Southeast : CLEANER BAY

The Port of Long Beach promised Tuesday to do a better job of keeping poisonous and carcinogenic pollutants out of San Pedro Bay.

“This is a great day for those who enjoy our ocean waters,” said Gail Ruderman Feuer, an attorney representing environmental groups that had sued the port in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles. An out-of-court agreement reached Tuesday calls on the port to begin a rigorous pollution monitoring program and develop a master plan to attack the problem.

“There were huge uncovered piles of petroleum coke with run-off going straight into the ocean,” Feuer said. “There were piles of treated lumber. Outside one facility, there were big piles of scrap metal.”