Greka Oil and Gas company was hit by a barrage of criticism from state, federal and county officials Friday - the sharpest coming from Assemblyman Pedro Nava - for numerous spills at its facilities in northern Santa Barbara County, and for repeatedly violating its operating regulations.

Near the end of the more than two-hour “briefing” in Santa Barbara, called and conducted by Nava, the Democratic assemblyman tersely suggested steps should perhaps be taken to entirely close down Greka's operations in Santa Barbara County.

“At what point do we sort of collectively come to the conclusion that enough is enough?” he wondered aloud. “At what point do you say an operator poses such a threat to the health and safety of our communities, and to the environment, that we're not going to allow you to operate anymore?” Nava remarked, even before allowing comments by Greka's attorney, Bob Sanger, and a handful of other public speakers.

Sanger, when his turn came a few minutes later, responded that Greka inherited a lot of equipment that was in very bad condition when it purchased an array of oil facilities in the North County in 1999.

Company officials, he said, “are making an effort to deal with very old facilities” and a “very sincere effort to comply” with the plethora of county, state and federal regulations.

“Greka has invested tens of millions of dollars in capital improvements in these fields,” added the prominent Santa Barbara attorney, who usually handles criminal cases, such as helping successfully defend Michael Jackson.

The briefing took place almost exactly a month after an estimated 74,000 gallons of crude oil and polluted water spilled from a Greka facility in the Sisquoc area and flowed into a creek there on the morning of Dec. 7.

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The county immediately ordered the facility at Palmer and Dominion roads shut down and won't allow it to reopen until Greka complies with a list of 26 “needed corrections.” Those include cleaning up the resulting pollution, which has been done, according to Greka representatives.

Sharing information Friday about the company's troubled operations and unusual history of violations were representatives of the state Department of Fish and Game, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Central Coast Regional Water Quality Control Board, the Santa Barbara County Fire Department and the county executive office.

Echoing some of Sanger's comments in defense of the company was Scott Proskow, a production foreman for Greka. He was one of about 65 company employees who attended the meeting, all wearing dark-green blazers bearing Greka's logo.

About 45 minutes after the briefing started, dozens of them standing in a rear isle and entrance of the room were ordered by city firefighters to move to an adjoining foyer so walkways and doorways into the meeting room could be kept clear. The room has a maximum capacity of 88 people, the firemen explained.

“We are moving forward and making improvements” to aged equipment and facilities, Proskow told the group of 12 government officials seated at long tables at the front of the room. “We are working on the (operating) systems left behind” by previous oil companies.

Several officials noted the extreme number of Greka incidents requiring special inspections or enforcement actions over the past eight years, however, particularly since 2005.

“In the past two years, I can't tell you how many times we've been out to Greka facilities - probably two dozen times - for various spills and accidents,” said Robert Wise, EPA's federal on-scene coordinator.

Nava opened the meeting by rattling off a list of disturbing statistics, including county regulators “writing Greka a notice of violation” on the average of once every 10 days in recent years, he said. He noted that Greka has been required to pay more than $2.5 million in fines and penalties since 1999 for violations within the county.

The frequency of spills, accidents and violations involving Greka “is extraordinary,” noted Steve Edinger, chief of Fish and Game's enforcement branch.

“It's a good business practice not to spill, to prevent these events,” he added. “I'm not sure that message has gotten across” to Greka.

That sentiment was echoed by John Robertson, a supervising engineering geologist for the regional water quality agency: “The frequency of spills at Greka facilities has been a concern for us for several years.”

By acting in unison, rather than separately, regulatory agencies “can exert a collective force to change this behavior,” he said.

Sanger told the gathering the statistics cited were skewed and “somewhat misleading” because Greka owns more than half the estimated 3,000 onshore oil and gas wells in the North County, far more than other operators. So, it's not surprising the company would have a higher number of violations, he inferred.

As damning as Friday's meeting seemed, it may be just a warm-up for the governmental wrath awaiting Greka in coming weeks. On Jan. 15, Santa Barbara County supervisors will hear a detailed staff report on the company's operations and history of violations, with an eye towards perhaps tightening ordinances or strengthening penalties to force better compliance.

January 5, 2008