South Bay Echo for Dec 31

Blessings of rain, West Basin nixes desal, Covid spikes, Webb launches and Penita closes

Happy New Year friends… Welcome to the 17th edition of South Bay Echo, your source of local hometown news with a real estate angle.

This Substack is brought to you by Rosetree Real Estate, a full service real estate brokerage dealing in residential and commercial properties to both own and lease. For more information visit RosetreeRealEstate.com. DRE# 02145024

Blessings of rainwater

Graphic courtesy West Basin

On this New Year’s Eve, the deluge of rainwater has finally subsided this morning and we are blessed with clear skies once again. What for so long seemed like such a scarce resource fell in buckets for more than 24 hours. Think of all that rainwater in this coastal desert washed away by the millions of gallons right into the ocean. What better time to think about purchasing a rain barrel? The West Basin Municipal Water District provides them for free or you can convert an old wine barrel for a rustic look.

Desalination plant nixed

Activists gather outside a West Basin meeting in Carson to oppose its desalination plan in November 2019. (Photo by David Rosenfeld)

Speaking of West Basin, something very momentous occurred shortly before Christmas. The West Basin water district board of directors on Dec. 22 officially pulled the plug on its idea to build a desalination plant on the beach near El Segundo. It was like a gift to all those environmentalists who fought so hard against it going back more than 20 years.

For decades, activists raised hell about this project. They said it was too costly, required too much energy and could destroy the environment. They called it an industry giveaway like Poseidon down south. Journalists like me spent a lot of ink on the matter. West Basin spent something like $65 million on a pilot project and studies over 15 years just thinking about building a full-scale plant. That’s not even counting the lengthy environmental review process completed in 2019.

The bottom line is the region can do far more to conserve and recycle existing water resources before we turn to a costly, energy intensive project such as ocean water desalination. It’s just too expensive and there are cheaper ways to generate fresh water. Take for instance stormwater capture, the millions of gallons of usable water pouring out of Hyperion each day and consider the historic amounts of snowfall occuring right now.

Finally, it seemed the board over at West Basin came to its senses thanks in part to the leadership of Scott Houston and one new member Desi Alvarez, who replaced Carol Kwan last year. The change of heart could also be in part to the less than cordial dismissal in August of its not so popular general manager. The vote to squash the project went down 3-2. The two directors who voted to continue the project were Don Dear and Gloria Gray.

James Webb telescope on its way

The James Webb Space Telescope developed in Redondo Beach successfully blasted off aboard a rocket from French Guiana on Christmas Eve. The sigh of relief breathed by engineers marked just the first stage of this ulcer-inducing mission. What’s the big deal? There is only about $10 billion and national pride on the line.

So far the mission is going even better than planned. Because the launch trajectory was so precise, the telescope may be able to extend its lifespan another 10 years due to the energy it’s saved.

Over the next month the telescope will make its way toward its ultimate position orbiting the sun roughly 1.5 million miles from Earth. Along the way its sun shield that’s most critical to its operation has already begun to deploy. There will be very few fingernails left on those Northrop Grumman engineers over the next month. So far so good. We’re all pulling for them. You can follow the mission at the NASA blog here.

Covid cases spiking again

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention here the spiking Covid numbers that have once again disrupted so many lives this holiday season. On Thursday, LA County reported a staggering 20,000-plus new cases marking a dramatic increase from a week ago when the county reported more than 8,000 new cases in a day and the beginning of December when the county was reporting 1,000 cases per day.

While it’s true that Omicron appears less severe, Delta is still spreading and at these vast numbers severe illnesses and deaths are likely to rise again. Hospitalizations have already began to spike, now up to more than 1,300 with Covid, almost entirely the unvaccinated, rising by about 10% from the day before. Deaths too will likely rise again.

While it seems that we are helpless once again to this never-ending pandemic, we have so many tools now, from therapies to vaccines. Among the unvaccinated the risk of being hospitalized was about 19 times greater than a vaccinated person and the risk of dying was about 11 times greater. Stay safe this New Years Eve.

Goodbye to Hermosa’s La Penita

Google Maps

Word has it the old beachside Mexican joint La Penita at Longfellow and Manhattan Ave has served its last wet burrito. A favorite of the local crowd, nearly everyone has a memory of scarfing down tacos and burritos after a beach session here. Maybe it was something about the refried beans, or maybe it was just the times. There was something special about that place that can never be replicated by any high-priced eatery. I don’t know what is planned to replace the joint. It might be good. It might even be better. But it will never be the same. Just one more twist of the knife. Another mom and pop calls it quits and so goes another staple of our community.

All for now… Thanks for reading and Happy New Year!!