By Martha Groves
Los Angeles Times
August 14, 2005
Sticklers, take note. If heading to Broad Beach in Malibu, be
sure to have tide chart, tape measure and public-access map in
hand if you want to be sure to plop your beach towel and
boogie board in a legal zone.
Without those tools, beachgoers will be pretty much at sea
when it comes to sorting out the crazy quilt of public
easements along the 1.1-mile stretch of prime beach. Anyone
caught on a private patch of sand — generally speaking, one
too close to a pricey beachside dwelling — runs the risk of
being shooed seaward by private security guards hired by
frustrated homeowners.
"You try to be nice," said Darryl
"Chicago" Cruse, a security guard stationed Saturday
near one of two public access points along the beach.
"But sometimes you get the ones who think they know
everything."
An uneasy truce has descended on embattled Broad Beach in
light of a decision Friday by the California Coastal
Commission to order an end to the posting of no-trespassing
signs and the use of security guards on all-terrain vehicles
to chase visitors off dry sand. Guards on foot, like Cruse,
are still allowed.
The cease-and-desist order against the Trancas Property Owners
Assn. marked the latest development in a long-running skirmish
over public access and private property rights on the
seaweed-speckled beach, just northwest of Zuma Beach. The
area's homeowners include prominent executives and
celebrities, among them Goldie Hawn, Danny DeVito, Steven
Spielberg and Dustin Hoffman.
For years, public-access proponents have fought to gain the
right for nonresidents to visit the beach undisturbed.
Homeowners have repeatedly challenged decisions by the
commission, which is charged with overseeing development and
protecting public beach access along the state's 1,100-mile
coast.
The commission's efforts to negotiate a settlement with Broad
Beach homeowners broke off recently after homeowners brought
in bulldozers and, without state permits, scooped sand off the
public beach and built a berm that impeded public access to
the beach. The homeowners had also hired guards who patrolled
on ATVs and were said by some observers to have roughly
treated beachgoers.
Many of the dozens of beachgoers in evidence Saturday said
they understood why the beach would engender conflict.
"Broad Beach has long been a where-to-be beach,"
said John Holmes of Santa Monica, toweling off after a quick
dip in the ocean, "but it has been hard for residents and
visitors to find common ground." As much as he enjoys the
area, Holmes said he could understand why residents "are
trying to preserve their paradise."
"I could go somewhere else," he added.
Theresa Melcher, visiting from Arizona, said she wondered why
security guards hovered nearby as she kissed her husband,
Marvin, while the surf lapped at their toes. The Melchers were
safely in the public zone, but the guards appeared poised to
warn them away from moving too many feet inland. Melcher said
she had also noticed discreet signs reading "Private
Property. Please Respect," posted on the dune that runs
directly behind many of the properties.
Previously, some homeowners had posted signs reading
"Private Property, No Trespassing," but the
commission contended that those signs "discouraged people
from coming to the beach," said homeowner Marshall
Lumsden. Such signs are still allowed on land that is clearly
private and if the homeowner gets a state permit.
"We usually put them up in the spring," Lumsden said
about the signs, noting that some beachgoers would "come
up and camp" right at the edge of his backyard.
On his property, Lumsden displays a small, polite sign asking
beachgoers to respect his private property.
Other residents complained that beachgoers sometimes use the
showers on their decks and leave behind beer bottles and other
trash. "A lot of the time, they'll pee in the corner
where my kayak is," said Krista Levitan as she watched
her husband, Steve, surf. "Some will knock on people's
doors and ask to use their bathrooms."
Still, Melcher, the visitor from Arizona, said limiting the
beach to residents would not be fair. "God made the
world, and I think everybody should have access to it,"
she said.
Of 108 lots at Broad Beach, just under half have public
easements. The easements have different conditions. Properties
with easements often abut dwellings that have none, creating a
situation where a law-abiding beachgoer would have to
hopscotch across stretches of beach.
To complicate matters, some easements specify that public
access extends 25 feet inland from the "daily high water
line." For others, public access might extend from the
"mean high tide line" to 10 feet from the seawall or
deck.
Most of this is lost on beach visitors because there are no
maps or signs on-site explaining the intricacies. And it's
highly unlikely that the typical sunbather understands the
concepts of high water lines and mean high tide lines. To make
things more confusing, those lines are ever changing.
As a result, California's courts have tended to consider the
public portion of beaches to be the wet sand.
Steve Hoye, executive director of Access for All, a nonprofit
organization that works to improve access to public lands and
seashores, said he has contemplated creating a map to help
visitors navigate the public easements. But he's holding off
for now. A map is available on the Coastal Commission's
website, but no laptops were in evidence at the beach on
Saturday.
"We'd like the homeowners to digest what actually
happened [Friday] and perhaps come back to the negotiating
table with the commission," Hoye said.
Hoye says he has high hopes for a homeowner proposal that
would provide for a "universal easement" all along
Broad Beach. "We'd like to find a way of defusing the
whole thing and allow homeowners to come to terms with the
public being there," he said, adding that a universal
easement "could be the real solution."
All homeowners would have to agree to that, however, and it's
far from clear that they would. Still, Hoye said, the Coastal
Commission might go for it.
"If there's some solution that gives the public
reasonable expectation to enjoy public access there and
satisfies the homeowners so they stop this ceaseless conflict,
that'd be great," said Sarah Christie, legislative
director and spokeswoman for the California Coastal
Commission."
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