California

In a letter to pipeline safety regulators, two California Senators called "insufficient" the response of pipeline operators to a large spill near Santa Barbara.

"Environmentalists urged California regulators on Wednesday to reject a proposed expansion of the only offshore drilling operation still permitted in state waters along the Santa Barbara coastline, seizing on public outrage over last week's nearby oil spill."

"California continues to allow one of agriculture’s most popular and potent chemicals to be used under rules its own toxicologists have said aren’t scientifically sound."

"Koko Panossian is on death watch. The Glendale senior park services manager gingerly steps around fresh tree stumps, ghosts of 30-year-old coast redwood trees. His eyes meet the brown, scratchy limbs of two towering gentle giants."

"HERMOSA BEACH, CALIF. — Christopher Knight makes no apologies: He likes a green lawn. But the actor best known for playing middle son Peter on “The Brady Bunch” also wants to do his part to conserve water. The solution? Fake grass."

"The pipeline that leaked thousands of gallons of oil on the California coast was the only pipe of its kind in the county not required to have an automatic shut-off valve because of a court fight nearly three decades ago, a county official said."

"Stephanie Mutz makes a living plucking sea urchins from the Santa Barbara coast and selling the prickly treasure to upscale restaurants in Southern California. Now, she needs new hunting grounds."

"Government prosecutors are investigating the company at the center of the California oil spill for possible criminal sanctions, according to the district attorney of Santa Barbara - a city that helped spawn the modern environmental movement."

"A group of California farmers, in a surprising turnaround, is volunteering to give up a fourth of its available water this year, sharing a resource all but guaranteed to them for more than a century."

"The U.S. Coast Guard captain overseeing cleanup of oil spilled from a pipeline rupture that closed two California state beaches and fouled offshore waters near Santa Barbara said on Thursday it may take months to restore the area to its natural condition."