Trapping the rain

What should Southern California do to get more water? Build differently.

A new report estimates that by 2030 the equivalent of two-thirds of Los Angeles' annual water use could be harvested every year in major urban areas if new construction incorporated rain-capture techniques.

Low impact development, as it is called, is designed to harvest storm water rather than send it into storm drains. Kept on site, the water seeps into the ground, reducing irrigation needs and replenishing local aquifers. It also cuts the volume of polluted runoff that reaches the sea.

The study, conducted by the Natural Resources Defense Council and a UC Santa Barbara professor, looked at projected rates of growth and redevelopment in Southern California and parts of the Bay Area. It then calculated how much water could be retained if that new residential and commercial construction was built according to low-impact guidelines.

More than half of Southern California's water supply comes from hundreds of miles away. But the region is rich in groundwater basins that provide a significant amount of local water. With new building techniques, they could provide more.

“There’s plenty of place right now to put that water if we’re able to reestablish the groundwater recharge patterns that existed before we paved everything over," said UC Santa Barbara professor Robert C. Wilkinson, coauthor of the study.

Tejon Ranch Co. seeks to release secret California condor documents

The Tejon Ranch Co. wants to release secret documents detailing its settlement negotiations with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service over plans to build a master-planned resort complex in federally designated critical habitat for the California condor.

The ranch this week asked Fish and Wildlife and the U.S. Justice Department to back its efforts to have a U.S. District Court vacate a controversial protective order issued in 2002 to seal the documents related to a lawsuit it had filed against the agency five years earlier.

In a statement, Robert A. Stine, company president and chief executive, said the protection was no longer needed because the negotiations had culminated in a proposed multispecies habitat conservation plan. It aims to strike a balance between protection of the condor and development of Tejon Mountain Village, a complex of luxury homes, hotels and golf courses on ranch property in the Tehachapi Mountains about 60 miles north of Los Angeles.

The plan would allow the ranch to receive a special permit to protect it from legal liability if any one of 26 sensitive species was injured or killed because of business activities on the property. However, the ranch would be criminally liable if a condor was killed because of those activities.

A year ago, a landmark agreement was struck by the ranch and environmental groups including the Sierra Club, Audubon California and the Natural Resources Defense Council to permanently conserve 90% of the 270,000-acre ranch.

Cleaning up South Coast school buses

The era of the big, yellow, diesel-belching school bus may be drawing to a close for some South Coast school districts.

On Friday, the South Coast Air Quality Management District issued nearly $43 million in grants to help 13 school districts replace their worst polluting buses with new vehicles that use cleaner-burning compressed natural gas and propane.

AQMD also issued more than $3 million to school districts for the installation of particulate matter trapping devices in 176 newer diesel school buses.

"The number of school buses being replaced or retrofitted with this award is extraordinary, and it's a giant step toward our goal of cleaning up all school bus fleets in the region," said William A. Burke, chairman of South Coast AQMD. "This will help thousands of school children and their communities breathe a little easier."

The California Air Resources Board has already cracked down on diesel pollution from trucks. Diesel accounts for about 84% of the cancer risk from air pollution in Southern California, according to AQMD.

--Amy Littlefield

Photo: Anaheim Hills Elementary School students board a diesel-fueled school bus in 2001. Credit: Rick Loomis/Los Angeles Times

Discreetly green: Santa Monica wants property owners to hide solar panels

 

Santa Monica has held itself up as a model of innovative energy policies, but now the city may be moving to hide away some of its solar technology.

Solar equipment must be installed "in the location that is least visible from the street" on certain properties, according to a 4-1 decision by the city council on Tuesday. The measure provides exceptions for when energy production would be decreased by more than 10% or the cost would go up significantly. It passed as part of an ordinance specifying standards for solar permits.

"From my perspective, the ordinance will simplify permitting for the installation of solar panels, and it still respects reasonable aesthetic concerns," said Mayor Ken Genser in a phone interview Thursday.

But Mary Luevano, policy director for Global Green, a Santa Monica-based advocacy group, said: "It creates what we think is unnecessary bureaucratic red tape. There are cities outside the state that are looking at Santa Monica, because they have been a leader for years."

L.A. business leans green

Representatives of more than 500 businesses -- including solar panel installers, venture capitalists and green janitorial services -- crowded into the Los Angeles Business Council's Sustainability Summit at the Getty Museum today, attesting to a growing surge of corporate interest in save-the-planet issues.

Green-washing? Well, some of the interest may be attributable to image-building. But the message from business leaders on several panels was that conserving energy and conducting environmentally friendly business is good for the bottom line.

Kevin L. Ratner, president of Forest City Residential West, a unit of the $10.9-billion Forest City development firm, acknowledged that building structures to meet the U.S. Green Building Council's standards of the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) can add 1% to 2% to construction costs -- or up to 5% if one seeks the highest LEED "platinum" certification. But LEED buildings rent for 6% to 10% more, and tenants are less likely to leave, he said. Building green "enhances our public image and the image of those who occupy our buildings, and increases productivity of the occupiers.... It also saves you money."

