Parents in the audience were irate. "The school and the oil companies will pay for this," said one man, blood-red with anger. Young cancer victims wept uncontrollably. The bevy of journalists, including a camera crew from the Today show, captured it all. A little over a month later, at the 7 a.m peak of the morning show's national viewership, Katie Couric somberly narrated a piece about Moss's battle with cancer and Brockovich's efforts to lay the blame. "The oil company," Couric stated simply, "says the well is not causing air pollution."
In the court of public opinion, Brockovich vs. Venoco was no contest. "I have 300 cancers staring me in the face and an oil-production facility underneath the school," she told all who would listen. "It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that the two fit together."
On June 9, on behalf of 21 former students, including two who were already dead, Masry & Vititoe filed a wrongful death and negligence lawsuit against Venoco and more than 17 other oil and gas companies that had worked on the site over the last 50 years. On August 1, the firm filed an additional action on behalf of 407 more plaintiffs, including 208 with cancer. But some scientists familiar with the case believe that establishing a causative link between the cancers and the oil will be difficult. The South Coast Air Quality Management District (AQMD) has conducted a number of tests and each has found the air quality to be normal. Wendy Cozen, an epidemiologist for the USC Cancer Surveillance Program, says statistics do not support Brockovich's claims that there is a heightened incidence of cancer among Beverly Hills residents. "There is no reason to expect that there is an excess in any types of cancer due to exposure to an oil well on the campus," says Cozen. "The biology doesn't make sense."
Brockovich and her law firm have long had their share of critics, who view the current case as nothing more than junk science employed by someone for whom 15 minutes of fame wasn't enough. "People are too often threatened by the mystique and settle," says Hudson Institute investigative science journalist Michael Fumento, who has written extensively about the firm. "[Defendants] should fight in court, because those who do generally win."
But right now, Rod Eson, still getting his feet wet as CEO, has more immediate concerns.
Chicken Eggs and Ostrich Eggs
Venoco is in a holding pattern these days, still dealing with the Marquez litigation, the need for capital, and especially the Enron payoff. The bankrupt energy conglomerate wants out of Venoco any way it can get out, whether that means getting bought out or somehow obtaining enough shares to take control of the board and liquidate the company's assets. Enron's entreaties have managed to push Eson and Marquez to the negotiating table to try to settle their own differences. Neither one of them will discuss specifics, but there seems to be a potential settlement emerging. The rough framework has Marquez getting some money and two oil properties in exchange for dropping his lawsuit.
Marquez and Eson are headed in different directions. Marquez plans to use the properties he would get from the settlement to jump-start a new business. In fact, he's already relocated to Denver, plugged CEO by his name once more, and started Marquez Energy--where he plans to follow the same strategy that built Venoco--but this time he plans to be unswervingly faithful to his aggressive instincts. "We'll grow faster than Venoco ever did," he promises.
Eson, of course, is taking a different approach. Steady cash flow from high oil and gas prices has kept Venoco afloat but done little to ease its strained banking relationships. "The banks haven't been happy with all the trouble we've been through, so we're paying down a big chunk of our principal," says CFO Wineland. "That's about $23 million a year that should be going to developing properties and acquiring new ones." And that's a problem. "We've got great assets, a terrific team, and a solid reserve," says Eson, but he understands that "in this game, if you're not growing, you're dying." The next few months will be tough. The company now employs 168, and a 20% staff reduction is in the offing, but the ultimate goal is to restart Venoco and rebuild a business that grows, only steadier and slower this time. "I'll take chicken eggs over ostrich eggs," he says.
Eson recently had to hold an uncomfortable all-company meeting. A man who doesn't like confrontation had to tell nearly 150 of his employees that the next few months will be rough. Some of you, he told them bluntly, aren't going to have a job. Almost an hour after the meeting, he got a call asking him to come back down to the conference room. Eleven of his top managers had never left. They told Eson they'd like to help him cut overhead. They said they believed in the company. Eson walked away thinking he'd finally spoken up--and he was heard.
Marquez, when asked what lessons he learned at Venoco, lets his anger flare: "Eson had all this stuff brewing in him for years, and he never said a word. Come talk to me." But then he stops for a moment--and changes direction. He says he's had conversations with his new employees, warning them he can be overly hard on people and overly passionate about this business. He told them they need to tell him when he makes mistakes. He told them he is willing to listen.
Both men wish their partnership and their dream had played out differently. Perhaps the ultimate lesson is that it takes far more than a great idea to build a company. "I used to think life was like an engineering equation," says Eson. "You plug in the right variables and the right answer comes out." He pauses. "And that's just not the way it is."
Now they're both back to will and hope and the opportunity to build a business. But they're both smarter now, and if they succeed, the past will be forgotten. Maybe each man could have gotten where he is today only by doing what they did together.
