Community Commentary -- Bill Langston
As the prime contractor for the new Balboa Bay Club, we at Snyder
Langston are very pleased that the issue of groundwater discharges from
dewatering the construction site has been resolved. This has been a very
frustrating situation both for our client and for us.
Snyder Langston has a hard-earned reputation for being meticulous
about environmental protection and we try to go way beyond what we’re
required to do. More important, the Balboa Bay Club has been an
institution in this community for more than 50 years and has been a very
careful steward of the waterfront environment it calls home.
That’s why we were disappointed that some of the Daily Pilot’s
coverage of the situation was skewed and, at times, just plain
mean-spirited.
Both the initial article on April 30 (“Water quality board fines
Balboa Bay Club”) and a subsequent editorial on May 5 (“Heal the bay”)
took the Bay Club to task without any mention that Snyder Langston, as
the prime contractor, is in charge of, and responsible for, all the
construction activity at the site, including the dewatering. We used
water treatment and testing consultants who we believed were experts in
dewatering and testing for compliance with the California Regional Water
Quality Control Board standards, and who had extensive experience with
the waters of Newport Bay.
The coverage turned ugly with a cartoon that ran alongside the May 5
editorial -- a gas mask with “BBC” stamped on it and a caption that read
“Balboa Bay Club Swim Mask.” If the cartoon was meant to be shocking, it
was. If it was meant to be humorous, it wasn’t.
The clear implication was that highly toxic, if not potentially
deadly, materials were being released into the Bay. The release of
naturally occurring sulfides that were a byproduct of decomposing
organics in groundwater was now being elevated to equal status with
dioxin, Love Canal and the Stringfellows landfill.
It might have been of more value to the Pilot’s readers to know that
the impacts of dewatering at the Bay Club are part of the same process
that gives the Back Bay that powerful odor at times. When the water
recedes, exposing the sediment on the bottom to the air, the result is
that unpleasant “rotten eggs” odor.
Likewise, the substance being pumped out from beneath the Bay Club
site was at times a foul-smelling, black slurry -- not unlike a pile of
leaves in the backyard that’s reduced to a shapeless black mass if it
sits there long enough. But natural byproduct or not, the sulfide levels
in the bay should definitely be monitored and regulated, which is why we
and our sub-consultants have worked closely with the state water quality
board from the start to meet the requirements for water treatment and
water quality reports.
It’s important to note that the violations for excess sulfide levels
in the groundwater being discharged were all discovered after the fact,
in the water quality reports that we had prepared and submitted to water
quality board. A review of those reports earlier this year for the period
of February 2001 to February 2002 showed excess sulfide levels for 20 of
those 365 days. The Federal Clean Water Act of 1999, Senate Bill 709
(1999) and Senate Bill 2165 (2000), require a mandatory penalty of $3,000
per violation, which we have paid.
We chose not to appeal the penalties, but we are trying to determine
why red flags and alarms weren’t sounded earlier, either by our water
quality consultants or the water quality board.
That issue aside, Snyder Langston accepts full responsibility for any
concerns over the dewatering process, and we are very sorry for any
inconvenience to our neighbors, especially the unpleasant odor they have
had to endure. Most importantly, we were relieved to hear that the
inadvertent release of sulfides didn’t do any damage to the bay.
The editorial urges the Bay Club “to make sure they are beyond
question when it comes to protecting the waters of Newport Harbor from
further pollution.” We want to assure the Pilot and the community that
Snyder Langston and the Balboa Bay Club have both done exactly that for
about half a century and we are fully committed to continuing to do so.
* BILL LANGSTON is a Newport Beach resident and chairman of Snyder
Langston.
All the latest on Orange County from Orange County.
Get our free TimesOC newsletter.
You may occasionally receive promotional content from the Daily Pilot.