CALIFORNIA OIL SPILL STUDY
FOCUS GROUP IV
SACRAMENTO
07/10/91
CALIFORNIA OIL SPILLS PROJECT
Focus Group IV1
July 10, 1991
Sacramento
Moderator: Robert C. Mitchell
RM: My name is Robert Mitchell, and I'll be leading the focus group tonight. Let me just
explain what a focus group is, because I assume that none of you have been in a focus group before, is
that correct? A focus group is basically a group discussion which gives the person leading it a chance
to find out how people think about certain things. This particular group is sponsored by the State of
California, and I'm part of a team of researchers who are trying to design a survey instrument to
measure what the public really feels about a possible new state program. I'll be explaining about that
later in the group. So in the group, it's very important that people give their frank opinions. There are
absolutely no right or wrong answers. I will try to get your reactions about different things. Sometimes
you might not have a reaction or just don't know, that's fine. Just say, don't know. We're tape
recording it, as you can see and the tape recording will be transcribed so I can study it and think about
it ... ponder the group later, because when I'm leading it, my attention has to be on the group, and it's
hard for me to always remember what people say. But your full names will not be attached to the tape
in any way, shape or form, and we guarantee your anonymity in this respect. Because we're tape
recording, it's important that only one person speak at a time. At certain points as we go along I'll ask
you to write certain things down. I'm going to give you a packet and ask you not to open it, because
we'll turn the pages as we get to certain points in the discussions. In the top of each of your packet, I'd
like you to put your I.D. number on it. We'll begin with Nicole who'll be number one. Duane will be 2.
Lynette will be 3. Don will be 4. Linda will be 5. Ruth 6. Just put on the right hand corner of your
packets. Brett will be 7. Joselyn will be 8, and Don will be 9. Okay. Great. So. I'd like to begin by
asking you a particular question and then have you write what your answer to that question is. And the
question is. The question is, are there any environmental problems facing California that are a particular
1
This transcript was edited by Robert Mitchell (8/17/91) for ease of comprehension only.
The unedited version of the transcript is available.
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concern to you. If there's more than one, write up to three problems. If there are none, leave it blank.
WOMAN: Just California?
RM: Just California, yes. Any environmental problems facing California that are of particular
concern to you.
MAN: Just one, you mean?
RM: One to three, if there are any. Or none of there are none. (Pause) Okay, Lynette, did
you have any?
LYNETTE: Pollution and logging.
RM: What kind of pollution?
LYNETTE: General pollution, air pollution. (inaudible) it's terrible.
RM: Don, how about you?
DON: Air quality and refuse disposal.
RM: Refuse disposal, what do you mean by that? The problem of getting rid of wastes?
Okay. Linda?
LINDA: Too much timber cutting, oil spills on the coast.
RM: Okay, Ruth?
RUTH: I didn't feel that anything specific jumped out in my mind, but generally, by the course
of things that are happening, (inaudible) the major problems really are.
RM: So you are concerned about a lot of things, but there aren't particular problems at the
present time that concern you. Brett?
BRETT: I have three. Loss of wetlands is one of them. The loss of forest is another. Air
quality is the third.
RM: Uh-huh. Okay. Joselyn?
JOSELYN: I said water, fumes and chemical run factories.
RM: Is this air pollution from chemical factories?
JOSELYN: Yes, they are (inaudible).
RM: I see. Okay, Don.
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DON: I've got lumber vs. the spotted owl. Water supplies for their (inaudible) and pollution.
RM: And what kind of pollution?
DON: Air pollution.
RM: Air pollution, I see.
WOMAN: I had air pollution and water shortage.
RM: Okay. Duane?
DUANE: I have logging and water pollution.
RM: Water pollution, any particular type of water pollution?
DUANE: Oil spills, things like that off the shore.
RM: Well, a couple of you here have mentioned the shore, and I'd like you to draw a line
under the answers you gave there, and write answers to another question that would be very helpful to
me for reasons I'll explain later. The question is, how would you describe the different types of land
along the California coast on the shore. One type is obviously sandy beaches, that's a type of land.
When you think of the coast, what other types of land come to mind. How would you describe them if
you had to describe this to someone else from another state. Just write them down if you would.
MAN: Just disregard the sandy beaches.
RM: That's just to give you an example of one type of land along the shore. (Pause) Okay,
Linda, what do you have?
LINDA: Rocky, marshes, with northern we have some black sand beaches, just varied.
RM: That's very helpful. Ruth.
RUTH: Rocky cliffs, sand dunes, the headlands, and beaches, of course.
RM: Brett?
BRETT: I think most of it is rocky cliffs.
RM: So that's what came to mind in addition to beaches. Joselyn?
JOSELYN: Well, I haven't really seen the coast along the shore while I was vacationing, but I
saw the river and it had a lot of hills and rocks all over and I know the shore is not too much of the
shore, and you can't go further than that or else you'll get pulled down by current.
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RM: Okay, how about you, Don?
DON: Rocky cliffs, views.
WOMAN: I was thinking kind of when you said along that ... besides mountainous terrain, I
was thinking about all the farmland and pastures and concrete. I was thinking of ... cause we just went
down to the (inaudible) Bay and you drive up to it, concrete and you walk into it.
RM: Concrete. Duane, how about you?
DUANE: I put cliffs, rocks, vegetation, trees, and sometimes, oil rigs.
RM: Lynette?
LYNETTE: Rocky coastline, rolling hills, trees, there's a lot of meadows up there.
RM: Don?
DON: Rocky coast area. Like around Point Loma or Monterey Bay, came to mind. And the
meadows and things like that around Spyglass, 17 mile drive.
RM: Okay. Let's see, I think Linda had mentioned marshes, if I'm correct. Another word that
people sometimes use for marshes is wetlands. How many of you have heard of the word, wetlands?
Eight, Nine. What comes to mind -- how would you define a wetland to somebody from let's say,
Sweden, who comes here and says, gee, tell me what a wetland is. How would you define it?
MAN: I would say, an area with water maybe 5 feet deep, vegetation growing out of it, maybe
islands out through the ... a lot of mud, some ducks.
RM: Swampy? Any other ...
WOMAN: A lot of birds, sea birds.
MAN: I would say an area that has pretty much perpetual water cover to it.
RM: But how would that differ from a rocky area which also might have water on it?
MAN: Well, rocky areas normally will run off, they don't have perpetual water.
RM: I see, so it's water ...
MAN: It's a lot area that collects water, that retains water.
RM: Anything else?
MAN: Swamp. Swamp land.
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RM: How many of you would use the word ... is there a difference between swamps and
marshes?
WOMAN: I would think so.
RM: What is it?
WOMAN: I guess swamp would be more disgusting. Stagnant water, no flowing water, just
stagnant water, lots of bugs, muddy and slimy.
RM: Linda?
LINDA: I think more of it as more of a balanced natural habitat for birds and ...
RM: Which does?
LINDA: Marshes. Not swamps. But it's more of a balanced natural environment, what I
would think of, and I've seen Louisiana swamps and there's no comparison.
WOMAN: I think of swamps as being dark, and don't they have a lot of trees. I've never
actually been to a swamp, but ...
WOMAN: Whereas the marshes and wetlands don't have a lot of trees.
RM: So kind of open, and anything else? Are there any swamps as you've described them
along the California coast?
WOMAN: Not that I've seen.
MAN: I can't recall any.
RM: How about marshes?
MAN: There's a few around some of the river outlets to the ocean.
RM: How many of you have ever seen a marsh on the coast?
WOMAN: As opposed to a wetland or is that synonymous.
RM: That's usually synonymous. Wetlands tends to be a technical term.
MAN: You mean outside the Golden Gate Bridge.
RM: Okay, you've seen.
MAN: No, I was just wondering ...
RM: Anywhere along the coast or where the salt water...
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WOMAN: What are you saying, outside the Golden Gate or inside the bay area...
