County HazMat to Monitor Refinery as it Prepares to Restart Operations After Fire
Also, City Council to discuss upcoming capital projects, including downtown restroom, and tackle downtown parking permit program, parking meter fines; MUSD special election set
Contra Costa Health plans to have at least one staff member from its Hazardous Materials Program on site at PBF Energy’s Martinez refinery during the upcoming work to repair and restart units that were damaged by the massive Feb. 1 fire.
In a letter to Martinez Refining Co. (MRC) Manager Daniel Ingram dated March 18, Director of Hazardous Materials Programs Nicole Heath said “CCH will maintain ongoing oversight at your facility through the presence of one or more CCH staff from the end of the current safety inspection until safe startup of the refinery.”
At a Town Hall hosted by county Supervisor Shanelle Scales-Preston on March 13, Ingram detailed plans by the refinery to restart the units impacted by the fire by the fourth quarter of this year.
“Beginning on approximately March 21, 2025, through safe startup, CCH expects that MRC will provide an individual workspace to house a minimum of one CCH team member (CCH employee and/or contracted CCH personnel) with space adequate to support documentation review and provide privacy,” Heath wrote to Ingram.
The letter goes on to list nine specific activities that CC Health expects the refinery to comply with as part of the department’s oversight of the restart.
The Feb. 1 fire, which triggered a Community Warning System Level 3 shelter-in-place advisory to the surrounding community, occurred in the refinery’s Catalytic Gas Plant and Catalytic Feed Hydrotreater units.
“As you are aware, this incident is the most recent of a number of incidents including Major Chemical Accidents or Releases from your facility which have compromised health and safety at your facility, and in our community,” Heath wrote in the letter. “CCH takes this most recent incident very seriously and has already put into effect numerous activities providing process safety oversight.”
In a March 6 news release, PBF Energy said that it planned to restart the refinery in two stages, with certain units, including the crude unit, expected to go back on line sometime in the second quarter, which starts April 1. PBF said that it expected the total cost of repairs from the fire to total $30 million, which would be covered largely by insurance.
“We have reviewed the letter from Contra Costa Health (CCH) and will continue to cooperate with all agencies, including CCH,” refinery spokesman Brandon Matson said in an email Monday. “At this time, we have nothing further to add to what we presented at the Town Hall, but we will post future updates on our Facebook page and website when appropriate.”
The February explosion and fire is the latest in a series of mishaps at the former Shell refinery that PBF bought in February 2020. The most notable before Feb. 1 was a Thanksgiving night 2022 release of as much as 24 tons of spent catalyst, a substance classified as hazardous waste by the Environmental Protection Agency. It took two days for the refinery to explain what happened, and PBF came under heavy criticism for the slow public notification.
The fire broke out at about 1:30 p.m. Feb. 1 when two contract workers for the refinery were preparing for planned maintenance on the Cat Feed Hydrotreater, according to a Feb. 28 report that MRC filed with Contra Costa Health. Refinery officials said that when the two workers opened a flange on the hydrotreater, liquid hydrocarbon-based material started leaking and caught fire within seconds. The fire grew quickly, soon producing smoke that could be seen for miles.
Six refinery employees suffered minor injuries, MRC officials said; none were taken to a hospital.
PBF Energy also announced recently that Thomas J. Nimbley will retire from his position as executive chairman of the company and its subsidiaries on June 30. Nimbley will become non-executive chairman of the board effective July 1, assuming his re-election to a board seat. Nimbley was a top executive at Tosco when it owned the nearby Avon refinery, where five workers died in major accidents during the 1990s.
U.S. Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, D-Walnut Creek, has questioned whether a poor corporate safety culture under Tosco management carried over to PBF when former Tosco executives took on leadership roles at that company following its founding in 2008. Nimbley served as PBF’s chief executive officer from June 2010 to June 2023, including the period in which it took over the Martinez refinery from Shell.
Contra Costa County is now pursuing the same type of “full-facility audit” of the PBF refinery that it conducted of the Tosco refinery (now owned by Marathon) following a 1999 fire that killed four workers.
DeSaulnier was a Contra Costa County supervisor during the Tosco audit. Recalling that audit’s findings in a discussion with the Martinez City Council in February, DeSaulnier said, “It came back and said the root cause of all these incidents was the corporate culture, which I’ll never forget.”
Meanwhile, PBF Energy’s stock price has continued to plummet since the Feb. 1 fire. As of Monday’s market close, it was down 28% year to date and 67% over the past year.
