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Runoff Controversy
Fri Apr 18, 2003
Listen in RealAudio 
We usually think of rainstorms as washing away unhealthy air, but in Los Angeles it's just the
opposite. Pollution is most severe during the rain. As correspondent Chris Richard tells us,
cleaning up the air has sparked controversy.
You know that song, "It Never Rains In Southern California"? Sometimes it seems that the
civil engineers who built LA and the surrounding suburbs really believed that. Because when it
does rain, even a little bit, all hell breaks loose. Roadways flood. Traffic lights fail.
And untreated storm runoff pours into the Pacific.
Dennis Dickerson of the Southern California Regional Water Authority:
DD: The runoff is picking up any number of contaminants that may be on the streets. So if you
have a homeless population, that is one area that may be contributing human fecal matter. You
have a lot of trash in our catch basins, and that flows to the ocean. So you have all
different kinds of contaminants, from oils and grease from your cars to copper from brake
pads, just a whole host of different contaminants.
Dickerson's agency has ordered Southern California to come up with ways to reduce runoff or
dry up pollution sources. Recommendations range from better street sweeping to more catch
basins.
But a group of University of Southern California professors claims that the water quality
standards require water purification plants, and they estimate costs of cleanup programs at
$300 billion.
USC Engineering professor Jim Moore:
JM: There are costs to pollution, and those costs are real, and there are costs associated
with controlling pollution. And what we're talking about is trading off the two.
The Los Angeles County Board of supervisors and 47 city governments are suing to block the
clean water requirements until they can be modified.
But Dickerson says the USC study grossly overestimates cleanup costs by claiming his agency
wants runoff to be clean enough to drink. He says the cities that paid for the study are just
dodging their responsibilities.
DD: The people who are polluting are trying to avoid the costs of the pollution that they
generate.
And Dickerson says there are costs to not cleaning up the mess, too, like damage to Southern
California's vitally important tourist industry.
That's correspondent Chris Richard in Los Angeles. The Weather Notebook is underwritten by
Subaru and the National Science Foundation.
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