MAN: There's some in the bay area ...
WOMAN: But that's on the bay and not on the coast.
RM: You're right, that's not quite on the coast. I'm really thinking of areas with salt water, and
of course, the bay has salt water and most of the rivers you don't get salt water back very far, except in
the bay area you do. Have any of you seen marshes elsewhere that you'd like to share?
MAN: I believe there's a few up around Eureka.
WOMAN: Outside of Vallejo, Highway 37, right out of Vallejo, Inverness along the coast.
MAN: I've driven the highway. There's not very many swamps, except, I mean, wetlands or
whatever you want to call them, unless they're right where a river might run into the ocean.
RM: Okay. If I were to ask you about marshes, would that word cause confusion, do you
think? Is it a pretty clear word to you?
MAN: I think so.
RM: But clearly, swamp is ...
MAN: Swamp is kind of stagnant water, and the marsh is more or less clear and maybe you
get a little flow through there, and it's a little nicer environment.
RM: Of course, well on the sea, you have tidal action, you have the nature of things, you've got
movement. Which parts of the California coastline come to mind when I mentioned the words rocky
shoreline. Which areas?
WOMAN: Mendocino.
RM: I should tell you, I'm from out of state.
WOMAN: It's northern California.
MAN: There's two areas that come to mind for me. South of Monterey is one, and San
Francisco up to Mendocino, it's very remote and you're very high above the ocean, you get a straight
cliff drop off right into the ocean, so it's quite a considerable area.
MAN: I concur.
RM: So mainly, middle north, as you think of it?
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MAN: I'd say central north, and central south.
WOMAN: Big Sur.
MAN: Big Sur has got them on both sides, really. That's south of San Francisco.
WOMAN: You're talking about high cliffs, that type of thing. There's rocks all the way. You
can go down all the way past L.A. and you've got rocks.
RM: I'm really thinking of shoreline that's ... cliffs would be one kind of rocky shoreline, but
another can be something where the rocks are not very high above, but to get to the water, you've got
to walk over rocks and there's not sand or marsh.
WOMAN: Sheltered cove.
MAN: Well, the unpopulated areas of the state, you've got a lot of cliffs, you've got a big drop
off straight into the ocean.
RM: Sure, that's most dramatic example of rocky shoreline. How about beaches -- which part
of California do you think of when you think of beaches?
IN UNISON: Southern California.
RM: But presumably, you have some of them in this area.
WOMAN: Santa Cruz.
MAN: There's some great beaches in northern California, but they're smaller.
WOMAN: Capitella. Water's cold. Carmel.
RM: What I'm particularly interested in today is the matter of oil spills, and so we'll be talking
about different aspects of oil spills for the rest of the group. The reason why I'm interested in how you
think about the shoreline, what words you use and things is, because I'm in the process of designing a
questionnaire that would ask people about these matters. So it's very important for me to know what
words make sense and what words people understand as they're intended. It's very helpful to learn
that swamps are not a word that is particularly useful in this case. What I'd like you to do is turn the
page, and answer the three questions on the next page. The questions are what kind of harm comes to
mind when oil from a spill comes ashore on a sandy beach, a marshy area, a rocky shoreline. Just the
kinds of things that you think of that are harmed. (Long Pause) Okay. So, what kind of harm comes
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to mind when oil from a spill comes ashore on a sandy beach? Don?
DON: Black shoreline, contaminated wildlife and sand.
RM: What kind of wildlife?
DON: Birds, particularly.
RM: Don, how about you?
DON: I've just got, ruins the beach for a time until it's cleaned up.
RM: Okay, Joselyn?
JOSELYN: I have the sandy beach ruins the sand for relaxation and recreation, kills the clams,
crabs, etc. which live in the sand, destroys the quality of the salt water.
RM: Destroys the quality of the salt water in what way?
JOSELYN: Spoils the whole ... it will stay with the oil and all the creatures all living in there
feed off of oil sand (inaudible).
RM: Okay, Duane?
DUANE: Yeah, I put oil covered birds and fish, dead fish on the banks, and black oily sand,
fewer people come to the beach because now it's like a wasteland, and oily waves coming in. Instead
of nice waves breaking, you see these slick oily waves breaking.
RM: Nicole?
NICOLE: I put pretty much the same. Public access is pretty much gone. Loss of bird and
mammal life, crustations, and just simply a mess.
RM: Any other things that the rest of you might have? Linda?
LINDA: Well, it also hurts the economy when these sandy beaches ... because people don't
go, they don't spend money, so it's a chain reaction.
WOMAN: Tourist attractions.
MAN: What comes to mind is what happened to Santa Barbara many years ago. The sand
looked fine, but you could walk out there and you don't realize it, but the bottom of your feet were
black after about 10 minutes from walking about in the sand, and it was billed as cleaned up, but the
residue remained for quite a while.
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RM: How many of you have actually been on a beach that's been oiled?
WOMAN: Long Beach.
RM: Okay, Brett?
BRETT: (inaudible)
RM: Santa Barbara. Duane?
DUANE: San Francisco.
RM: What did you notice.
DUANE: Like it was almost impossible to clean it up. Because the sand it may look after a
while, pretty good at the time, but when you dig down, you still find black sand and stuff, and like I
said, dead birds and stuff like that. It's just like everything just dies.
WOMAN: Smelly. It smells.
RM: What about marshes? What did you have for that? Anyone?
DUANE: I just put the whole marsh was covered with oil. It was like a pool of oil instead of
water, because I scuba dive. You can't when you go down, there's no light down there, there's nothing
down there, because that oil just cuts everything that's under the oil, it doesn't get any light, oxygen and
things like that. So it's kind of like a dead pool of oil.
MAN: I just put down it kills birds and animals. Is much more difficult to clean up the damage
than it would be maybe on the beaches.
RM: Would the rest of you agree with that?
WOMAN: It turns it swamp-like.
RM: It turns it swamp-like.
WOMAN: I think of a marsh as very scenic to travel along, and it would really just destroy all
that too. You wouldn't enjoy driving by it.
RM: What would you see?
WOMAN: I just put basically, my thought when you come to oil spill is death because you kill
everything, and you're driving through a graveyard basically.
RM: And what kinds of things would it kill?
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WOMAN: I think it would kill everything. Plants, and if there's no plants, you wouldn't have
any animal life or water life.
RM: What kind of animal life is there in a marsh?
WOMAN: I think of birds myself.
DUANE: Birds, fish ...
WOMAN: Insects.
WOMAN: It's a natural balanced environment. We're totally destroying it.
MAN: I would think it's easier to clean up a beach or rocks, but a marsh, you really kind of
lose that.
RM: Other comments about the marsh and the effects of oil on it?
WOMAN: I had a question. Does the marsh have a sand layer beneath it or is it dirt?
RM: Good question. Okay, Duane, when you're diving down there, what do you see?
DUANE: Looks like dirt to me. Some dirt, silt. Doesn't look like sand.
RM: More like mud. It's kind of soft. Under that I suppose it's sand.
DUANE: Algae covered, more or less on the bottom.
RM: As I said, I'm not an expert on marshes, but that makes sense to me. Okay, any other
comments about marshes.
DUANE: One thing I think about is the smell. Probably if everything died, it'll start stinking like
crazy because no ... the carbon dioxide isn't getting turned back into oxygen. So it'll probably just start
stinking like crazy.
RM: And the last one is rocky shoreline. What kinds of things came to mind when you thought
of the harm from an oil spill on rocky shoreline?
DUANE: Oil covered rocks.
WOMAN: Slick areas and lack of access.
WOMAN: Total devastation.
RM: Devastation, I'm sorry, devastation of what?
WOMAN: Of just everything. Because especially in the rocks, you have your seals, your
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otters, and again you have your complete food chain which affects man eventually. Just total
devastation just like up in Alaska. It just killed everything.
RM: Other comments.
