Local Gulf Coast officials met on Monday with the Coast Guard and BP representatives regarding the continual cleaning of Alabama beaches.

According to Gulf Shores Mayor Robert Craft, the Coast Guard is considering changing the shoreline treatment recommendations from level three to level four, which would mean going from daily cleaning of the shoreline to a weekly process. Craft said elected officials at all levels of government in Alabama are adamantly against the change.

“In the last 15 days, these crews with nets have picked up 9.600 pounds of tar balls,” Craft explained. “If you have ever picked up a tar ball, it doesn’t weigh very much, it is mostly sand. So that is a lot of tar balls to be picked up off of our beach in 15 days.”

If the tar balls are not picked up immediately, the next wave will cover them with sand, requiring the deep cleaning process.

Two weeks ago, Craft, along with other Gulf Coast mayors, the Alabama Department of Environmental Management, state park officials and elected officials from Baldwin County met to develop their own maintenance and monitoring plan for Alabama beaches, which includes daily pick ups of tar balls along the shore line.

In addition, their plan called for keeping the beach cleaning equipment on the Gulf Coast, something Craft said could possibly change.

“We have heard that there are plans to demobilize the beach cleaners and move them to Memphis because they don’t need them,” Craft said. “They don’t need them right now because the beaches are in good shape, but given the fact that we have tar mats off shore, any type of minor storm event will put oil up in an area that would have to be picked up by machines.”

Craft said the plan is to help prevent any future economic distress on the community.

“With the fact that many of our businesses have had to, because of the economic pressures, accept final claims and had to release BP, so any future oil on the beach would be without protection for our businesses. So it is vitally important that the machines stay here and that they be prepared to react to any oil on the beach.”

Craft said ADEM would not sign the request to go from level three to level four, although representatives from other coastal states did sign the agreement.

Hurricane preparedness

Craft said discussions have already begun regarding oil, should 2011 include a Gulf Coast hurricane.

“What happens if we have a hurricane late in the year and this debris has oil on it? Now it becomes hazardous, contaminated debris and how do we pick it up. We don’t have any of that in our contracts. June 1, hurricane season starts.”

Craft said the city is looking to ADEM for recommendations, so they can re-address their contracts so if it happens, clean up crews will know how to react.

“It is also important to address, who is going to pay for it. Are we going to pay for cleaning up contaminated oil or is BP going to pay for it? And who will we deal with?”

Craft said it is important, before BP is released from anything, they understand the consequences down the road of a future oil event in every circumstance.