7/1/12
The big Independence Day celebration is Wednesday, but this is sort of the unofficial holiday weekend, so it’s time to pack up the family and head to the beach.
According to the Natural Resources Defense Council, that might not be the most sanitary place to spend some quality time.
The council has released its latest beach water-quality report, and it’s not good — at least for Californians. While beach closures and advisories nationwide dropped 3 percent last year, the number of closures and advisories increased in California in 2011. And even the report on the nationwide situation came with a caveat — though daily episodes decreased from the prior year, 2011 had the third-highest number of closures in the past two decades.
Nearly half the beach closures are the result of runoff swept into the ocean by rainfall. For folks living along the upper rim of the Gulf of Mexico, the BP oil spill — which occurred more than two years ago — remains among the main reasons beaches are shut down.
As pristine as we believe our own Central Coast beaches to be, they suffer from runoff and high bacteria counts, too. In Santa Barbara County, the most dangerous spot in 2011 was East Beach at the mouth of Mission Creek in Santa Barbara, which was the site of 88 closures and/or advisories last year.
Even away from the population glut on the South Coast, North County beaches had problems. Jalama was in closure/advisory conditions 48 times last year. Guadalupe Dunes had only six bad days, but Gaviota State Beach was in shutdown/advisory 47 days, El Capitan 21, and Refugio 35.
The problems are mostly caused by stuff we consider part of our everyday lives — oil and grease on our streets and roads, pesticides on our lawns, litter, etc. It just sits there until the winter rains come, then much of that junk washes down to the coast.
Making the problem worse in and around urban centers is that so much of the ground is covered by pavement, sidewalks and anything that prevents storm runoff from soaking into the ground before it reaches the ocean. It’s called “impervious cover,” and that cover increases along with the general increase in the population. And because more than half the U.S. population lives in coastal counties, it’s not hard to see the magnitude of the problem.
Making this situation potentially far worse is climate change. Most models predict Earth’s warming will increase the amount and frequency of heavy rainfall, which has a direct, adverse effect on water quality at our beaches.
Solutions to the beach water-quality problem are complicated and could be painful. It could start with something as simple as not putting pesticides or certain types of fertilizers on your lawn, things individuals can do.
But the real solutions will have to be collaborative. It won’t do a lot of good for you to stop adding to the pollution runoff if your neighbors don’t join in the effort. Adding to the problem is that a lot of people simply aren’t aware that their everyday actions contribute to diminished water quality at a beach that may be miles away.
The solution to this problem starts locally, spreads to the community, then the region and finally nationwide. With half of all Americans living so close to a beach, it’s vitally important that we work together to take the steps necessary to ensure that our beaches — part of our franchise here on the Central Coast — are protected.
The threats to that franchise are real. We need to take them seriously.