MAN: I was thinking, it probably cleans itself better than if in a marsh or a beach.
RM: Why is that?
MAN: Because you get high wave action during certain times of the year, and it tends over a
year or two to self clean, you know.
RM: Other comments?
WOMAN: I disagree with that. It may clear from that area, but things in this world never
disappear. I mean they become something else, but we don't get rid of anything.
MAN: I was just saying, compared to a beach or marsh. I think that would ... if you had to
have a spill, it would probably be better on the rocks ...
WOMAN: I mean to look at it, it would clean itself so it would be pretty again, but the damage
... it's not going to go away. It's going to either go deeper, it's going to go down, it's going to move out.
It's going to continue.
RM: Other comments. Okay. I mentioned that I'm writing a questionnaire, and what I'd like
to do now is to administer a draft of that questionnaire to Don, if he's willing, just to be my foil as it
were and give answers. I'd like the rest of you to listen to the questionnaire and give me feedback on it.
These are the kinds of things I'd appreciate your thinking about, and of course, Don can give feedback
too. One thing is, do the words that I use, will they make sense to people? Because it will be
administered to a random sample of people in the state of California which includes people of a very
broad educational attainments; people live in the north, people live in the south, people live inland and
on the coast and so forth, so the question has to be really clear. Another thing would be the description
I give of a situation that ultimately I want Don to answer a question about, and that question is whether
he would vote for a program that I will describe, whether the program itself makes sense as I described
it. Am I leaving out crucial pieces of information that you'd really want to know if you were being
interviewed about it? The problem about an interview like this is that in describing a program, there's
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so much information that I could possibly use. If I use it all the interview could last a couple hours, and
Don would be asleep before I'd have a chance to get to the question, so I try to limit the amount of
information to just the information that's really important to make a decision about how you'd vote on
this particular problem. But I may have left out information that's useful. I may have included
information that I don't need. So your reactions to that would be very helpful. So I'll begin the
interview, and periodically I'll stop and we can discuss what's gone on since the last stop and I'll get
your comments.
DON: 20 questions.
WOMAN: Can I have a cookie?
RM: If your friends will let you have one (laughter). (Pause) Okay, Don, if you would be so
kind as to respond as if I were interviewing you in your home. You would be selected by a random
process and then an interviewer would try to waylay you somehow and convince you to take the
interview, and then you'd be kind enough to do it, and then the interviewer would do just what I'm
about to do. Okay, any questions about what we're going to do. No, all right.
Let's talk for a moment about 5 issues that may or may not be of concern to
people in California like you in the years ahead. I will read you the list of issues. If the
#1 means not at all concerned, and the #10 means extremely concerned, what number
between 1 and 10 best describes how concerned you personally are about each issue
when you think of the future in California. Education in primary and secondary schools.
DON: 10.
RM: So, it means extremely concerned. Oil spills along the coast.
DON: 5
RM: Water supply.
DON: 8
RM: Air pollution in the cities.
DON: 10
RM: And traffic congestion.
DON: 10.
RM: Any problems with that question. Just out of curiosity, how would you have answered the
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oil spills along the coast.
WOMAN: 10. I would have given 10 to all of them.
MAN: A little higher than 10.
DON: 10.
RM: Linda?
LINDA: 10.
WOMAN: 5
MAN: 5
JOSELYN: 10
RM: Wow, it's either 10 or 5. So much for the 10 point scale.
MAN: The preference that of the crime there, and my understanding of the question was my
concern for the future, and I don't see enough of a potential, enough of it happening, as is compared to
some of the items that you brought up there.
RM: That's exactly what I'm trying to do here. Okay, now I proceed with the interview.
The state of California has many demands on it for new programs for everything
from improving education to building highways. Since each new program costs
taxpayers additional money, it is important to see if citizens are willing to pay for such
programs or not. In this survey, I will ask you about a program that has been proposed
to prevent certain types of damage from medium to large oil spills in California.
[Periodically, I have to make notes]. Have you ever taken part in a survey like this
where the state sought your views about a potential new program?
DON: No.
RM: All right.
After giving you some important background information, I will tell you about
what kinds of spills the program would prevent, and how much the program would cost
your household. As you may know, California already imposes strict regulations on oil
companies that transport oil on or near the border. These regulations prevent most
spills that involve 25,000 gallons of oil or more. Spills this large can cause significant
amounts of damage. If a spill does occur, the state requires the company responsible
for the spill to pay the cost of cleaning it up. Okay. Now, I will hand you card A, card
A is also in your booklet. You can make feel free to turn to card A, and make any
notes you want on the page. There are three types of shoreline that have been affected
by past spills.
The first is sandy beaches, and then when the questionnaire is completed, I
would open a nice piece of cardboard, and show nice pictures of sandy beaches. At
the moment I only have these little bitsy pictures, but I want to give them a sense of
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what I mean by sandy beaches. These photographs show some California beaches.
So, Don will look at those, and I say the second is rocky shoreline. And then I would present
Don with three photographs, so I'll pick those three, and again those would be matted on a piece of
cardboard and they'd be much bigger and much more attractive, but they would illustrate, at least one
of them would have the tall cliffs, another one might look at kind of lower rocks. They would try to
show the variety and convey together this type of area. And then I'd say the third type of area is salt
water marshy areas. These marshes are located in bays or at the mouths of rivers, and then show
photographs of marshy areas which again would show the diversity of the marshy areas.
DON: You'd like these.
RM: And if I get the chance, I'd like to get your judgment on these, but I'll have to figure out a
way to do it efficiently, so if we have the time, we'll do that. Okay in a real interview I would retrieve
the photographs, and then I would say: this is a map of California showing the coastline of the state.
Then I would point out the city of San Francisco is located here, and I would point to where the city of
San Francisco is just to give you an orientation, and to Los Angeles. Then I'd say:
This map shows you the location of the shoreline types. The coast marked in
red is predominantly rocky shoreline. The yellow areas are sandy beaches, and the
blue areas mark the locations of salt water marshes. They are located along the coast
where rivers run into the sea. Marshes are also found in bays such as San Francisco
bay.
I've been conveying a fair amount of information, so of course, we've already discussed some
of it, so it's familiar to you, but in an interview, obviously this is it. Comments? Things that weren't so
clear?
MAN: I'll comment, I didn't realize there was so much wetland. You've got a lot more blue
marks on there than I ... Those are all streams?
RM: Yes, they are.
MAN: Except for the bay here.
MAN: You're defining that as an area where a river runs into the ocean.
RM: Yes. This particular map probably exaggerates wetlands. The problem is up north where
each river comes in, there is some sort of wetland, but it's a very small area. This map is, of course, a
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fairly small map. When we first did the map we didn't have these blue lines, then it looked like very few
wetlands, when in fact, they are located all up and down the coast. Howver, when we put the little blue
lines in, it conveys an impression of a large area of wetland, and in fact, the area is relatively small, but
they are distributed up and down the coast.
WOMAN: You have blue lines going well into inland.
RM: That's a mistake. It shouldn't be on the map.
WOMAN: That's what I was wondering if they thought that oil would go that far inland.
RM: No, they wouldn't. Because most of these rivers, the salt water doesn't ... it would be as
far as the salt water would go up, and for most of the rivers, it doesn't go very far.
WOMAN: Up here by the bay, the salt water does go all the way ... a long ways.
RM: It's an area that's at risk. You're right. These lines do go inland a bit. We're just trying
how to portray in an accurate fashion without misleading people, the nature of it. Probably we're going
to use a bigger map. The ideal map is very large. When you have a very large map, it clearly shows
where each stream and these areas are. I'm thinking of doubling the size of the map. It would be a big
fold out, and try to see if that would convey it. Is there any other information that would be helpful
about the distribution of these types of shoreline? What you think people would want to know?
MAN: Where the major cities are -- highlighted.
RM: Would that be helpful to you Don?
DON: Give me more of an idea of places that I'd be familiar with.
