Del Mar Still Working Out Plans To Deal With Rising Ocean

Speaker 1: 00:00 The city of Del Mar and the California coastal commission have put off a decision that would have tackled the difficult issue of managing climate change. KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson says coastal regulators and San Diego's smallest coastal city are locked in a battle over how to plan for sea level rise. Speaker 2: 00:20 Camino Del Mar cuts through the heart of this upscale enclave of about 4,400 residents. He just over two square mile community features of beach that attracts more than 2.7 million visitors a year. Tell them our city council member, Terry Gaster land says the seaside location puts more than a billion dollars worth of homes in the path of a rising ocean. Speaker 3: 00:44 That's a difficult issue in Del Mar because we have 600 homes that are vulnerable and at risk. If we initiate managed retreat on the beach front, homes, Speaker 2: 00:55 homes right along the beach are actually in a better spot. Those homes sit about 13 feet above average sea level gastro Lynn says homes behind them are only seven to five feet above. She says, giving that property back to the sea is widely considered a bad idea here. So the city's alternative is to bolster local beaches with sand and protect lower lying homes with a natural berm. Gastro Lynn says that's enough for now and the next few decades Speaker 3: 01:24 after that 50 year Mark, after 2070 it gets the cone of uncertainty broadens and so to plan for the worst case scenario is to plan for great extremes that we don't know what timeline it's on, Speaker 2: 01:37 but the California coastal commission is not convinced. Del Mar has done enough staff is recommending rejecting Delmar's new local coastal plan unless the city accepts 25 amendments. The coastal staff praise the city for its near term plan, but found the document lacking when it comes to longterm strategies. Mar Councilman Dwight warden says those changes are just a clever way to introduce managed retreat buried in those 25 changes are what I characters his take backs. It's an undermining of the basic premise that they're letting us go with our plan. A, they're not a, they're trying to undermine that. The surf rider foundation disagrees. Stephanie [inaudible]. Quinn says, the commission changes are practical and help the community drop the longterm plan to cope with a retreating shoreline. Speaker 3: 02:27 Again, it's the long term proactive planning that Surfrider wants to get out there because again, we owe it to future generations for them to have these tools because when the time comes, they're going to need to have all of these things on the table. Speaker 2: 02:39 SickKids Quinn says, adjusting the local coastal plan would allow Del Mar to prepare now for changes that are coming. She says she wants the city to review their local coastal plan. Speaker 3: 02:50 We cannot put our head in the sand and look down the road and pretend like we're not going to have to deal with that. So if we do that now, if we put our head in the sand now and ignore the inevitable parts of climate change, it's just going to get harder in the future. Speaker 2: 03:05 He is already underway. Scripps institution of oceanography researcher Laura Angerman says the ocean is getting warmer. Ice sheets are melting and the pace of ocean level rise is increasing. She says how fast or how severe that change will be remains undecided. Some of it depends on what people do about carbon emissions and that makes policy decisions different. Speaker 3: 03:28 We need to think about ways that the science can support those kinds of adaptation pathways, uh, and give a sense for the pace and the acceleration, um, as much as possible. Uh, one thing that we can do is work with our cities to really develop more strategic monitoring so that we're really tracking what's happening in our shoreline. Speaker 2: 03:48 The coastal commission and Del Mar city staff are continuing to talk about the city's local coastal plan. In an effort to find common ground. A decision on this issue could set a precedent for the rest of the state's coastal communities. Speaker 1: 04:02 Joining me is KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson. Eric, welcome. Thank you. Why might a decision on Delmar's coastal plan set a precedent for other California coast communities? Speaker 2: 04:14 Well, Del Mar is going to be one of the first communities along the California coast that's going through this process with an eye on sea level rise. So the coastal plan that Del Mar delivers a could likely be the first that will consider sea level rise and the impacts of climate change. And if that blueprint is out there than other coastal communities will likely follow the example that comes through here. Speaker 1: 04:39 What is a local coastal plan and why do cities like Del Mar have to have one? Speaker 2: 04:44 Well, um, that's a good question. And uh, what a local coastal plan is, is really kind of a policy that guides development in the coastal zone. It's something that the California coastal commission asks for. And here's how it would work in a community like Del Mar for example. Del Mar is completely