Blue-belt as valuable as green

I am appalled that the U.S. Corps of Engineers, courtesy of the county of Orange, is permitted to dump from to 1 million to 5 million gallons of untreated urban runoff water every day, directly into the surf zone at Aliso Beach this summer.

This is a response to the policies and politics of cities above the Aliso Estuary to reduce their toxic water and excess flow, [which occurs] at the expense of us all in Laguna Beach.

I am not an expert on this issue but it doesn’t take much brain power to understand you can’t dump this kind of foul water into the ocean and not expect pollution that will badly affect the health of not only young surfers, body boarders, skimboarders, kids, my grandkids, beach-goers and our trusty lifeguards, but will produce horrible red tides that cause more bug-eyed distortions to the ocean environment. Do you remember all the ugly red tides we had last summer? They will be back. And think about the effect this will have on our kelp forests.

How lovely for the Montage to become known as the No. 1 West Coast resort destination that resides right next to a contaminated beach and ocean. Montage, why are you remaining silent? The Athens Group should take over the reclamation of Aliso Creek now.

At last week’s City Council meeting, the City Council voted 3 to 2 in favor of ? Pearson-Schneider and Kinsman voting against ? formally objecting to the “dumping” permit; requesting an environmental report; investigating summer diversions to Moulton Niguel and the Coastal Treatment Plant; and researching legal grounds to defend Laguna Beach from inland nuisance urban runoff flows. However, the situation remains the same at this time ? nothing has changed.

Please write your City Council and say you will not tolerate this chemical and germ-ridden band aid of a noxious plan and ask them to stay focused on saving our beach and our ocean and not allow dumping of this untreated water.

Summer is coming and without decisive action we will have 120 days of polluted water pouring onto our precious beach and into our precious ocean. Our Bluebelt is as valuable as our Greenbelt and we must take better care of it.