RM: What cities would you suggest. I don't want to put too many on, because that would
clutter the map.
DON: Monterey, San Francisco.
RM: Okay, Monterey, San Francisco.
DON: Los Angeles.
WOMAN: San Diego.
RM: San Diego.
DON: Eureka or Big Sur or some coastal areas.
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MAN: Mendocino.
WOMAN: Maybe Santa Barbara, did you get that?
RM: That would help you to orient the places you've seen or been. Okay. Any other
suggestions?
MAN: I have a question here. Down in Los Angeles, if you've got water running out of the
Los Angeles River, down around Huntington Beach....
(End of Side A - Tape 1)
MAN: ... I don't know for sure.
RM: I don't know either.
MAN: Huntington Beach is the only place I can think of down there that would fit marshlands
or wetlands, but again, I see a lot of these places in southern California are dry in the summer.
RM: Yes, the rivers are.
MAN: Would wetlands still define something that is wet part of the year and not the rest of the
year?
RM: Well, there are areas where rivers come in that are kind of low and sandy and those
areas, even that south, that (inaudible) wetlands because they are located in various places. Any other
suggestions? Okay. Here's another issue. About the colors that I used. Did they... were they
appropriate? Did they exaggerate something more than another, create a poor impression of some
area?
MAN: Why don't you use green for wetlands?
RM: Green for wetlands. What the reaction of the rest of you?
WOMAN: I was thinking brown.
RM: Why brown?
WOMAN: The blue just really jumps out, and maybe it's because our map has got a little more
blue on it than the other map. But it just... and green is very comparable to blue. Brown would be a
little softer, because there's a little areas that are accentuated, like around the bay, it's not all wetlands.
There's a lot of wetlands, but it's not all, and it makes it look like the whole thing is wetlands.
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MAN: I was thinking that maybe the ocean is usually blue, and the ocean and the bay would
be blue, and maybe the wetlands would be green. Some differential, because they're normally fresh
water.
RM: Well, actually the plants and things in these type of wetlands do live in salt water, of
course, sometimes it's brackish water, a mixture of regular water and salt water. Okay, brown or
green, Lynette?
LYNETTE: Brown.
RM: Why?
LYNETTE: Because it doesn't stand out as much. (inaudible)
RM: Why is it good not to stand out so much.
LYNETTE: I think the blue makes it seem like there's more than there really is. On the bigger
map, some of that would be eliminated wouldn't it.
RM: Yeah, we'd try, but that may not be totally possible, whereas brown would be more in
keeping. Okay, what about red for the rocks, is that ...
WOMAN: Maybe if you just didn't color in the whole bay. Maybe colored around the
perimeter of it.
RM: I think that's a very good idea. Because, you're quite right, I mean, the whole bay is not
one big marshland.
MAN: I think the desert is brown to me and wetlands are green, that's my thinking. I don't
think of wetlands as brown, I think of everything there as green. Vegetation and all that is normally
green. Brown is like you're driving across Nevada.
RM: Are there folks here (inaudible) brown and green?
WOMAN: You're talking about a larger map.
RM: Yeah, it would be somewhat bigger than this, but it will still be tough to convey these river
mouths.
WOMAN: Is this something that has to be portable?
RM: Yeah, what we'll do is open it up, like this.
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WOMAN: So plastic overlays for each one is out of the question.
RM: I think so.
WOMAN: I like the green for the marshes and brown for the rocks.
RM: Not red?
WOMAN: Not red.
RM: I see. Nicole?
NICOLE: I pick green for the wetlands and the red and yellow are fine with me.
RM: Don?
DON: Green (inaudible) for the wetlands?
RM: Yes.
DON: If you're going to go between green and brown, I'd go with green, as far as I'm
concerned, you can leave it blue. I'm not that impressed one way or the other with the colors, as long
as I can identify them.
RM: Yellow for beaches, is that okay? Of course, that's kind of helpful, it has a certain
meaning. Of course, if we put black for rocks, (inaudible) because it looks like an oil spill and has
other kinds of connotations. Your comments are very helpful. But do you think a map like this would
be helpful to people? What besides the amount of blue on the map, are there any other surprises that
the map conveys to you, things that ...
MAN: You know it might be interesting to put in and it would give some help maybe, to put in
the number of miles that you've got from one end of California to the other, it's probably 1,000. I don't
know, is there 1,000 or 1,200 -- there's a lot of miles.
MAN: Valleys here don't stand out very well. Kind of blend in with the heavy terrain.
RM: This is a xerox that's taken off a rather detailed topical map, and reduced, so all those
lines really jumble. Ultimately, instead of showing the topography, which is kind of irrelevant, I would
use a map that shows the counties, so you'd have county lines, so you could kind of see where your
county was in relation to the coast. But you know, we're just at the early stage of fooling around with
it. Your feedback is very helpful because there's several different ways to go, and it's hard to know
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what would be best. Is there anything else that surprised anyone about the map, what we show on the
map?
MAN: I would reiterate, I was startled by the number of wetlands.
WOMAN: Me too.
RM: But the beaches make sense to you as far as you know them and the rocks.
WOMAN: Sandy beaches, yeah.
RM: Okay. All right, let's continue. We've shown Don photographs. We've shown him the
map. Now we ask:
Which type of shoreline do you think the state should make the greatest effort to
protect? Marshes, rocky shoreline or sandy beaches, or don't you have a preference
about this.
Actually before Don answers, why don't each of you write down your own answer to the
question. Which type of shoreline do you think the state should make the greatest effort to protect:
marshes, rocky shoreline, or sandy beaches, or don't you have a preference?
MAN: I have a question. How can the state better protect one area than the other.
RM: Ah, there are ways.
MAN: There are ways. Okay, I'm not familiar with them.
RM: Okay, everybody made their choice? Don, what would you say?
DON: I guess I'd have to go with the wetlands.
RM: Why is that?
DON: I'm no expert on this, but I would feel there is probably more potential damage there
than the beaches which after time can be cleaned up, and the shorelines. Wetlands it seems to me
would be a lot tougher to clean up. And whatever you did clean up would not be the same ever again.
RM: Okay, how many of you put wetlands, marshes, I'm sorry. Okay, three. Others? How
many put sandy beaches? One. Then how many put rocky shoreline? No one. So the rest of you
were indifferent, you couldn't choose.
MAN: No preference.
MAN: They all seemed equally important to me.
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WOMAN: I felt that way too. I feel all three...
MAN: I feel that there so many (inaudible) each other, I don't know how they can judge. ...
wetlands all the way down, and how you could choose one area maybe that's 12 miles, and the next 12
miles you wouldn't put as much protection.
RM: So you shared Don's skepticism about that. Any other comments about that question?
WOMAN: I can see where a large populace would say beaches because that's where most
recreation is, but I think there are a lot of beautiful things along all the parts of the coast. That's why I
couldn't decide, because for my own enjoyment I enjoy them all.
RM: All right. Now I'm going to ask Don another question. Now, turn the page to Card B.
This card, and of course, these three cards I'd hand to the respondent.
This card shows the average number of medium to large spills involving 25,000
gallons or more of oil that currently occur each year in California. If there was no
regulation, there would be many more spills like this each year. As you can see, despite
current regulation, California experiences an average of 3 spills of 25,000 or more
gallons every year. The spills are caused by oil tankers going off course due to human
error or mechanical problems. The state is considering a new program to prevent these
spills from damaging the shore. Before I describe the problem, have you ever voted for
or against any propositions in a California election or aren't you sure about this?
DON: Yes.
RM: You have, good.
Here's how the plan would work. The oil companies would pay the cost for
each tanker or barge that transports oil anywhere in California to be escorted by an oil
safety ship run by the U.S. Coast Guard. The oil safety ship would help make sure the
tanker stays on course and strictly obeys all maritime regulations. This will help prevent
spills. If the tanker developed engine trouble, the oil safety ship would be large enough
that it could tow the tanker out of danger. If a spill does occur, it is important to take
action before the oil reaches the shore. The safety ship would carry special equipment
and trained personnel who would immediately begin to recover the oil from the sea.
