By way of introduction, he said that Houston-based PXP, which is traded on the New York Stock Exchange, has been emerging as a major player in Los Angeles and California oil drilling since 1990. A mid-sized company, it is rated the third largest independent producer of oil and natural gas in California.
Mr. Rush said the gas invasions of Culver Crest were so unusual that nothing like this has occurred in four hundred previous drillings over the years.
In the past, the company has met with other hilltop residents of the region, in Baldwin Hills and Ladera Heights. “But prior to this winter, we never have had one incident in Culver Crest or one complaint from that neighborhood,” he said.
PXP’s Texas roots notwithstanding, Mr. Rush portrayed the company as a major player especially in Los Angeles where, he said, there is more oil to be found beneath the surface than in Saudi Arabia.
“We can’t get to it, though, for a couple of reasons,” he said with a trace of irony, “The area above it is, of course, heavily urban. And a great deal is deeply embedded inside of rocks.”
Reputations Run Counter to Facts
Just as California’s image of border to border urban lifestyles betrays a more accurate reputation as the breadbasket of the country, the state is an equally lush destination for oil companies, even if the cowboy fields of Texas and Oklahoma are more prominent in the American imagination.
Declining to call the two Culver Crest invasions “freakish,” Mr. Rush said both were unexpected and that PXP has attempted to resolve them. Such incidents should not happen again, he said, but they may because a guarantee would be impossible.
Based on the reactions of Crest residents after two intrusions of gaseous odors five weeks apart this winter, Mr. Rush may need to reach for everything in his arsenal before the summit meeting is over.
And he may not.
The fury of January and early February appears to be subsiding. Residents have indicated that the sensibilities of their noses are returning to normal. By now they may be more wary than serene, and they are insistent upon relief. Mark Salkin, the always candid president of the homeowners group, has been setting the pace for establishing a calm, reasoned approach to confronting the perceived intruder.
On the other side of the table is Mr. Rush of the Plains Exploration & Production Co., a measured, seasoned professional who hangs out in the mysterious, faceless, often abstract world of oil drilling. Necessarily, he has mastered the delicate modern art of balancing public relations with dense but sensible insights into deep, dark wells of PXP that dot West Los Angeles. He has learned to make himself comfortable in both settings despite their dramatic dissimilarities.
The Two Sides Will Eye Each Other
Although he did not flatly say so, it appeared that a decade and a half of drilling in probably the most environmentally conscious state in the union has been an evolving learning experience. Relations with nearby residents have become increasingly acute as drilling technology has expanded and environmental rules have grown more stringent.
Mr. Rush repeated foundational points that he made on the night last month that he addressed the City Council, and apologized to angry Culver Crest residents for the first gas invasion, which blew into their neighborhood at two in the morning.
He was emphatic in declaring that neither the Jan. 10 nor the Feb. 13 incident constituted an emergency.
“What happened was not toxic,” he said. “It w as not unsafe. It just brought a God-awful smell. We will, as I said, try to be more sensitive so that residents know what we are doing, and that they never again are surprised.”
The nine members of the Culver Crest board — Michael Bauer, Cathy Finamore, Peter Friedman, Rosalind LaBriola, Howard Lichtman, Ron Ostrin, Steve Reitzfeld, Marlene Rose and Mr. Salkin — are professionals themselves. They can be expected to penetratingly study and evaluate Mr. Rush’s body language and sincerity even as they are digesting his message.
Mr. Rush will be surrounded be an equally strong supporting cast of experts from the vaguely comprehended business of poking strangely shaped machinery into the crust of the earth and seeing, in the fairy tale manner of Little Jack Horner, what they can pull out.
PXP is prepared to be accommodating, Mr. Rush said, and to be receptive toward the laundry list of applicable mitigation factors that Mr. Salkin presented to the City Council.
Their agenda does not, however, call for breast-beating, but rather for orderly peer negotiation.
