PROJECT GREEN

’69 Flashback

Forty years ago, an oil spill near Santa Barbara, Calif., spawned environmental activism. Not surprisingly, residents are none too happy with President Bush's offshore drilling plan.

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By Jamie Reno | Newsweek Web Exclusive

Jul 16, 2008 | Updated: 3:08 p.m. ET Jul 16, 2008

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The notion of new offshore drilling isn't going down well in Santa Barbara, Calif., the idyllic seaside community 90 miles northwest of Los Angeles that has often been called the birthplace of the modern environmental movement. Longtime residents still talk about the oil rig spill in January 1969 that left 35 miles of coastline covered with black goo and caused severe environmental damage. The disastrous spill, which gained worldwide attention, spurred the creation less than a year later of the Environmental Protection Agency by the Nixon administration and passage of the Clean Air Act.

Four decades later, with gas prices continuing to rise, President Bush announced this week that he was lifting the executive ban on the construction of new offshore drilling platforms that was initiated by his father in 1990 and urged Congress to lift its own ban. Sen. John McCain, who in the past supported the ban, now supports more drilling. Sen. Barack Obama still opposes it, as does California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a McCain supporter, who said in a statement, "California's coastline is an international treasure. I do not support lifting this moratorium on new oil drilling off our coast."

In Santa Barbara, opposition to oil drilling runs deep—even among the pro-business crowd. Don Sipple, a veteran Republican campaigner who lives in the area, recently told the Los Angeles Times that opposition to drilling is "not an issue in Santa Barbara, it's a deeply held value." One McCain supporter, Dr. Dan Secord, reportedly told McCain at a private Santa Barbara fund-raiser a few weeks ago that Santa Barbarans are "kind of goosey about oil spills." McCain jokingly responded: "This gathering is adjourned," which got a laugh.

Marty Blum, Santa Barbara's Democratic second-term mayor, moved to this high-rent enclave as a young married mother just three months before the 1969 spill, which left an indelible impression on her family. NEWSWEEK's Jamie Reno spoke to Blum about how Santa Barbarians are reacting to President Bush's decision to lift the drilling ban. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: What was your reaction when you heard that President Bush had lifted the executive ban on offshore oil drilling?
Marty Blum: Well, it's got everyone here a bit anxious, and it's got everyone talking about the oil spill. It was almost 40 years ago, but we still remember it here as if it just happened. I had a toddler and another baby on the way when my husband got a job offer and we moved here in October 1968. The oil spill happened shortly thereafter, and it was just this phenomenon, this horrible thing.

How did it affect you personally?
There's just nothing so pitiful as seeing a sea lion covered with oil, slowly dying because his skin can't breathe. When we came to town we purchased a little sailboat. It was covered with oil after the spill and destroyed. It all just made us deeply aware of our environment and made me realize how much people truly love living here. I saw grown men crying as they looked at the black cliffs, the tar on the beaches, the dead and dying mammals and birds. Everyone in town pitched in and tried to help in a lot of ways. We did recover from it. But our psyches did not.

Member Comments

Posted By: Cashew @ 08/28/2008 6:12:45 AM

Listen to this message. The Big oil companies want to drill off shore because it will make it much easier to ship the crude overseas in large tankers. The oil companies would have to move it across land, which would cost so much more, if they drilled inland. Bush, Chaney, and McCain are bought and paid for by these oil companies. Ofcourse they want to help big oil business and are boosting this propaganda and expecting us to swollow it hook, line, and sinker. McCain is a followier, not a leader.
Posted By: mccainsupporter @ 08/08/2008 9:20:22 PM

The best way to effectively exploit our offshore resources and really help the average American is to divide up the 4.4 million square miles of US offshore economic zone among the 218 million Americans adults who are 18 years and older according to the 2003 US census. Because a square mile equals 640 acres and you multiply 4.4 million square miles times 640 acres, there would be 2.816 billion offshore acres to be divided among the 218 million American adults. The current federally leased acreage of roughly 100 million acres both onshore and offshore represents roughly only three and a half percent of the total 2.8 billion offshore exclusive economic zone acreage of land that could be leased and divided up by all Americans. Subtract out that acreage and you still have 2.7 billion unleased acreage. Granted this remaining acreage may not be the best prospects but we won???t know for sure until there is actual drilling. The Democrats say that there is 80 million acres leased and the oil companies are sitting on it. Well here are 2.7 billion new acres that new and older drilling companies can bid on.
Under this proposal, every adult in the US would be entitled to 12.8 acres of mineral rights to offshore production. A lottery could be set up to randomly assign 12.8 acres to every American. You may end up with mineral rights to acreage south of Canada???s Hibernia offshore project 300 miles south of Newfoundland that is producing 50,000 barrels a day from only one well. The resulting lottery would create ten of thousands of instant American millionaires whose acreage abuts known contiguous offshore oil fields. A market to buy and sell acreage rights could be created which would put money into the pockets of those who acreage contains unknown oil potential. Turning over the acreage to ordinary Americans to collect leasing revenues and royalty rights will empower Americans and stimulate the economy. We do not need the Minerals Management Service of the Department of Interior and Nancy Pelosi to argue over the next four years which tracts of land should be leased and have that money end up going into the General Treasury. Its your money and you can get it now when you sell the rights to drill for oil and collect your royalties for the next twenty years.
Posted By: mccainsupporter @ 08/08/2008 9:18:30 PM

Democrats under the leadership of Barack Obama want to effectively give away in trust our offshore exclusive economic zone by standing in the way of any current offshore development. Under the 1982 United Nations Law of the Seas Convention the US has an exclusive economic zone of 200 nautical miles and mineral seabed rights up to 350 nautical miles extending along the Continental shelf. A nautical mile is 6080 feet so our exclusive economic zone extends about 240 miles and mineral seabed rights extend 420 miles. The US has the world's largest offshore exclusive economic zone totaling 4.4 million square miles. In comparison, the total land area of the United States is only 3.4 million square miles.
On the East coast alone, if you drive from Key West Florida to Bangor Maine it is 2000 miles. Multiply the 2000 miles by mineral seabed rights extending out 420 miles results in a total of 840,000 square miles of ocean acreage. Because we have the world's largest offshore coastline which is twenty-five percent greater than our land area, it only makes common sense that we exploit our offshore resources to achieve our energy independence.