Photo by Bruce Perry via CSULB Geology Department
Tomorrow’s City Council meeting will put forth a vote on the proposal from City Manager Pat West that would authorize him to add additional funds to speed up the process of the breakwater reconfiguration study.
For more than four years, the City has been involved in various reconnaissance studies regarding the breakwater, the wall of rocks which prevents waves in order to have safer harbors that the Army Corps of Engineers built and currently has jurisdiction over. With the lack of water movement, the natural cleansing mechanism of the waves has become eradicated and the Long Beach shoreline has since been plagued by exacerbated levels of bacteria and sediment collection.
Last October, the City had to renegotiate the terms it held with the Army Corps of Engineers in regard to the study. In 2010, a four-year, $8 million study, the East San Pedro Bay Ecosystem Restoration Study, was approved. The City at that time had appropriated $4 million contingent on the fact that Congress match with another $4 million. However, a “3x3x3” model was instead adopted, stipulating that the feasibility study take no longer than three years to conduct, cost no more than $3 million and fit into a binder less than three inches thick.
That renegotation was confirmed unanimously by the City Council, in which the City agreed to fund half of the new, smaller-in-scope $3 million study. West is requesting a maximum addition of $750,000 funded through ours Tidelands Fund, to ensure the study goes forward. $50,000 will be specifically set aside to re-scope the project, a cost initially funded by the Corps; it is part of the deal in order to incentivize the Corps moving forward.
The response from the Corps of Engineers remains unclear, as officials estimate at least one year before hearing back as to whether the support will be reciprocated. Given that the City can no longer approach Congress for funds in this area, it has to come through the far more competitive budget of the President.
Note: This article previously headlined that the budget of the study was being expanded; the additional money being requested by Mr. West is from the $4 million already appropriated from the previous study negotiation.
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