With buildings responsible for 71% of electricity use nationwide, and 38% of planet-heating carbon dioxide emissions, it was no wonder that much of the summit focused on the built environment. Joseph Pettus, senior vice president of Safeway Inc., which owns Vons groceries, boasted that "we are putting solar panels on our roofs as fast as we can." He added that the company on Jan. 1 converted its fleet of vehicles to B20, a biodiesel fuel blend, but recently suspended the experiment "to take a look at it."

Michael Mahdesian, chairman of the Culver City janitorial firm, Servicon Systems, said using cleaning products that are less toxic, thus improving indoor air quality, can boost the points leading to a LEED certification by 26%. His firm, which cleans 70 million square feet a day in hospitals, aerospace factories and high rises, cleans "completely green," he said. "There are chemicals that are less harmful but can get the same job done.... We limit the use of water and chemicals.... We use paper that is post-consumer recycled." And even a small issue such as providing doorway mats will limit the dirt and moisture tracked into buildings, and limit inside air pollutants, he said.

California wants to buy your old car

Looking to retire your retro car?

California will trade incentives for clunkers in a new effort to get smog-emitting cars off the road. An older state program only accepted cars made after 1976 that had failed a smog check. On Friday, the Air Resources Board decided to accept all cars, regardless of the year and whether they've failed a check.

UPDATE: You'll have to wait though. The state will start taking cars April 2010.

"It will encourage people to dump their old clunkers and purchase cleaner cars," said Karen Caesar, a spokeswoman for the ARB. "If you've had a car just sitting around that you seldom drive, it would be an opportunity for you to think about acquiring a new car, and it will help you make that choice."

Under the Enhanced Fleet Modernization Program, part of AB 118*, the state will now provide a $1,000 incentive if drivers turn their old cars over to dismantlers. Lower-income drivers could get $1,500.

Forest projects aimed at wildfire protection misdirected, study says

With the federal government spending nearly $3 billion trying to reduce the impact of fire in national forests, a new academic study suggests the bulk of the work is being done in precisely the wrong places.
 
Researchers at the University of Colorado found that only 11% of so-called fuel-reduction projects in the last five years are undertaken where increasing numbers of Westerners are living: in that alluring landscape on the edge of suburbia that fire officials call the urban-wild land interface.

Despite the fact that the National Fire Plan calls for special emphasis on thinning forests in or near the interface areas, the paper published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences concludes that Americans living in fire-prone areas are not beneficiaries of the same fire protection projects as back country forests.

"We were very surprised by our results," said Tania Schoennagel, lead researcher. "It's a problem. I think we need more targeting of the wild land urban interface in terms of mitigating fire. It's more effective if you are near communities. The public has the impression that a lot of acres are being treated, so there's a sense that a lot is getting done."

The Forest Service's analysis last year, however, cataloged 15 million acres of public land in the urban-wild land fringe that had been treated for "hazardous fuels reduction and landscape restoration" since 2001, compared with about 29 million acres outside the interface: roughly a 1:2 ratio. The study also included Department of Interior lands.

The University of Colorado team of geographers, fire ecologists and landscape ecologists examined more than 44,000 federally funded fuel-reduction projects in 11 western states between 2004 and 2008. It is the first analysis to systematically juxtapose the Forest Service's cutting and clearing with communities and subdivisions. The researchers concluded that only 3% of the projects took place in the interface as strictly defined. An additional 8% of the work occurred within 1.5 miles of the interface, an area the team defined as a "buffer."

Complicating the best intentions of federal fire managers to clear forest land, the study revealed that about 70% of the property in the interface is privately owned and beyond the jurisdictional reach of the U.S. Forest Service.

"It's an odd situation when you step back from it," Schoennagel said. "The Forest Service is in charge of fire suppression and protecting homes, yet that agency has no jurisdiction over requiring fire-wise homes and landscaping."

Schoennagel noted that projects undertaken in interface zones are three to four times more expensive than those in remote areas. With 15% of the West's interface already developed, Schoennagel said, "If we really want to control fire risk, I think we really have to control development in the wild land urban interface."

-- Julie Cart

Photo: Flames threaten a home in Santa Barbara County's Mission Canyon area last month. Credit: Spencer Weiner / Los Angeles Times

Rancho Los Alamitos historic garden restored

In restoring the Rancho Los Alamitos historic gardens in east Long Beach, the guiding principle was simple enough: Provide plant explorers with the same leafy, contemplative landscape of indigenous and imported species created in the 1920s by Florence Bixby.

But it wasn’t easy. Over the decades, the one-acre oasis with roots in the romance of California had deteriorated into a mix of Bixby’s original glades and myriad invasive plants. A pumping system that supplied a rocky brook -- and serenaded the grounds with the soothing sounds of running water -- quit working in the 1950s.

Now, after 17 years of restoration work based on historic photographs, Rancho Los Alamitos is preparing to celebrate the opening of the renewed gardens June 6 with seminars, guided tours, live jazz and a native plant sale.

