eaWorld is moving forward on plans for a new administration building and the city is continuing to implement a beach alcohol ban. At its Feb. 12 meeting, the Mission Bay Park Committee (MBPC) also discussed how the alcohol ban could affect special-events permits and whether the bay needs to be dredged.
“Dredging Mission Bay ” any or all of it ” is an enormous task,” Park and Recreation Director Stacey LoMedico said. “It is way premature to make the assumption that the bay needs to be dredged.”
Mission Bay is too shallow to safely rent or lease speedboats 90 days a year, said Marshall Wiseman of Campland on the Bay told the committee. He added that he was unable to rent watercraft on numerous days over the past year.
Wiseman’s concerns echo those of Bill Evans, who in June told the committee that the Bahia Hotel had been unable to use its sternwheeler boats on 42 days.
A survey of the area should be complete by March, said Susan Gonzales, Mission Bay Park manager.
City park staff has posted stickers informing beachgoers of the recently implemented beach alcohol ban. Calling the stickers an “interim measure,” Gonzales said signs are forthcoming.
The committee needs to decide how it is going to interpret the alcohol policy for special events like the annual Over the Line Tournament on Fiesta Island, Gonzales said.
Enforcing the new policy at the raucous event could be a “nightmare,” Gonzales said. Educating the public on rules and regulations is critical, she added.
Sailors and other recreational boat users will also encounter some new rules, Sgt. Rick Strobel of the San Diego Lifeguard Service said. Lifeguards are reimplementing a vessel safety check program. To renew mooring permits, the water, a boat must be free of water and the mast must be in place.
The state’s harbor code requires abandoned watercraft to be held for 30 days, while the city mandates 90 days.
Referring to a 65-foot sailboat abandoned in Mission Bay near Mariner’s Point in September, he said, “We were sort of handcuffed by the policy.”
The average cost to remove a beached boat is $1,500 to $2,000, Strobel said. Roughly 15 to 25 boats are abandoned every year, he said.
Approximately 45,000 cubic yards of sand, more than 20,000 cubic yards of kelp and tens of thousands of tons of trash are removed from beaches and stockpiled on Fiesta Island, Keith Merkel of Merkel and Associates told the committee.
“It’s a misnomer that Fiesta Island is a sand management site. It’s a kelp management site,” Merkel said. Kelp is especially problematic on beaches, he said, because it sticks to everything.
Kelp and sand are eventually returned to the beach, Merkel said. Wood, vegetation and metal are recycled and trash goes to the Miramar Landfill.
Beach maintenance activities include seasonal kelp management, beach restoration, storm protection, debris collection and beach grooming.
Beach grooming involves kelp and eel grass removal, beach contouring, sand screening and fire ring cleaning.
Eighteen percent of shorelines are groomed and 35 percent of coastal beach shorelines are groomed, Merkel said.
Fiesta Island is also a sand management site, with sand from different beaches occupying separate areas of the island. “Sand from Mission Beach is different from sand at La Jolla Shores,” Merkel said.
Sand management is a good use of the island, Merkel said, because it is generally poorly suited to support native habitats. Sand maintenance also supports rare plants and accounts for dune habitats, he added.
In proposed redevelopment plans, the current sand management site is intended to be a gathering place for small to midsize parties, said committee member Judy Swink.
An alternate sand management site would require a buffer with a 10-mile radius, suitable slopes and at least 8 acres of space. Possible alternatives include Montgomery Field and MCAS Miramar.
Mission Bay Park or the north side of the San Diego River are possible sites for a facility that would tell the story of the river, said San Diego River Park Executive Director Rob Hutsel.
“It’s something that would enhance Mission Bay Park as well as the estuary,” Swink said.
SeaWorld will break ground at the end of the month on a 9,000-square-foot administration building, said SeaWorld’s Patrick Owen.
The building, which was first proposed in 1995, will be a single-story, 20-foot-tall stucco building. The new structure will replace three temporary buildings and add six parking places. Owen said the structure could be built by the end of August or September.
In its first meeting of the year, the committee did not vote on any items.
“I really want us to focus on accomplishing something,” MBPC Chairperson Rick Bussell said. To that end, he would like the committee to present a status report to the city’s Park and Recreation Board.
The committee also plans to refocus on hotel leases, including the park’s six holdover leases.
The issue is “not dead, it’s just not moving as fast as we’d like,” Gonzales said. “It’s still moving forward. It has not moved off our radar.”
The MBPC will hold its next meeting at 6 p.m. Tuesday, March 4. For location information, visit www.sandiego.gov.