Coastal Will Consider Losing The Bluffs Today
Written by 991KBU on August 9, 2018
The California Coastal Commission will likely make a big change in policy …. that will drastically affect Malibu’s oceanfront … today.
Meeting in Redondo Beach… the Commission is expected to formalize a scientific conclusion … that the average global sea level has increased by 7 to 8 inches …. and that in 80 years … the ocean level will be between 2 to 8 feet higher than it is now.
Maybe 10 feet higher.
And that means residential adaption … says Coastal.
Translation … housing use along the beaches will have to change … as they call it … managed retreat.
AT yesterday’s meeting … commissioners talked about what wil happen to bluffs areas … and they looked specifically at those projections for Malibu’s Point Dume.
The L-A Times printed them.
They show the bluffs at Point Dume … receding one or two blocks inland … taking blufftop mansions down.
The only alternative … armoring the bluffs with rocks or concrete… destroying the beaches.
Coastal Commissioner Donnie Brownsey pointed to the fires ravaging California as an example of radical changes.
NEWSCART 77662 SEALEVEL BROWNSEY :33
QQQ BUT DO THEY REALLY
I think this is going to be the summer that we remember when things changed.
“I remember decades ago, when I was reading articles from climate and other scientists … predicting the wildfires that would be burning in our state and I think that sea level rise is another one of those issues people say they understand that but do they really???”
Point Dume … with the ocean moving more than a block inland … and the fires burning elsewhere in the state were also on the mind of Commission Chairwoman Dayna Bochco … and she says there is a lesson from the fires applicable on the coast.
NEWSCART 77661 SEALEVEL BOCHCO :20
QQQ KNOW THEY WILL EVENTUALLY BE GONE.
“Regardless that these fires are burning so many homes …they’re still constructing homes in fire zones.
“So it’s very similar to what we face on the Bluffs … whether or not you should build your house close to a bluff when you know that without armoring that sooner or later it’s going to be gone.”
Managed retreat means abandoning property along the ocean … it’s already happening in Ventura… where a park has been abandoned to an ocean that is moving inland.
A house in Laguna beach may be ordered demolished … to save the beach … that’s the front page headline in the LA Times today.
Commission executive director Jack Ainsworth warns that some places in California will have to be abandoned to the ocean … depending on local conditions.
NEWSCART 77660 SEALEVEL AINSWORTH :19
QQQ: PLANNING ISSUES GOING FORWARD
“The most important thing is to recognize that sea level rise is occurring … there are areas that are vulnerable to inundation and from increased storm activities …
People need to be aware of that to inform their investment bank expectations going into the future… and to inform our decisions on planning issues going forward.”
In Malibu .. local planning rules are governed by the L C P … the Local Coastal Program … the set of zoning rules imposed on local coastal cities by Coastal … under state law.
Coastal holds the cards … and as L C Ps are coming up for renewal up and down the state … Ainsworth says there will be tough negotiations to deal with an ocean that is moving up … and in.
And he says he knows that will be some huge fights.
NEWSCART 77659 SEALEVEL AINSWORTH 2222 :23
QQQ COMPASSION AND EMPATHY.
“There seems to be a demonization of each side you can’t have a conversation about it. And this is sort of the trend in our society now.
“We need to deal with it on the fax the science and as I say the rule of law at a good dose of common sense and compassion and empathy.
Today in Redondo beach ,… the Coastal Commission will likely adopt the scientific reports that it will use … with compassion and empathy … to decide which parts of development along the California coast to write off.
The meeting is being covered by Cal Span on the internet.
If you want to watch ,… it will be at 9 o’clock this morning … in Redondo Beach.
