Coastal Commission Approves SMMC Efforts to Expand Public Use

• Malibu Bluffs Parkland Is Added to List of Possible Locations for Overnight Camping

BY ANNE SOBLE

The California Coastal Commission followed staff recommendations and denied the proposed Local Coastal Program Amendment submitted by the City of Malibu that included a prohibition on overnight camping on public lands within its borders.
After almost 10 hours of reports and testimony at the panel’s meeting in Marina del Rey on Wednesday, June 10, the commission unanimously approved a competing LCPA override submitted by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy. The agency wants to expand public camping and other uses on its holdings in the area.
A ban on overnight camping was sought by the Malibu City Council after initial efforts to reach a compromise with the SMMC on the issue met with vocal opposition from some members of the community who view overnight camping as a source of wildfire danger even though no California wildfire has ever been attributed to legal camping.
The plan proposed by the SMMC includes trails connecting coastal canyons and camping in Escondido, Corral and Ramirez canyons, as well as increased use of SMMC property in Ramirez, and some residents voice concern that these areas would not be adequately patrolled and be subject to misuse endangering public safety.
A sizable contingent of municipal officials and local residents went to the hearing on a bus charted by the city. Supporters of the SMMC plan were bused to the meeting by the public access advocacy group The City Project.
Malibu testimony, including that by the city attorney, the city manager, members of the city council and a large contingent of residents, focused primarily on safety and wildfire issues, but representative after representative from visitor recreation and inner city advocacy groups stressed issues of public access, social justice and civil rights.
Several commission members expressed puzzlement that the City of Malibu continued to push for a ban on overnight camping, which is legal throughout the state on public lands, even though CCC staff and previous panel action had indicated, as the commission’s executive director, Peter Douglas, stated, “That a ban on camping was not subject to negotiation.”
A number of speakers and several coastal commissioners also indicated that they perceive a contradiction between expressions of concern about legal overnight camping by city officials and the Los Angeles County fire department and the ongoing approval by both entities of residential development in high fire-risk areas.
SMMC Executive Director Joe Edmiston told the panel that nine new residences were approved for the Ramirez area during the time that opposition was voiced against expanded use of SMMC property at the end of the canyon.
Several pro-camping speakers reiterated the contention that no wildfires have resulted from legal use of campgrounds. It was noted that, apart from rare lightning strikes and rarer acts of criminal arson, most wildfires result from downed power lines or equipment sparks from power tools, discarded cigarette butts, backyard grills and other aspects of residential development in wildland areas.
However, to help allay fire concerns, Edmiston said the Conservancy would work with Los Angeles County fire officials to have stringent wildfire safety and evacuation policies in place when specific park use plans come back before the commission. He said this would include SMMC undertaking, at its expense, the removal of private landscaping on Ramirez Canyon Road that has illegally spilled over onto the roadway. Edmiston said this would improve access and make the area safer for residents, as well as visitors.
Coastal Commissioner Sara Wan said the Conservancy’s camping plans would make all of the areas that are proposed for this activity “much safer.” Wan, a Malibu resident whose own home has been threatened by wildfire, told the local residents, “Camping isn’t the problem. Legal camping is not the source of fires.”
With a consensus on the wildfire safety issue, the commission reiterated its mandate to make public parklands accessible to all of the people of California. Commissioners unanimously determined that the city’s proposed Land Use Plan amendment would diminish the range of potential access and recreational uses in the City of Malibu and is “inconsistent with the public access and recreation policies of the Coastal Act,” as the staff had reported.
Although a number of Malibu residents repeatedly referred to the millions of people who visit local beaches, the notion of exclusion marked much of the testimony by speakers in support of the SMMC proposal for overnight camping. When one speaker decried what he called Malibu’s “arrogance of self-entitlement,” locals in the audience, who were subsequently chastised by the CCC counsel, loudly booed him.
From an advocate for the disabled who criticized what she called Malibu’s “separate but equal” handicapped proposal to Spanish-speaking mothers and grandmothers who spoke passionately about the impact of the outdoors on their families, the need to make the Santa Monica Mountains accessible to everyone affirmed the CCC staff report.
Immediately before the commission vote, Edmiston sought a revision to add another area for camping that the SMMC executive director said would address all of the Malibu resident concerns expressed at the hearing.
Edmiston said utilization of some of the 80 acres of state-owned Malibu Bluffs property—land that was originally acquired for camping in 1976 but encountered strong local opposition at the time—should calm most residents’ fears about canyon fires that are swept seaward by powerful Santa Ana winds through difficult to defend residential areas.
The SMMC head said the Malibu Bluffs site offers ample parking, is at the water’s edge, near a fire station, and accessible to all law enforcement and other safety personnel because of its proximity to Pacific Coast Highway.
Because many of the Malibu attendees had to leave the meeting early because of the bus schedule, they did not learn until much later that the Coastal Commission approved this change when it approved the Conservancy’s overall request.