Within a few hours, the safety ship would receive assistance from one of the new oil
response centers that are being located along the California coast.
This program would be expensive. The cost would be passed on to California
consumers through a special surcharge at the gasoline pump. In order to make sure
that the money will not be used for anything else, the money from this surcharge would
go into a special state fund, that by law could only be used for the response center and
the safety ship program.
Okay. That's a description of the plan.
MAN: Did I understand you right that here you're talking about having an escort ship for
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everything, to keep them on course, and okay. One step at a time. The second thing I remember you
saying is if they did have a spill, have the engine quit or something, they have assistance, right?
RM: Yes.
MAN: How close to the shoreline are they allowed to come?
RM: Not very close. That's a very good question, but I don't...
MAN: That was the question I had. Where would they pick up the ship?
RM: For the ships coming from Alaska, they would be picked up north and be escorted the
whole time. These questions are very helpful.
MAN: Do they come down in convoys or do they come down individually?
RM: Yes, I believe they come down individually.
WOMAN: (inaudible) I've got to think about this.
MAN: Did you want some comments on this now?
RM: Absolutely.
MAN: I don't know how many tankers are off shore at one time, maybe 15 or 20. To have an
empty ship with each tanker is an extremely expensive operation.
MAN: Overkill.
RM: Why do you say overkill?
MAN: I don't know, I just ...
MAN: (inaudible) a lot more reasonable, double hull tankers. You could force a lot more
restrictions on the oil companies and a lot cheaper, I think.
RM: What kind of restrictions?
MAN: Double hulls, maybe offshore loading, when it's way off shore, maybe 10 or 15 miles,
and then pipe it in, a lot of things could be done, and then perhaps maybe 5 ships could be stationed up
and down the coastline in case of a spill.
RM: Right. Okay, other questions.
MAN: That's what I was thinking. Where you have, you have stations, regulated stations,
along the coast. That's what I would think, you have an assistance ship near each one of those
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locations when a tanker came in your vicinity, you'd send a ship out to escort it out to the next vicinity,
and then another one would come out, instead of having one follow it all the way down the coast.
WOMAN: Are oil tankers required to carry the equipment the clean up the spill on them?
RM: No.
WOMAN: Why aren't they ... That seems... rather than having a ship, why not equip the
tanker themselves.
MAN: Well, if they're in trouble, if they're floundering somewhere out there in the ocean, they
can't do much. If something happens to the engine.
MAN: That's what I was saying, why not make the tankers a lot more safer, so they wouldn't
leak. But I can understanding that the assistance ship is a good idea to me, like you said, if the engine
fails or something, you might need a tow or you might need somebody there where you could unload
some of the oil there onto another ship or something like that.
RM: And that's how it would work. Because, of course, the assistance ship could have tanks
for some oil. These tankers are big, but from these response centers, you have other ships called
lighters that can come out and then receive the oil from the tanker directly, but for the first part of the
spill, you would have the escort ship.
MAN: It seems that to me that's the biggest problem is time, once a ship starts leaking oil, you
know, how fast can you get there to plug the leak of take the oil from that ship, or like you say, start
cleaning up that spill.
MAN: Well, statistically, how many ships lose power out there in the course of a year?
RM: Well, that's a good question. I don't know exactly. I'll be talking about numbers of spills
in a second.
MAN: If you take an airplane and send it anywhere, it's under control by towers along the
way, and they certainly don't have an escort with them, not that it would do them any good if they lost
power. (inaudible) If you had stations up and down the coast that are monitoring this, and somebody
standing by to go out and help a given situation, statistically how often would it come up. That would
be a question I would ask. The idea of somebody out there in a separate going up and down with each
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and every tanker is (inaudible).
RM: As I mentioned, that there is, at the moment, an average of three spills a year, that this
program would be directed at. In a little bit, I'll describe those spills, but ...
MAN: Those spills including the bay, where you know how many were in the bay.
RM: Actually, why don't we wait until I describe the spills for that. Now, I'd just like your
reactions to the plan.
DON: Would you be able to give us an idea of how many trips, how many ships come and go
a year?
RM: So in a sense to get an idea of how many escort ships you'd need, would that ...
DON: Put that in perspective, how many gallons does a typical tanker, how many trips were
made by these tankers every year, how much (inaudible)
MAN: ... one following one tanker all the way down the coast, and then you'd have to send
him back to start over, to catch another tanker coming in the waters, whereas if you had them at each
point, the return journey wouldn't be as far.
RM: Other reactions?
WOMAN: Well, if they have response stations all along the coast, would it be feasible that
another boat could get there if they got in trouble rather than have them follow it around, and you say,
we'll pay for it by a surcharge at the gas pump. Do you expect the oil company to take a loss at all the
money they're spending to get these people to escort them down the coast.
RM: The oil companies would have to pay for it, and then we....
WOMAN: ...we pay for it at the pumps. It's not just gonna cost just the surcharge, it's gonna
cost us a lot more than that.
RM: Why is that?
WOMAN: Because it's going to be passed down through the products they provide for us.
Things are going to go up to pay for the cost of the escort ship.
MAN: Like a bureaucracy.
WOMAN: Yeah.
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RM: But the prices would only be increased to cover the cost of this particular plan.
WOMAN: Right, but I don't see how it's feasible to have each ship escorted by another ship.
It is overkill, I really feel that.
MAN: These tankers are so large. You know, the ship that follows them would have to be at
least half as large to do any good, that's a big ship. I don't know how many people it takes to man a
ship, but it would take a lot, I think. And maybe the response to areas of the shore would have to ...
you mentioned lighters, what would they take out, maybe 5 lighters or something, have to have 10, a
whole bunch of them.
RM: A number of round trips, yeah.
MAN: If the tanker has navigational problems, what about the following ship? If they get in the
fog and he runs into him. The major objection I have is to the expense and so forth. When you boil it
all down, you're starting another bureaucracy. You've got to get rid of bureaucracies instead of starting
more. But that's tough to do and still maintain the balance of taking care of the oil problem. But the oil
is there, and statistics would have to enter into it someplace. Someplace in the world that's got to have
somewhat equal flow of tankers going up and down the coast that's unregulated, and how many
accidents do they have? And if you put in your program, statistically how much of this would it cut out?
Would it cut it down to 1, 1.2?
RM: That information is coming. Other reactions to the plan, to whether it would work,
whether it would make sense, whether it's plausible as a way, because it's very hard to reduce these last
spills? You know, you put the regulation in, and you eliminate a lot of them, but it's these last ones that
are tough.
MAN: My opinion is, it's not plausible. To me, it's not possible.
RM: Okay, why is that?
MAN: Cost. It's such a huge operation. I would assume that maybe 15 to 20 oil tankers in
California to have 15 or 20 ships following these guys, and if the ship would have to be a certain size, it
just seems to be it wouldn't be plausible. Many other things could be done before we go to that
extreme.
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MAN: I think you have to sacrifice cost for what you're trying to protect the coastline, even if
you say, you have three, it's going to be a lot of damage, and if it's going to cost a little more to keep it
down to one or less than one, I think you should take that chance or pay that extra money or whatever
you have to do, because once it's gone, it's not coming back anymore. It's gone for good.
RM: That again, raises the question of what would be prevented. We'll go on to that. Other
comments? Okay. Very helpful. Here we go again with me reading the survey to Don. Ready -okay, I would have asked if you have any questions about this program, but you've clearly had the
opportunity to pursue that...
Before I tell you what this program would cost your household, it is important
for you to know just what kind of harm from oil spills it would prevent. As I
mentioned, each year an average of three spills occurs somewhere along the coast.
