Water Board Lowers its Tolerance for Sewage Spills

Reportedly, the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Board voted on January 28 to have voted to increase the fine it assessed the City of Los Angeles for two raw-sewage spills to the ocean.

In April 1997, a sewer maintenance manhole along Pacific Coast Highway released 60,000 gallons of raw sewage into a storm drain that emptied into the Santa Monica Bay. Then in November, the failure of a sewage pump caused some 90,000 gallons of sewage to enter the Los Angeles River, which flows to the ocean.