Identification of sand source critical to state’s approval for $20 million-plus Broad Beach restoration project.
By Jimy Tallal / Special to The Malibu Times
The attorney for Broad Beach homeowners who are funding an estimated $20 million beach restoration project says the project has been held up due to an inability to settle on a sand source for the project, but that could change soon.
Kenneth Ehrlich said core samples have been taken from the ocean floor about a half-mile off the coast of Manhattan Beach, as well as off the coast of Dockweiler Beach, near Los Angeles International Airport.
The two apparent final sites were chosen after a half-dozen offshore sources of local sand, ranging from Point Mugu to Santa Monica, were “investigated and crossed off our list,” Ehrlich said. The Broad Beach group then had to start looking a little farther away—possibly making the project even more expensive, Ehrlich said.
The Broad Beach Geological Hazard Abatement District, or GHAD, was formed to find a way of preventing the ocean from eroding the seaside lands and houses of 121 property owners after the once wide beach disappeared due to erosion over the last few decades.
The homeowners were granted an emergency permit to build a rock wall in front of the most endangered houses in 2010, but the state considers that a temporary fix, and required a proposal for a more permanent solution.
Since then, the group has been aggressively pursuing state approval of the pricey beach replenishment project, which aims to add 600,000 cubic yards of sand to the beach. However, Ehrlich said “the sand source issue has stalled the environmental review.” Ehrlich said that was because the State Lands Commission, the lead agency on environmental review of the project, has indicated it needs to know the specific site the sand is coming from rather than a list of possible sources, so that it can do a thorough environmental review of the sand and the site itself.
In order to be approved, the site must be able to sustain the loss of 600,000 cubic yards of sand without digging a hole too deep in the ocean floor, and the sand must match the granule composition and chemistry of the sand at Broad Beach. Sand surveys from each site require approval from a task force or clearinghouse of multiple government agencies.
The sand offshore from Dockweiler Beach was sampled and turned out to be “bountiful, plentiful and a good match,” said Ehrlich. However, Ehrlich said the City of Los Angeles owns the mineral rights to the submerged lands off of Dockweiler, and would be entitled to collect royalties if the sand were taken from there (for legal purposes, sand is considered a mineral). The Broad Beach GHAD is currently awaiting word from the City of Los Angeles on how much it would charge for the sand.
At Manhattan Beach, samples are being taken in the ocean at a depth of 80 feet, with core samples of sediment going down about 20 feet. The State of California owns the offshore sand at Manhattan Beach.
But if the sand there turns out to be plentiful and a good match, Ehrlich said the GHAD should not have to pay the state royalties for the sand.
“The state should just accept the fact that we’re paying $20 million for the project,” he said, which will benefit the state by resulting in the re-establishment of a public beach on state property that is currently unusable.