State experts have studied the size and type of shore affected by past spills, so we
know what the new spill prevention program would prevent. [Okay. Then I would
give you these cards.] These three cards describe the damage that would be prevented
by this program each year. Please spread them out and look at them. Since only
California would require such a program, it will only prevent spills on the California
coast. As you can see from the information on these cards, each of these spills is much
smaller than most of the spills you may have read about in the newspapers, like the one
in Alaska and none of the wildlife listed on these cards is endangered. After a period of
years, the local populations will recover.
Okay. Comments, questions on these descriptions?
WOMAN: I was surprised that sandy beaches reopen after one week of intensive cleanup,
whereas marshes are 7 years. I change my back answer.
RM: In the case of the marsh spill, it would be more oil, a bigger spill.
WOMAN: Are these like average, these spills this is what that...
RM: Basically, on average the program would prevent this kind of damage. This describes the
kind of damage you would prevent.
MAN: This is not the kind of damage that's happening right now. This is our three spills per
year.
RM: Yes.
MAN: The sum total of them.
RM: Right, and these are very similar to them.
DON: So you're saying then that your proposed program is going to cut down the spills to
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zero. Right?
RM: That's right.
DON: I don't agree with it. I don't think it's possible.
RM: Well, other reactions to Don's comment?
WOMAN: I agree. I don't think it's possible.
RM: Why not?
WOMAN: Because you always have human error.
MAN: Why happens when they're unloading and a line breaks. You can have all the escort
vessels you want, and it happened in the bay area I think recently. It wouldn't prevent that kind of spill.
WOMAN: But why aren't you talking about that spill being cleaned up before it can reach...
the sand, so it would eliminate that. They're there to clean it up.
RM: What I think Brett is saying is that it would be real hard to prevent the damage...
BRETT: The ship is in port and it's unloading oil and a line breaks.
MAN: What caused that one down in Huntington Beach or that area there? A year or so ago.
WOMAN: A hole in the hull or something, and it started leaking.
MAN: Yeah, the guy hit something out there, a rock or something.
RM: Unfortunately, I don't know all the details of that.
MAN: I think he was outside the lane that he was supposed to be in. I think that's what
caused that.
MAN: So my question is, we know about those kinds of spills that you're talking about, like
Huntington Beach and so forth, what's that got to do with escorting ships? If the three spills, maybe I'm
confused here... you've got three spills a year that are happening... but you're talking about bigger spills,
now. These are the bigger spills. So what we're talking about are the smaller ones that are under
25,000 gallons, is that correct?
RM: No.
MAN: Okay, it wouldn't be germane to what we're talking about. Aren't most spills likely to
happen while the ships are coming into docks or unloading or they're out in the ocean 30 miles, it's kind
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of unlikely, I mean it hasn't happened in Northern California, to the best of my knowledge...
RM: Actually there have been spills in areas that are somewhat closer to the shore because
they hit something and began to leak.
MAN: I know they had one lose power off Washington state last year. It got resolved, I don't
know precisely how.
RM: Yeah. Other reactions to the cards. Don, what's your...
DON: Since this Alaskan disaster, what have they done to look at the specific types of spills,
and say what could have been done to specifically stop this spill.
RM: Well, I do know something about Alaska. Let's assume this plan would have stopped
that damage.
WOMAN: It would have stopped the damage.
RM: It would have prevented it.
MAN: Can they be monitored from shore on their course?
RM: It's much harder and of course it failed in the Alaskan case.
WOMAN: And nobody could get there soon enough (inaudible).
RM: Of course, there are two stages in spill damage protection. Then once a spill happens,
you go to a second stage, and you try to keep the oil from spreading out. Of course, in Alaska there
was a big delay. And again this program we are talking about here is set up that there would be
extremely little delay. Get the boom out, and block the oil, and begin to pump it out into another ship.
WOMAN: I have a question. They said that the captain or who it is, was drinking and that's
why it happened. So just because somebody from another ship says, hey you're off course, if you're
drunk you could just ignore that guy and stay off course. Couldn't you?
RM: In this case, the captain wasn't steering the ship.
WOMAN: Who was?
RM: Someone else was, who was making mistakes.
WOMAN: So why did they make such a big deal about the captain drinking?
RM: Well, the captain was in charge and should have been on the bridge where he was
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supposed to be. But I think we could spend the rest of the time on Alaska, and I would prefer to get
back to these little cards. There's all kind of information that we could present about damage, do these
cards do a reasonably good job of giving you a sense of what ...
MAN: I was just questioning clean-up, that's all. It says like re-opened one week after
intensive clean-up. That seems pretty fast.
WOMAN: (inaudible) down south, it only took a week. You mean re-opening the beaches...
RM: How many of you were skeptical about that week? Four, five, six are skeptical. Okay,
raise your hand if you're extremely skeptical, one extremely. Somewhat skeptical, the others. So it
seems real short. Actually, I think it can be done. I'm no big expert, but I think if you really go at it,
you can dig up the sand, and perhaps that keeps it from sinking.
MAN: If you have a crew handy, but I'm thinking you don't have any crew particularly waiting
around, and if you have to round up people, and get equipment, and bring it in, you couldn't hardly do it
in a week.
RM: Yeah, this says intensive clean-up. Obviously, anything short of that ...
WOMAN: I think also some of the skepticism is based too on how clean it really is. Yeah, it's
re-opened, and people can go out there, but are they going to enjoy being out there.
MAN: It's like in Alaska, they say it's clean, but everybody else says no it's not clean. So then
they fight over it a month or two, and by that time it's not clean, and they go out again.
MAN: After these last oil spills, the thing that sticks out in my mind is the pictures of these guys
on T.V. with paper towels cleaning up rocks, and it seems unbelievable to me that you can get any kind
of progress out of that.
RM: It's unbelievable they had that many paper towels. How about the rocky shoreline card,
did you have any problems with that one, the description and the effects? Okay. Salt water marsh?
MAN: Is that rocky shoreline intensive clean or is it natural...
RM: Basically it's cleaned by wave action. Basically it breaks the oil apart and ... (inaudible)
Okay, salt water marsh, any comments on that one? No? Let me proceed.
MAN: One question I would have is 120 acres, what percentage of that is total acreage at
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risk?
RM: Uh-huh. Okay, so what if I said...
MAN: 120 acres doesn't seem like much, considering 1200 or 1500 miles of coast line.
RM: That's true, and of course, you have the local marsh as well, so it might be all one marsh
by a particular river, or it might just be a portion of a much bigger area. Would it make a difference to
you to know that?
MAN: Well, in terms of numbers and what the percentage is of the total, certainly not 10%,
one percent? Half a percent?
RM: But (inaudible) a total for the state?
MAN: Of the marshes at risk, how much is 120 acres?
RM: That would be a very small percentage.
MAN: So I wouldn't be really impressed with that, see what I'm saying. I don't see a big risk
with 120 acres.
MAN: Is this the marsh cleaning itself, or some company goes in there?
RM: This is the marsh recovering gradually, because there's not much that you can do, as far
as I understand. They would do what they could, but I think it's just real tough. Get as much as you
can away from it. Does 120 acres have a meaning to you as a size, or is that kind of big? Can you
picture 120 acres?
MAN: Yeah, that's pretty big.
RM: Pretty big.
MAN: Pretty big.
WOMAN: I don't think it matters that it's such a small percentage.
WOMAN: When you think of 10 miles of rocky shoreline, (inaudible) how many 1000 miles
of coastline, it's (inaudible).
RM: So nobody has problems with 120 acres as a way of describing the area.
WOMAN: Takes a little longer to visualize than miles, but you can do it.
RM: All right, let me continue.
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Now I would like to know how you would vote on this program if it were on
the California ballot, and it would cost your household $25.00 in higher gas and oil
prices. Those who support this program say they would vote for it, because it's worth
$25.00 a year to them to prevent the damage to the shore and to the wildlife described
in these cards. Those who oppose the program say taxes are too high already. The
damage this program would prevent is not worth $25.00 to them. They would rather
use their money for other things or other programs.
