San Francisco Baykeeper recommends a Yes vote on Berkeley’s Measure M. This bond measure will provide funds to reduce rainy-season pollution that runs off Berkeley’s streets and into San Francisco Bay.
During storms, rain rushes across roads, driveways, sidewalks, and roofs, picking up trash, oil, pesticides and other pollutants. In Berkeley, as in most Bay Area communities, the contaminated rainwater zooms down a storm drain into a concrete culvert that dumps it—unfiltered and untreated—into creeks or the Bay itself.
Baykeeper recommends you vote Yes on Proposition 37, the statewide initiative that requires genetically engineered food sold in California to be labeled. Prop 37’s passage will empower Californians to choose whether or not to eat food and drink beverages containing genetically engineered ingredients. Right now, food manufacturers are allowed to keep secret the presence of genetically modified ingredients in their products.
San Francisco Baykeeper is urging the State Lands Commission not to approve a large increase in sand mining in San Francisco Bay. Scientists at the U.S. Geological Survey have found that sand mining contributes to the erosion of Ocean Beach, and increased sand mining would exacerbate the problem.
Twenty-six swimmers made a 9-mile crossing of San Francisco Bay on Sunday, September 30 in San Francisco Baykeeper’s annual Swim for the Bay. We’re so proud of their accomplishment, and honored that they swam to support Baykeeper’s work for a clean and healthy Bay. See photos of Swim for the Bay by clicking below.
Do you or does someone you know have a passion for San Francisco Bay and expertise in water pollution? If so, Baykeeper asks you to consider serving on the major regulatory board overseeing the Bay’s water quality—the San Francisco Bay Regional Water Quality Control Board.
The Regional Water Board adopts and implements all water quality policies and permits in the Bay Area region. The board is composed of highly-skilled professionals whose decisions have a tremendous impact on the water quality of the Bay and its tributaries.
Lakeside Nonferrous Metals, an Oakland metal recycling company, agreed last week to move one of its outdoor facilities indoors and take other measures to prevent rainy-season pollution of San Francisco Bay.
Baykeeper sued Lakeside after documenting that the recycler’s storm water runoff has violated Environmental Protection Agency limits on lead, aluminum, and other toxic pollutants.
The C&H Sugar Refinery, which has repeatedly contaminated Carquinez Strait in ways that deplete oxygen available to fish and other aquatic life, needs tighter pollution controls, Baykeeper recently told regulators.
Baykeeper urged the Regional Water Quality Control Board to tighten controls as it renews C&H’s five-year permit to discharge wastewater, process water and runoff into Carquinez Strait. The strait connects Suisun Bay and San Pablo Bay, carrying water from the upper Delta into San Francisco Bay.
Chemicals that kill algae and other water weeds shouldn’t be put into California waters unless there is a clear need, Baykeeper recently told regulators.
Baykeeper made our recommendation as part of the State Water Resources Control Board’s process for updating California regulations requiring controls on the use of algaecides and aquatic herbicides.
San Francisco Baykeeper recently filed suit in federal district court to compel cleanup at one of the Bay’s worst industrial polluters, a shipping terminal in Richmond. We took this action because the Levin-Richmond Terminal Corporation is allowing harmful materials stored onsite to be washed and blown into the Bay.
