South Los Angeles residents fuming over oil field

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At a town hall meeting for residents of a South Los Angeles neighborhood who say fumes from an oil field are making them sick, Thomas Florio suggests that air-quality samples should be taken inside local apartments. The meeting was moderated by South Coast Air Quality Management District officials and held at Mount St. Mary’s College. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Barry Wallerstein, executive director of the South Coast Air Quality Management District, center, listens to South Los Angeles residents at a town hall meeting express concerns about fumes from a nearby oil field. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Nancy Halpern Ibrahim, executive director of Esperanza Community Housing Corp., speaks during a town hall meeting concerning fumes from a South Los Angeles oil field. She holds a model that she says depicts some of the symptoms, including headaches and nose bleeds, that people living near the field are experiencing. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Sabino Valencia cleans son Jonathan’s face after the boy had a nosebleed at their University Park home. Valencia is planning to move his family away from the neighborhood where he has lived for 22 years because two of his five children have nosebleeds nearly every day, and he believes the area is no longer a healthful place to live. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Brenda Valensia, 7, left, and her brother Steven, 5, watch a movie in their parents’ bedroom in University Park. It is one of a growing number of communities with concerns about newly invigorated wells. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Teresa Mendoza mixes Kool-Aid for son Jonathan Valencia, 2 1/2, as Sabino Valencia, 36, helps son Steven, 5, with his homework at their University Park home. The couple say their boys have frequent nosebleeds. They’re in the process of seeking medical tests to find out why. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Monic Uriarte, 55, right, speaks with Geronimo Duenez in the University Park area of South Los Angeles. Uriarte is going door to door handing out fliers to residents to bring attention to the air quality in their neighborhood. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Jonathan Valencia, age 2 1/2, plays in his home in the University Park neighborhood. Later that evening, Jonathan had a bloody nose. His brother Steven and the boys’ parents state their two sons have nosebleeds daily. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Residents were asked to sign their names on paper next to Styrofoam heads representing the various symptoms they were experiencing in the University Park neighborhood in Los Angeles. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Maria Bejarano, 51, signs her friends’ names on paper next to Styrofoam heads representing the symptoms they were experiencing in the University Park neighborhood. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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About 40 members of the community gather in front of Monic Uriarte’s building in the University Park neighborhood. In what they called an “action,” they hung a banner that read “People Not Pozos” (“People Not Wells”) and spoke about the air quality in their community. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Paul Caballero, left, and Jose Enriquez, center, air quality inspectors with the AQMD, speak with Monic Uriarte in front of her building in the University Park neighborhood in Los Angeles. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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This Allenco Energy Inc. facility is concealed behind a 12-foot-high, ivy-covered wall. Between 2009 and 2010, Allenco increased oil production here from 4,178 barrels to 21,239, according to the state Division of Oil, Gas & Geothermal Resources. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

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Monic Uriarte, 55, waters flowers outside her apartment in University Park. She says she began having recurring headaches and bouts of dizziness about three years ago and her daughter started suffering nosebleeds and respiratory ailments. (Francine Orr / Los Angeles Times)

By Louis Sahagun

Oct. 16, 2013 9:53 PM PT

The South Coast Air Quality Management District’s top brass faced a frustrated crowd at a town hall meeting Wednesday, during which more than 100 South Los Angeles residents criticized the agency’s inability to say whether fumes from an oil field are hazardous.

Some of those gathered in an auditorium at the Doheny Campus of Mount St. Mary’s College cradled Styrofoam model heads pierced with sewing needles or bound in rope to demonstrate ailments they believe are linked to the oil pumping operation: dizziness, chronic fatigue, severe headaches and nose bleeds.

Barry Wallerstein, the agency’s executive director, assured the crowd that air samples taken on the land Allenco Energy Co. leases from the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles have not shown dangerous levels of toxic substances.

Flanked by seven of his top officers, Wallerstein said more air samples will be taken in what he described as a matter of “extremely high priority for us.”

Monic Uriarte, whose 12-year-old daughter is among neighborhood children suffering from frequent nosebleeds, was less than satisfied with Wallerstein’s comments.

“I’m very frustrated with the AQMD — even insulted because until now, they did nothing about complaints from our community,” she said. “Obviously, they’re here because of all the negative attention they are getting in the media and from elected leaders.”

The meeting came less than a month after U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.), with support from Rep. Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles), intervened and asked federal environmental officials to ensure the safety of the neighborhood.

Allenco has declined to comment on its operation.

On Wednesday, residents and environmental activists received additional help from Los Angeles City Atty. Mike Feuer, who confirmed that his office is investigating possible violations of city statutes and ordinances by the oil company.

“The city attorney’s probe is great news — and changes the way we have traditionally approached contaminated sites and polluting facilities,” Martha Dina Arguello, executive director of Physicians for Social Responsibility/Los Angeles, said in an interview.

“Regulatory agencies such as AQMD can spend years trying to prove harmful effects in what some critics describe as a ‘delay game,’” she said. “But the city attorney has far more tools at hand to deal quickly with problems.”

Residents say they have suffered from respiratory ailments, headaches and nosebleeds since 2010, when Allenco ramped up production at its wells more than 400%.

Neighbors complained to state air quality officials 251 times over the next three years. The South Coast district responded by issuing 15 citations against Allenco for foul odors.

New extraction technologies and rising prices for crude oil are motivating a revival of old oil fields across Southern California.

Los Angeles City Councilmen Paul Koretz and Mike Bonin a month ago submitted a motion that would impose a moratorium on oil and gas “well stimulation” activities within the city.

louis.sahagun@latimes.com

South Los Angeles residents fuming over oil field

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