From: Michael Rock [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Tuesday, November 04, 2014 1:28 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Daily Breeze-Blackout of all communication

November 4, 2014 Mr. Frank Suraci City Editor Daily Breeze

Dear Mr. Suraci:

After many years dealing with the Daily Breeze and Nick Green the City of Lomita is issuing a blackout of all communications with the Daily Breeze. The City feels very strongly that due to the Daily Breeze’s inability to make any effort to gather factual information and write articles that present all sides of an issue we are hereby blacking out all communication. The Daily Breeze clearly takes a side in every article it has written about the City of Lomita, and in particular, our water system.

There is so much information in the articles that Nick has written over the years that lack any factual credibility and clearly show a lack of basic understanding of how a municipal water system works. Nick has never been to our water treatment plant and has never seen the well despite many invites by the City to take him on a personal tour. He does not understand how the municipal bonds for the water treatment plant work and keeps reporting that our bond rating was reduced. In fact, our water bond was upgraded this year, but he never bothered to check as to whether the rating had changed. The bond ratings are reviewed annually and could and often do change. He keeps using the word “bleach” in his articles despite many attempts to educate him on the fact that we do not use bleach. We never have.

Additional clarifications:

Despite Nick’s assertion that residential water rates have increased dramatically the fact is the blended water has saved the rate payers from steeper rate increases. The City is blending fifty percent well water with fifty percent MWD water saving the rate payers about $300,000 per year in purchases of MWD water. MWD water costs nearly ten times as much to deliver as well water.

About four weeks ago the City received 32 formal complaints of which 30 had to do with a stronger than normal smell of chorine which I explained to Nick was due to the use of regular chlorine rather than using chloramine which takes the smell out of the chlorine without taking out the chlorine which is needed to kill bacteria that can form in the water. The other two complaints had to do with a strong odor of rotten eggs or sulfur. Of these two complaints one of the residents lives in Torrance and does not receive water from Lomita. This means the City received one compliant regarding a bad smell out of 15,000 consumers. The problem was with the resident’s pipes not the municipal water system. The article published today clearly does not reflect this fact at all. Nick also wrote that the City stopped flushing the hydrant by Phil Bucy’s house because the Daily Breeze sent the City a You Tube video of Mr. Bucy filming the flushing of a hydrant. The City had completed flushing the hydrant and that had already been determined before we received the You Tube video. This is simply a red herring.

Nick also told me that he took information from a Facebook chat room to write this article. I pointed out to him that I don’t think there are too many people who would think that a Facebook chat room is corroborating information that would be needed for a reputable newspaper business.

It is extremely irresponsible for a daily newspaper to print articles that are clearly designed to make our residents fearful of the water quality. As I told Nick on the phone last Thursday the City was given a permit to operate our well and water treatment plant from the State of California and we have delivered water that meets all the primary drinking water standards and have done so since we came on line in April of 2013. This fact was intentionally left out of the article because it does not support Nick’s view that something is wrong with the water. You should not leave out facts that don’t support your point of view just so you can try to win an argument when it is you job as a journalist to present an unbiased set of facts for the reader.

Nick also wrote that the City began operating the treatment plant four years ago. That is not accurate. He knows full well that the well and treatment system was on-line for only two months in late 2010, then was off-line until April of 2013, which he has reported many times before in many articles.

Shame on the Daily Breeze for letting down the community of Lomita and the entire South Bay and for not taking seriously the tremendous responsibility you have to your readers to present information in an unbiased and responsible way so that the community can make informed decisions based on facts and information instead of fear.

Sincerely,

Michael Rock City Manager City of Lomita, CA (310) 325-7110 Ext. 115