Refinery linked to 400 spills in 9 years

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Mar 30, 2008 | by Noaki Schwartz

A former county supervisor, Mike Stoker, has served as a Greka spokesman and said he was hired last year as a consultant to improve the company's relationship with local regulators and help Greka become a "better corporate citizen." He would not say what Greka pays him. Stoker is also the $60,720-a-year district representative for state Sen. Tom McClintock.

McClintock, R-Thousand Oaks, defended his employee and said he had no plans to get involved in the Greka situation.

While there are few rules regulating outside employment for legislative staff, Secretary of the Senate Gregory Schmidt said Stoker is "dangerously close to being a lobbyist."

After a series of spills, including the incident at the Firestone estate, the fire department issued its stop-work orders; the EPA launched an investigation and threatened Greka with tens of thousands of dollars in fines per day; Assemblyman Pedro Nava, D- Santa Barbara, began working on legislation that would beef up enforcement, impose higher penalties and provide more resources to clean up inland spills; and the county government, which issues various permits, began looking into increasing its penalties, too, and making companies reimburse emergency cleanup costs.

"I believe in giving people and businesses more than one chance, a number of chances if they're trying to make things right, but I don't believe in 400 chances," said Doreen Farr, a former planning commissioner running for a seat on the board.

Greka officials have mounted an aggressive defense, threatening to sue the county for $100 million if it isn't allowed to reopen and offering a $25,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of saboteurs.

Meanwhile, even with operations largely shut down, firefighters responded to five incidents at Greka installations last week.