Sometimes meanly compared to Hell’s Angels, the City Council more closely resembled the faultlessly formful Blue Angels flying team last night.
The tightly unified Council seldom has performed with such unassailable synchronization on a disputed topic.
Muscularly flicking away residential protests — not to mention a lawsuit by the looming oil drilling company PXP — the Council forcefully voted to tack 10 1/2 more months onto an in-town oil drilling ban that would have expired this week.
Without a dissenter in view, each Council member repeated the mantra:
The city needs more time to study the health and safety aspects of oil drilling to protect the welfare of its 40,000 residents.
The whole personality of the Council and the atmosphere in Council Chambers change when members unite on a tough subject. A balmy breeze blows away the standard contentiousness.
As for PXP, the Council reckons that an updated study will take until next summer. Subsequently, a governing ordinance would be written, and only then, once Culver City drilling permits are approved, would drilling be allowed to proceed.
PXP’s strategy, by sharp contrast, is slightly less circuitous — drilling maybe not tomorrow or Thursday, but much sooner than the end date of the moratorium, next Aug. 23.
Five Reminders
PXP, undeniably, is eager.
Indeed, City Hall reports that PXP has five applications on file with the state governing agency known, unmellifluously, as DOGGR, in an attempt to break through Culver City barriers.
Plains Exploration & Production Co., whose relationship with City Hall has weaved in and out of favor, means to (slant) drill for black gold beneath Culver City streets and residences “all the way to Culver Boulevard,” says Mayor Andy Weissman.
Like shock troops, the five gentlemen of the City Council, shoulders impressively aligned and coordinated, stand in the center of the street, an impassable impediment — unless a court rules otherwise.
Which side has more staying power? A judge, rather than either combatant, may be the pivotal arbiter.
Opponents of the moratorium, notably School Board candidate Robert Zirgulus and veteran activist Sandra Kallander, say they can’t understand the Council’s stubborn posture since City Hall derives nearly a quarter-million dollars annually in revenues from the drilling.
Simultaneously conducting a separate battle with Culver Crest area residents not far away in the 2-mile long Baldwin Hills oil field, PXP’s course of action, while not officially articulated, seems clear.
After the 5 to 0 vote, John Martini, PXP’s manager of Government Affairs, said the rebuffing vote was anticipated, especially after reading Councilman Scott Malsin’s remarks in this newspaper yesterday. “He telegraphed that the decision already had been made,” Mr. Martini said. “We are not at all surprised by tonight’s vote.”
PXP’s next move?
“We will evaluate our options,” said Mr. Martini. “But we are prepared to defend our rights. It is clear the city’s actions are legally baseless and, in fact, illegal. “
That may rate as an understatement.
Speaking of telegraphing, PXP demystified the last remaining doubt about their intentions last month when they sued City Hall. Eschewing passivity, the Houston-based company, facing a larger fight in Baldwin Hills, is determined not to stand on a Culver City corner and watch all the oil go by.
(Parenthetically, Mayor Weissman observed that “PXP seems to have an unlimited litigation budget.”)
To the question of whether PXP expects to be drilling underneath Culver City long before next Aug. 23, Mr. Martini said, intriguingly:
“We expect the Council to follow the law and process our applications under their existing ordinance.
“The moratorium they have enacted is legally baseless, legally inadequate.”
His response sounded affirmative, but he declined to say precisely yes. “I can’t answer in any other way,” Bakersfield-based Mr. Martini said.
The Ever Spinning Globe
The other matter before the City Council concerned a further disposition of 7 parcels of downscale single-family property between 4044 and 4068 Globe Ave., hard by the 405 Freeway.
This slow-moving, meandering tale may be nearing denouement. While a demolition plan for the first 6 long has been all but executed, the glitch came with No. 7, which some people thought was salvageable. Faced with 4 expensive alternatives for saving 4068, the Council ultimately agreed to knock it down, too.