Council to discuss upcoming capital projects
Following a March workshop, the City Council on Wednesday will fine-tune its five-year Capital Improvement Program. According to a staff report for the meeting, the council has prioritized funding for the following projects over the next two years:
Downtown restroom
Downtown plaza improvements
Bike Park conceptual design
ADA transition plans for public buildings and parks
Senior Center improvements
Traffic safety improvements, including Safe Routes to School
Annual street tree/landscaping
Morello/Center Avenue traffic safety (including a possible traffic circle) and green infrastructure
One topic of discussion Wednesday figures to be a proposal from the March 12 workshop to reallocate $600,000 from street paving to increase funding for street trees, landscaping and traffic safety projects. The staff report notes that this would reduce gas tax revenues dedicated for street paving by roughly 60%, potentially delaying for deferring key street-paving projects — including the Ward Street utility undergrounding project.
Council set to act on downtown parking initiatives
Following a series of discussions and study sessions to evaluate options for easing downtown parking burdens on business owners, employees and customers, the council is poised to act on specific proposals Wednesday.
The first is a resolution implementing a temporary reduction in parking permit fees for merchant and employee parking in the downtown meter zones, effective May 1. Merchant and employee parking permits for 10-hour meter spaces are currently priced at $1,116 per year ($93/month), available in annual, semi-annual or quarterly increments. The council will discuss Wednesday how much to reduce the permit fees, if at all. According to the staff report, reducing the parking permit price to between $180 and $360 annually would result in anticipated lost revenues to the city of between $41,500 and $84,500 annually.
Other issues the council members are being asked to address are whether the number of permits issued should be capped; whether businesses with existing on-site parking should be excluded; and whether to impose a fee for residential parking permits (they are currently issued at no cost to the applicant).
The council also will consider revising fine amounts for parking meter violations. A March study session on downtown parking raised concerns that that “the current $50 fine was excessive and negatively impacted businesses and visitors in the downtown area,” according to the staff report.
The fine amount increased from $39 to $50 in 2023, but the late penalty was reduced from $39 to $25. Staff is recommending setting a reduced fine amount at no lower than $45 and making them subject to an annual Consumer Price Index adjustment. The council may also consider adjustment parking meter enforcement levels.
Finally, the council will be asked to approve a proposed layout design for the expansion of Parking Lot 4, which is bordered by Escobar Street, Ferry Street, Marina Vista and the Contra Costa Community College District office.
Of the two alternatives under consideration, one would be generally limited to paving the existing gravel area and keeping the existing curbs, lighting and landscaping, resulting in the creation of 13 new parking spaces and room for bike parking. The estimated cost is $80,000.
The second alternative would provide for an improved circulation pattern and create as many as 15 new regular parking spaces. It would require the removal of existing curbs and four trees, as well as the relocation of parking lot lighting and irrigation. The estimated cost is $200,000.
The agenda for Wednesday’s council meeting can be found at the following link: https://granicus_production_attachments.s3.amazonaws.com/martinez/477b4c1f43889cf8539309c303998a1e0.pdf?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery
The council also will hold a study session starting at 5:30 p.m. on strengthening code enforcement. The regular meeting is scheduled to start at 7 p.m. but may be delayed if the study session runs long (a common occurrence).
MUSD special election update
Brittany Ayala and Brenda Leal are the two candidates who will appear on the ballot in the Martinez Unified School District special election scheduled for June 17 to fill the Area 3 vacancy. Ayala was chosen unanimously by the four remaining trustees to fill the vacancy in a special appointment in January, but in an unprecedented move, petition signatures were gathered among Area 3 voters to terminate the appointment and force a special election.
Leal, a retired teacher and former district teachers union president, was the other candidate who applied for the January appointment. Leal’s former union, the Martinez Education Association, has already endorsed her, marking its first election endorsement since the group raised eyebrows by endorsing a donor to Donald Trump’s 2020 presidential campaign and other MAGA causes during the 2022 board race, choosing to stay silent and stick with the endorsement after the MAGA contributions were made public. That candidate lost to Yazmin Llamas, who vacated the seat when she was elected to the Contra Costa County Board of Education in November.
Ayala, the daughter of Mexican immigrants who works as a community college transfer specialist for UC Berkeley, where she graduated, was the only ethnic minority on the school board at the time her appointment was terminated by the petition; more than 30% of the district’s student body is categorized as Hispanic. Prior to Ayala’s appointment, six appointments to fill board vacancies had been made in MUSD dating to 2001, with none triggering a special election.
Ballots in the mail-only election will be mailed to Area 3 voters the week of May 12 (see map below of Area 3). Detailed information on the election can be found at the following link: https://www.contracostavote.gov/election/june-17-2025-special-mail-ballot-election/#PollingPlaces
