"Oil Storage: Long Beach To Pay Landmark Settlement"

"In the first enforcement of its kind against a public agency, the (Calif.) State Water Board on Tuesday said it has reached a $6.2 million settlement with the city of Long Beach for extensive violations of regulations governing the storage of petroleum and waste oil in underground storage tanks.

“The State Water Board will not tolerate violations of these important environmental protection laws,” board director Reed Sato said, "and will take swift action against all violators, whether public or private.”

Long Beach has failed to perform required testing and monitoring and failed to install leak prevention equipment at 40 of its underground storage tank facilities, many of which are located at city fire and police stations."

Louis Sahagun reports for Greenspace blog in the Los Angeles Times January 26, 2010.