During a recent tour of garden trails lined with sage, cactus, poppies and mahonia bushes laden with maroon berries, Rancho Los Alamitos Executive Director Pamela Seager said, “It was a very complicated effort, and it took a lot of time and patience to do it right.”

“Restoration work proceeded incrementally,” she added. “We took the stream system apart and put it back together again, rock by rock. Many of the species we planted were allowed to grow back into maturity.”

Then there is the 6-foot-tall example of Texas Ranger sage planted near the gardens’ entrance between 1921 and 1925 by the Rancho’s then-owners, Bixby and her husband, Fred.

“It’s gnarled, old and magnificent,” Seager said. “We’re babying it along, like a historical figure deserving of respect.”

Admission to the gardens and activities for adults and children on June 6  is free, but four seminars require pre-registration and fees. The fee for admission to all four seminars is $40. Individual seminars are $10 for Rancho Los Alamitos members and $12 for nonmembers.

There is limited ticket availability, and advance reservations can be made online at www.rancholosalamitos.com

Rancho Los Alamitos is owned by the City of Long Beach and operated by the nonprofit Rancho Los Alamitos Foundation.

-- Louis Sahagun

Photo: Steven Looman painting of Rancho Los Alamitos' historic garden. Credit: Cristina Salvador Klenz

Parks under utility towers: why not?

In the crowded urban sprawl of Southern California, only one of four residents lives within 440 yards of a neighborhood playground or park. In low-income neighborhoods, 1000 people, on average, share a third of an acre of public open space.

A bill passed this week by the California Assembly, AB 521, would ease the development of parks on utility rights of way, according to its author, Assemblyman Hector De La Torre (D-South Gate). It would require the California Public Utilities Commission to take into consideration the community benefits of open space when determining a fair lease rate for land under power lines.

Under current law, the utility commission considers the economic return to rate payers from leasing rights of way, and is not required to factor in a broader public good.

The city of Bellflower would be a beneficiary, according to De La Torre. Its Riverview Park, in a utility right of way, spans six acres and needs to lease an additional 12 acres from a utility. The park, which would run along the San Gabriel River, would increase the city's park space by a quarter.

"Millions of Californians lack access to parks, particularly in low-income areas," said Rico Mastrodonato, an official with the Trust for Public Land, in a statement. "AB 521 will give thousands of kids places to play, and bring more green space to our urban areas."

The bill, which now goes before the Senate, is also supported by Southern California Edison.

--Margot Roosevelt

Photo: Soccer players in Rio de Los Angeles park. Credit: Spencer Weiner / LA Times

Lessons learned from mountain lions in Southern California

Tracking a family of radio-collared mountain lions in Southern California's Santa Ana Mountains has provided researchers with insights into what it will take for the large carnivores to survive the region's rapidly urbanizing landscape.

One of the huge cats was tracked across 100 square miles in the span of just a month, underlining the range the animals require. That same lion, however, is currently marooned by development in an area adjacent to the Riverside Freeway in Orange County.

The animal's plight highlights the difficulties mountain lions face when trying to move from one wilderness area to another in Southern California, even though the region is already criss-crossed by corridors created to allow wildlife to navigate through habitat fragmented by development. Trouble is, many of those corridors are not protected from continued urban encroachment.

The findings do not bode well for the Puma concolor, according a study entitled "Conserving Connectivity: Some Lessons From Mountain Lions in Southern California," which appears in the April issue of the scientific journal Conservation Biology. But the big cat's problems could be at least partially  resolved if large, inter-connected natural landscapes are protected as soon as possible.

"Mountain lions require very large areas, so the challenges of protecting these animals are great," said Scott Morrison, director of science for the Nature Conservancy's California chapter, co-author of the study with Walter Boyce, co-director of the UC Davis Wildlife Health Center. "But if we can protect a population of mountain lions, we'll be protecting  a lot of other species as well, everything from shrubs to songbirds."

The study warns that the issues confronting mountain lions in Southern California will soon be experienced elsewhere. With California's population expected to grow by about 18 million people over the next 15 years, the authors urge land-use planners to begin setting aside large swaths of mountain lion habitat.

"Where linkages between large blocks of habitat are still intact," the study concludes, "they should be placed high on the list of conservation priorities, because pro-actively protecting ecological cohesion is far more likely to be successful than trying to salvage it from a fractured landscape."

In the meantime, urban sprawl -- and the prevalence of roads, pets, livestock, pesticides and public safety issues -- are creating a gauntlet for wildlife.

Although mountain lion attacks on humans are rare, about 10 such cats were killed each year from 2001 to 2005 in California because of public safety concerns, the study says. Separately, about 100 of the big cats are killed each year in California in connection with attacks on domestic animals.

"We should expect these kinds of interactions with humans to increase," Morrison said. "So we should design communities in ways that are good for people and wildlife."

-- Louis Sahagun

Photo: Radio-collared mountain lion in Southern California's Santa Ana Mountains. Credit: D. Krucki / UC Davis Wildlife Health Center