Waterboard minimum Fines
A Ventura County Star article on the Water Board fines
Dec 3, 2025 | Ventura and Los Angeles Counties
The Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board could have fined the Boeing Company $12,000,000 for allowing the Santa Susana Field Lab (SSFL), a toxic and radioactive site in the hills above Los Angeles and Simi Valley, to pollute local watersheds. They didn’t.
Instead, the Water Board reduced Boeing’s penalty to the bare minimum to $600,000, despite documented illegal discharges of long-lasting chemicals, toxic metals, and radionuclides into both Ventura County’s Calleguas Creek Watershed and the Los Angeles River watershed.
This is not an isolated incident. Boeing has been fined over $1,000,000 in the past for illegal stormwater discharges from the SSFL, penalties that were also reduced, yet violations have continued. Discharges continue until the site is fully cleaned up at the source.
Boeing will only do a complete cleanup if it saves them money, but with $0 fines from the Department of Toxic Substances Control and minimum fines from the Water Board, there is no financial incentive for Boeing to do the right thing.