built out. There is no room for any additional development there. But what a local coastal plan will do is, uh, kind of regulate what changes can be made to the properties there. So say for example, um, two houses next to each other are bought up and a company wants to take those two houses out and put in an apartment complex that has multiple units and, and increases the value of that property. Maybe it's a multistory property, the local coastal plan would regulate what could be done, uh, as that land is redeveloped. And one of the things that the coastal commission looks at is armoring against the sea. It's not something that they recommend. Uh, they have restrictions on, um, you know, bluff side homes, uh, that already have armoring there has to get, they have to get special dispensation that's renewed. Um, and so that's the kind of thing that the, a local coastal plan would guide, you know, guiding that redevelopment would, would create limitations. And if you want to do something outside of the limitation of that local coastal plan, you would have to go directly to the coastal commission and make an application to them and get approval. Speaker 1: 06:08 And when you talk about armoring, are you talking about people building their own seawalls and things like that? Speaker 2: 06:13 Exactly, yeah. There are homes that sit right on the river that goes, uh, to the lagoon pass the fairgrounds. Uh, there are homes that, uh, are on the, uh, the ocean front on the, you know, right on, on the other side of the beach, uh, away from the ocean. But you know, in the winter time you get a strong storm, you get King tide, some other high tide event and those things combined and it pushes water, you know, over, uh, and into those houses. So, um, you know, if you're a homeowner there and you say, well, what if I built a sea wall or put some rip rap in here, that would do a lot to protect my home. But that's something you need coastal commission approval for. Speaker 1: 06:51 Now, the disagreement between the commission and Del Mar centers around the concept of managed to retreat. Can you explain that and what it means for beachfront communities? Speaker 2: 07:01 Yeah. Well, well, we know what we're going to have. Uh, as sea levels rise, we know that sea levels are going to rise. Uh, and we know what we're going to have as sea levels rise. There's going to be more, more coastal erosion on Bluffs. There's going to be a [inaudible] of beaches. Um, those things are going to happen. The shore line is going to retreat. Uh, no question about that. There's no dispute. Um, what managed retreat is, is sort of planning for that event, right? And saying, look, we understand that the ocean levels are going to rise and it's going to put certain properties at risk when the ocean level rises to a specific level. Maybe it's time to take action. Uh, maybe there's a point where we can either do some additional armoring or some other kind of an action or, uh, the, the bad concept that everybody reacts poorly to in Del Mar is the idea that we might abandon some of those properties that are put at risk by the higher level ocean waters. So it's just kind of planning for what might be to come. But again, people are very tied into the property of, uh, the money that they've sunk into those properties. Uh, they're very expensive properties, so 600 homes with an assessed value of more than a billion dollars. So these are very expensive homes. They're, people have invested a lot. They don't want to give that up. So there's a lot of resistance to this idea that, well, it might come to the point at some point where we just have to abandon our property because sea level gets too intense. Speaker 1: 08:29 Well, since no one is absolutely sure whether these projections will be realized on a specific time frame. What is stopping Delmar from coming up, let's say with a plan like you, like you're describing for the year 2070 and beyond, because really nothing would be effected right now. Speaker 2: 08:48 Well, I think what the coastal commission is asking the city of Del Mar to do is not so much the timeframe, don't the timeframe so much, but consider the level of sea level rise that you see when you, when you see it reach a certain portion, you know, then look at it. Let's, let's examine it again. Uh, when it reaches another plateau, let's reassess what we have and, and do another local coastal plan. You know, lo, you do some research into it. What Del Mar officials are saying about that approach is they think it's just a backdoor way to get to managed retreat. And they say they would rather spend their time and effort actually doing things to protect their community or to deal with the changing conditions than just being required to study them. Uh, these are some of the differences that both sides are trying to work out in private. Uh, the staff of the coastal commission and the staff of the city of Del Mar are talking and they'll likely bring this local coastal plan, uh, back in front of the coastal commission probably early next year, and hopefully they'll have some of these items resolved. I've been speaking with KPBS environment reporter Eric Anderson. Eric, thank you. You're welcome.