By Dave Downey
North County Times
October 6, 20061
SAN
DIEGO ---- Five years have come and gone since a regional
planning agency sponsored a $17 million makeover of San Diego
County's scrawny shoreline ---- and so has much of the ripply
beach body that officials artificially created.
Consequently, some regional officials suggested Thursday that
it is time to beef up area beaches again.
"Five years have gone by really fast," said Del Mar
Mayor Crystal Crawford during a meeting of a shoreline
preservation committee that advises the San Diego Association
of Governments, the planning agency.
And it shows, Crawford said.
Some sections of the county's coastline, such as Torrey Pines
State Beach, have managed to retain much of the sandy bulk
that was dredged from the ocean floor, she said. But after 2.1
million cubic yards of sand were placed on a dozen beaches
from Oceanside to San Diego Bay, Crawford said that some of
those beaches are beginning to look thin.
For example, the shore in the vicinity of Grandview Street in
Encinitas has shed a strip of sand 45 to 85 feet wide since
August, said Kathy Weldon, natural resources manager for that
city.
"We're getting rocks on our beaches again ---- and this
is before the storms even get started," Weldon told the
panel.
Clearly, said panel member Joe Kellejian, a Solana Beach
councilman, "we need to start moving forward" with a
plan for another regional beach replenishment project such as
the one in the summer of 2001 that was the first of its kind
for the West Coast.
Encinitas Councilman Jim Bond, who also sits on the committee,
warned, however, that no plan will get far without money. And
he urged colleagues to spend the bulk of their energy figuring
out ways to finance another strategy to nourish county
beaches.
The 2001 project was financed with grants from the Navy and
the California Department of Boating and Waterways.
Obtaining state and federal money for a follow-up project
won't be easy, if a report delivered to the panel by an
economist from Northern California is any indication.
Philip King, an economics professor with San Francisco State
University, said that California historically has brought in a
trickle of money from Washington, given the state's size and
extensive coastline of 1,100 miles.
The nation's leader in procuring federal dollars for beach
restoration is New Jersey, which brings in more than $250
million from that source, King said. Florida ranks second,
with $220 million. He said California is way down the ladder
at a little more than $5 million a year.
Even the inland state of Illinois snares far more than
California.
"lllinois doesn't have any ocean coastline, although it
has the Great Lakes," King said. "There doesn't seem
to be any rhyme or reason to this."
And indications are that Washington will spend less, not more,
on beach restoration in the future, he said.
"The bottom line is, while federal funding is nice, we
can't count on it," King said.
King told the panel he is studying options that the state and
its coastal metropolitan areas may want to pursue for
financing restoration projects, with or without Washington's
help. Even in Florida, a state that is faring comparably well
in the federal funding department, officials are dipping into
local and state budgets for 80 percent of the money to fortify
beaches there.
King, whose report is due by the end of this year, said
options could include passing local hotel taxes and charging
fees to park at the beach.
Citing a preliminary finding, he said that half of
California's surf lovers spend little, if any, money in the
beach towns they visit. Instead, he said, they buy food and
other items for their day at the beach in the communities they
live.
"These people are basically free riders," King said.
"They are not generating any money for Encinitas or
Solana Beach or Carlsbad."
Even the tourists who are vacationing in California tend to
spend a lot more at places like Disneyland than they do at the
shore.
"They're generating lots of money for Anaheim, but not
much for the beaches," King said.
He suggested that a parking fee would be a relatively easy way
to raise revenue. In Carlsbad, for example, such a fee could
generate more than a half-million dollars, he said.
And King suggested that such a strategy would be relatively
painless for the population along the coast.
"Most of the people in Del Mar can afford to pay $5 for
parking," he said.
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