I would like you all to answer this question and just answer it as honestly as you can, don't try
to please me. If the cost to your household was $25.00 a year, would you vote for the program or
against it?
DON: I'd vote against it.
RM: Then I would ask Don, why did you vote against the program?
DON: Based on the information that you've given me, I don't believe it can be done for $25.00
per household. And I have an enduring belief that you start a bureaucracy, it's $25.00 this year,
$50.00 next year, $100.00 the next year, $200.00 the next year, after that $400.00 and it just keep
escalating, and that's not taking into account the normal prices going up and so forth.
RM: So it's a foot in the door sort of thing? How many of the others of you had that concern?
Okay.
BRETT: I did. I voted yes, if it's $25.00 a year guaranteed, but I don't believe either it can be
done for $25.00 a year.
RM: You think it would cost more.
BRETT: I think it would cost much more.
WOMAN: I also think your oil would increase, I really do.
RM: How did you vote?
WOMAN: I would vote no.
RM: What if it could be guaranteed it would be just $25.00.
WOMAN: Then I would vote yes, but I don't believe the state of California could keep
(inaudible).
MAN: I would change my vote, if there were someway that I (inaudible) There's no way that
the state of California is gonna ensure me or guarantee me that it's going to remain at $25.00.
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WOMAN: And eventually they'll want more.
RM: So, Don, what you're saying is in fact to prevent these three spills...
DON: I'd pay $25.00.
RM: It would be worth it.
DON: If I could ensure that that was the end of it...
MAN: And it would prevent the spills, and it was $25.00. I would sure go for that, I think
most people would.
RUTH: I wouldn't.
DON: Based on what, that it would cost you more than $25.00.
RUTH: I don't think we need the extra regulation, I don't think we need to be putting that extra
money in. Period. Whether it's $25.00 or if it's $5.00. I would vote no.
RM: Is this because preventing these spills is not worth the money to you, or is it because of
the way the program is designed or some other thing. It's perfectly acceptable, we've had people look
at these spills and say, you know, gee there are other things that are more important to me.
RUTH: I guess, if you want to put it that way, okay. I don't think it's very accurate though of
my perception. I think I guess for me personally, it gets down to maybe if we realized, if we saw the
spills happening, we would become more personally involved and stop driving our cars or whatever it
would take to stop it on a more personal level rather than a federal, state, governmental level. I think it
needs to become a more personal responsibility, and I don't think we as a country are going to come to
that personal realization until it actually happens, until we actually are sitting on this beach and the oil
comes rolling over us. (inaudible)
RM: Now return to these three cards, which describe three types of spills, would it be worth
any money at all to you in higher prices to prevent any of these?
WOMAN: No.
RM: And it's because the damage isn't that much? There are other things you'd rather use your
money for?
WOMAN: I don't want to be giving my money out to government agencies, yes. I don't want
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32
the government ...
(End of Side B - Tape 1)
WOMAN: ... then I would have to decide whether I was gonna buy that gas at that price, but I
don't want the government forcing that on me. I want that to be my decision.
RM: What if you could make voluntary contribution to some group that would provide these
services, but it wouldn't be the government.
WOMAN: Kind of a charitable type of group. I would consider it, but I probably wouldn't.
More than a government group, I would.
RM: And of course, earlier, you indicated that oil spills were not one of your high priorities, so
it's perfectly understandable. Linda, okay. How did you vote, what was your thinking?
LINDA: I think it's a great idea. Cost prohibitive. I don't think it would ever pass, but I think
it's a great idea.
RM: How would you vote?
LINDA: I would vote yes.
RM: Why?
LINDA: Because actually it sounds like a good idea to have, what he said, the inspection
station, but actually the escort service sounds good to keep an eye on them out there, to be there if they
get into trouble, when the oil starts leaking, because it's going to continue, it's going to get worse. As
we use more oil, there's going to be more tankers coming down. There's going to be more accidents.
Obviously, something has to be done, but again, I don't think it would pass, and I would like to be also
assured that it would only be used for this escort service. Basically the government should keep their
hands off of it. That would have to be worded so well, because they're real good at dipping into where
they're not supposed to dip into.
RM: And that's why I designed it that way to provide that assurance, because I didn't want
people to the government so much, but as much as possible to look at this program and see what it's
worth to them. It's a hard thing to arrange, of course. Nicole, what was your ...
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NICOLE: I vote yes. I thought $25.00 per year per household is peanuts. But I agree also
that there should be a stipulation that there can't be a cost increase, or if there is, it's so minute that it
wouldn't bother us. But $25.00 per year per household, I mean, I go out and buy lunch for $25.00 in
one day, and I think it's nothing. And if it's regulated, I'd be all for it.
RM: Okay, but if I'm not mistaken, Californians have voted down, especially in recent years,
lots of, what do you call it then.
NICOLE: Initiatives.
RM: You folks have voted down lots of these initiatives that wouldn't cost you any more than
this a year, and some of them were for environmental programs. How come you would go for this but
not for those?
MAN: Fear of government, I think that's what that is.
MAN: No confidence.
WOMAN: Yeah, cause we always get screwed.
MAN: You want to put it in, and then you say, well if it goes in, it'll go to something else, it's
not gonna go to what you ...
MAN: That's what happened to the school money.
WOMAN: Lack of faith, yeah. The lottery was supposed to be for the school, and all you
hear about is cuts and cuts and cuts, and yet they're bringing in billions left and right. So where's that
going, I think it's a lack of faith.
MAN: If I had an extra $25.00 to lay on the table for any purpose, I'd put it out for education
before I'd put it out for this, and I feel it's a waste of $25.00 because it's going to the government.
MAN: It doesn't sound ... $25.00, you know, anybody would go for that. I could take my
wallet out and give $25.00. If I was convinced that these 3 spills wouldn't happen, it's well worth
$25.00 to me, but I have no confidence that you can take some government entity and do all this for
$25.00 and it will actually prevent these three oil spills or four next year. You know, crazy things
happen. It might save one spill or two spills, but I just don't have that confidence that that program will
be that good.
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JOSELYN: I was thinking, why not pay for more professional, technical people to be on
board to ensure that the ships are well kept and then the people are not going to make their makes.
RM: Like an inspector or somebody.
JOSELYN: A lot of technical engineers, more educated people on board so that their
navigators are straight, their drivers and their people that are running the ship are all straight and do the
right job.
MAN: And tax the vodka that the captain drinks.
MAN: I would think that the court system and economics would be the way to handle the oil
spills, let the oil companies do it. If they get their hands slapped enough times, they'll get the message.
They might have to put in their double hulls and their ...
RM: Of course now, if they do have spills now, that they have to pay for the clean up. This
effort is kind of intended to prevent the spills. Don, how'd you vote?
DON: To me, $25.00 sounds real good. I think, what the average taxpayer does when he
goes to vote on a proposition, they make up their mind whether they want to spend their mind on taxes
or they don't and they just go right on down the line and vote. Unless there's a specific item that stands
on their mind, most people don't talk about an issue for two hours before they go in and vote either.
So, yeah, it sounds good from what I heard. Proposition usually says, as a result of this proposition
being passed, will be another 900 zillion dollars in revenue or something like that and that turns
everybody off right there.
RM: So what if I said this program will cost, you know, we took every household's $25.00
and it would be $7 million a year.
DON: It sounds worse than the $25.00 when you total it up.
MAN: It's just that 7 billion ...
RM: Million.
MAN: 7 million going to that program, or where ... that's my concern, is it going to go to that
program or is it going to get lost down the line, advertising and something else and something else, and
when it gets down to actually buying equipment and sending people out there, it's down to $2 million
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and maybe that's not enough.
RM: Let me ask you. If instead of 3 spills, we could only guarantee the sandy beach spill,
would that be worth $25.00 from those of you who said the 3 were worth $25.00.
