information on theSan Fr
Page 53 and 54: Humboldt CountyIn an effort to proa
Page 55 and 56: FIGURE 4-252010 Summer Oregon Water
Page 57 and 58: Beach Types and Water QualitySouthe
Page 59: Beach Pollution PatternsPercentage
Page 62 and 63: Even though the EPA’s water quali
Page 64: Island and perform additional epide
Page 67 and 68: California’s beach monitoring pro
Page 69 and 70: will move from the State Department
Page 71 and 72: fornia Environmental Quality Act Sc
Page 73 and 74: APPENDIX A1Heal the Bay’s Annual
Page 75 and 76: APPENDIX A1Table 8-3:Single Sample
Page 77 and 78: APPENDIX A2Table 8-6:Single Sample
Page 79 and 80: A+San Luis ObispoCounty• San Sime
Page 81 and 82: APPENDIX C1AB411 Dry Wet Winter Dry
Page 84 and 85: APPENDIX C1County“Beach Bummer”
Page 86 and 87:
APPENDIX C1Los Angeles County, cont
Page 88 and 89:
APPENDIX C1Ventura County, cont’d
Page 90 and 91:
APPENDIX C1San Luis Obispo County,
Page 92 and 93:
APPENDIX C1San Francisco CountyAB41
Page 94 and 95:
APPENDIX C22010 Summer Beach Report
Page 96 and 97:
APPENDIX C32010 Summer Beach Report
Page 98:
1444 9th Street, Santa Monica, CA 9
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Beach Report Card - California Coastkeeper Alliance

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