Unanswered Questions Still Are Dominating Oil Drilling Dialogue as Deadline Nears

So much scholarly and emotional testimony have flooded through Council Chambers on the subject of drilling regulations and protections this summer, and still this well-educated attorney wondered what to make of the overwhelming information.

Of the hundreds, possibly thousands, of organized and individual complaints and protests that have been filed, how much is in play?

Enough to seriously affect the final versions of the two main documents?

Is the supposedly rushed process of Assessment-Public Release-Comment-Prospective Change-and Final Approval linked to a certain Supervisor’s pending retirement? To a reasonable accommodation of the oil drilling company?

Artificial Deadlines?

Or are the deadline dates for the recommending and the approving bodies arbitrarily chosen and amenable to change after all?

Since the mountains of paperwork on guidelines for drilling and its impact were released in June, a frantic war has been ignited.

The bitter conflict pits Los Angeles County and the oil drilling company, Plains, Exploration & Production, or PXP, on one side against a surprisingly well-informed community on the other, fighting, say resident leaders, for the safety and breathing welfare of their families.

Somewhere in between the two camps is the most talked about personality of all, County Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke. Pushing the speeded-up process along to cross the finish line ahead of her late autumn retirement, she is charged with lobbying her fellow Supervisors to vote with her in late October on the tone and precision of the guidelines and impacts that will satisfy both sides.

Are the Judges Impartial?

The non-partisan players in this scenario are said to be Los Angeles County, that is the Regional Planning Commission and Ms. Brathwaite Burke. Many of the organized residents contest that assertion, claiming that PXP and the County are virtually inseparable allies.

Ms. Brathwaite Burke probably has been the quietest of the principals, and PXP has had little to say publicly except for the tit-for-tat role the Texas-based company played at a n Aug. 2 community meeting that was said to be an exclusive speakout opportunity for5 residents.

Whether a series of community-style meetings in July and August — overseen by County officials — will significantly alter the final regulations and impact reports that the Board of Supervisors approve is one of numerous unknown factors.

A dominant complaint from the beginning of the process is that PXP has written its own rules book that will govern drilling until 2028.

Because of that fact alone, some community leaders said that if the County’s heavily criticized method of approval is not rigged, it looks and feels that way.

Meanwhile, Councilman Weissman is trying to make sense of fast-moving events.

Holding a copy of the voluminous draft environmental impact report in one hand and the equally thick and daunting Community Standards District in the other, Mr. Weissman asked, not rhetorically, “Now what?”

“These are hugely technical documents that are way above my competency and that of most, if not all, of the City Council,” he said.

Another overarching, and thoroughly unanswered, question is whether Culver City, perhaps more directly in the line of fire of the oil field than any other community, will have a meaningful say in the outcome.

Mr. Weissman pointed out that City Hall has invested more than $150,000 in a team of consultants to evaluate the EIR and the CSD — but to what end?

At best, the answer may not become apparently until September when the County Regional Planning Commission makes its recommendations to Ms. Brathwaite Burke and the other 4 County Supervisors.