WOMAN: It would for me.
RM: Why?
WOMAN: Because I think eliminating any of it is worth it.
MAN: Yeah. For $25.00 can eliminate any of it.
WOMAN: $25.00 a year, sure.
RM: You agree, you agree. What if it would cost $100.00 to eliminate this one.
WOMAN: A year? (inaudible)
MAN: That's too much as far as I'm concerned. $100.00 a family to eliminate one spill like
that? I think that's too high.
MAN: Now you're talking something a little different. For a year, I'd say yeah.
WOMAN: I'd say yes.
MAN: That's a ton for many families, I tell ya.
MAN: That's less than $1.00 a day.
WOMAN: Yeah.
RM: Yeah, that's less than $1.00 a day, but it's $100.00 a year. Lynette, how about you?
LYNETTE: (inaudible)
RM: How about $25.00 for one spill?
LYNETTE: $25.00 for one spill. It'll never $25.00. It'll always escalate, I'm sorry.
RM: Linda?
LINDA: It's terrible to put a price on our concerns, isn't it? We're concerned at $25.00, but
$100.00 (inaudible)
MAN: Try for $150.00.
LINDA: It would be worth, like I said, I never see it actually passing the ballot, but I feel it
would be worth it.
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RM: But (inaudible) if what you say, you would get a majority. Three said no and the rest said
yes and we still have a majority. So, how come if we have a majority here, it wouldn't pass on the
ballot?
MAN: I think it's the lack of the faith in the government.
RM: Okay, let's say that (inaudible)
WOMAN: With this money, would this then be self-supporting without other tax dollars,
where they start chopping and pretty soon there's no program left, but there's a surcharge on us still.
They do have a way of doing this in California.
RM: The whole idea of the survey is to see what it's really worth to people to prevent a certain
kind of environmental damage without worrying about what government is going to do and so forth. It's
to put a value on this, which can be used ...
MAN: (inaudible)
WOMAN: You can't.
WOMAN: Well, if I went to vote on it, and that's all I was voting on, I wasn't looking at the
big picture, I'd say yes. But I don't vote on anything without thinking about what it's gonna be like later.
RM: Yes.
WOMAN: You have to look at all aspects of it. You can't just say, oh yeah, great. We'll pay
$25.00 and that'll be it, and we'll never hear of it again. But five years down the road, they're going to
lose money.
MAN: But that's like a double-edged sword, because if we don't do anything, 20 years down
the road, we're going to be wearing gas masks, walking around ...
WOMAN: But what's that $100.00 or $25.00 gonna be.
MAN: Somebody'll be selling gas masks for $100.00 and you'll have to invest.
RM: We're close to the end of the group. I have one thing I want you to do and then there is a
little questionnaire on the last page that I'd like you to fill out. Before you do that, please pass the cards
back. Keep your questionnaires. All right, I've given you another pack of cards. It has more types of
spills and locations of spills. Would you please rank order these in the order of the ones you'd most
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like to prevent. The ones you're most concerned about down to the ones that you're least concerned
about, thinking about the state and the nature of the damage and so forth.
WOMAN: Do you want us to number them, is that what you said?
RM: Just put them in order, but the top one is the one you'd most like to prevent and the
bottom one is the least. (Pause) Put your ID number on them. (Pause) In ordering the cards, the top
one is the one you'd most like to prevent and the bottom one is the least, so they're in rank order.
MAN: That's two different areas ...
RM: No, however you wish. Put your number on the back. And I'd like to say you've been a
very helpful group, and I appreciate your comments and questions. (Pause) Okay, that's it. Thank
you very much.
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APPENDIX I
CARDS USED TO REPRESENT THREE SPILLS
AREA IMPACTED: 120 ACRES OF SALTWATER MARSH SOMEWHERE
ON THE CALIFORNIA COAST
DURATION OF IMPACT:
7 years to recover full ecosystem function
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 750 wading and shore birds such as:
herons, ducks, and gulls
kills 50 small animals such as:
weasels and muskrats
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AREA IMPACTED: 10 MILES OF ROCKY SHORELINE SOMEWHERE
ON THE CALIFORNIA COAST
DURATION OF IMPACT:
2 years until natural cleansing accomplished
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 1000 sea and shore birds such as:
oyster catchers, plovers, sand pipers,
black necked stilts, and avocets
kills 10 marine mammals such as:
seals and sea lions
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AREA IMPACTED: 2 MILES OF SANDY BEACH SHUT DOWN
SOMEWHERE ON THE CALIFORNIA COAST
DURATION OF IMPACT:
reopens after 1 week of intensive cleanup
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 50 sea and shore birds such as:
common gulls, plovers, sand pipers, cormorants,
and scoters
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APPENDIX II
CARDS USED FOR RANKING OF SPILLS
LOCATION:
GREATER LOS ANGELES AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
120 ACRES OF SALTWATER MARSH
DURATION OF IMPACT:
7 years to recover full ecosystem function
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 750 wading and shore birds such as:
herons, ducks, and gulls
kills 50 small animals such as:
weasels and muskrats
SM120-LA
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LOCATION:
GREATER LOS ANGELES AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
25 ACRES OF SALTWATER MARSH
DURATION OF IMPACT:
2 years to recover full ecosystem function
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 100 wading and shore birds such as:
herons, ducks, and gulls
kills 10 small animals such as:
weasels and muskrats
SM25-LA
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LOCATION:
GREATER LOS ANGELES AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
10 MILES OF SANDY BEACH SHUT
DOWN
DURATION OF IMPACT:
reopens after 3 weeks of intensive cleanup
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 250 sea and shore birds such as:
common gulls, plovers, sand pipers, cormorants,
and scoters
SB10-LA
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LOCATION:
GREATER LOS ANGELES AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
2 MILES OF SANDY BEACH SHUT DOWN
DURATION OF IMPACT:
reopens after 1 week of intensive cleanup
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 50 sea and shore birds such as:
common gulls, plovers, sand pipers, cormorants,
and scoters
SB2-LA
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LOCATION:
GREATER SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
10 MILES OF ROCKY SHORELINE
DURATION OF IMPACT:
2 years until natural cleansing accomplished
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 1000 sea and shore birds such as:
oyster catchers, plovers, sand pipers,
black necked stilts, and avocets
kills 10 marine mammals such as:
seals and sea lions
RS10-SF
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LOCATION:
GREATER SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
2 MILES OF ROCKY SHORELINE
DURATION OF IMPACT:
1 year until natural cleansing accomplished
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 200 sea and shore birds such as:
oyster catchers, plovers, sand pipers,
black necked stilts, and avocets
kills 1 seal
RS2-SF
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LOCATION:
GREATER SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
120 ACRES OF SALTWATER MARSH
DURATION OF IMPACT:
7 years to recover full ecosystem function
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 750 wading and shore birds such as:
herons, ducks, and gulls
kills 50 small animals such as:
weasels and muskrats
SM120-SF
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50
LOCATION:
GREATER SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
25 ACRES OF SALTWATER MARSH
DURATION OF IMPACT:
2 years to recover full ecosystem function
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 100 wading and shore birds such as:
herons, ducks, and gulls
kills 10 small animals such as:
weasels and muskrats
SM25-SF
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LOCATION:
GREATER SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
10 MILES OF SANDY BEACH SHUT
DOWN
DURATION OF IMPACT:
reopens after 3 weeks of intensive cleanup
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 250 sea and shore birds such as:
common gulls, plovers, sand pipers, cormorants,
and scoters
SB10-SF
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52
LOCATION:
GREATER SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA
AREA IMPACTED:
2 MILES OF SANDY BEACH SHUT DOWN
DURATION OF IMPACT:
reopens after 1 week of intensive cleanup
WILDLIFE AFFECTED:
kills 50 sea and shore birds such as:
common gulls, plovers, sand pipers, cormorants,
and scoters
SB2-SF