A trademark battle over the name of the pier has not yet been settled.
By The Malibu Times Staff
The Malibu Pier is slowly returning to the full-fledged operation it once was. This past weekend, boat tour excursions returned to the pier. However, a date for an opening of the entire pier remains unknown as legal and real estate issues are being dealt with.
Boat excursions will go out every Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning until Memorial Day. They will be available on other days and times for groups of six passengers or more, such as families and groups from schools, clubs and community organizations. According to a press release, a more extensive schedule of boat excursions will be announced for Memorial Day through Labor Day.
The Saturday afternoon excursions will be devoted to harbor tours and whale watching. The boat will depart from the Malibu Pier at 1 p.m. for a half-day of cruising. Sunday mornings, fishing boat excursions will depart from the Malibu Pier at 9 a.m.
Also last week, the Malibu Pier announced the hiring of Mark Zuckerman as director of development. Zuckerman has a history in restaurant management and created a coffee house chain that was eventually sold to Starbucks.
Malibu Pier Partners LLC will run the concessions and operate the pier when it eventually opens for full use. Principals in the partnership are Jefferson Wagner, pier operations manager and owner of Zuma Jay’s surf shop, and Alexander Leff, a San Francisco attorney. The partnership and the California Department of Parks and Recreation inspectors have reached an agreement on the exterior construction work that has been completed on the structures situated on the pier.
Negotiations are underway with Bruce Heckler, owner of Mo’s at the Pier restaurant, to lease the former Alice’s Restaurant at the foot of the pier, Wagner said last month. No name has been decided for the new facility. Mo’s at the Pier operates on a month-to-month basis on weekends during the peak season from May to October in the former Alice’s preparation building.
Also, the concession buildings will soon be designed and built by Pier Partners in conjunction with potential vendors, subject to inspection and approval by State Parks.
A lawsuit is still pending over the trademark right for the Malibu Pier name. Agoura resident Stephen Harper has said that the name is his intellectual property by virtue of a trademark filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
The lawsuit, for which a federal judge is expected to make a decision soon, has stalled progress toward signing up vendors to operate any of the planned facilities on the pier.
A city landmark, the 98-year-old Malibu Pier has been battered and bruised over the years by nature as well as by man. Built in 1905, the pier was originally privately owned by Malibu rancher Frederick Hastings Rindge. A 1942 storm severely damaged the structure, but it was rebuilt two years later and used as a U.S. Coast Guard station during World War II.
The state took over the property in 1980, and with the legendary Alice’s Restaurant perched at the end of the pier, the site served as a popular fishing spot, movie backdrop and eatery. The structure’s heyday ended in 1995 when an El Niño storm forced it to close.
The current makeover of the Malibu Pier began in 1999 with a three-phase reconstruction plan funded collectively by the county, the state and the city. The first two phases focused on stabilizing the structure, updating the pilings, remodeling the buildings, and adding a boat landing and a sewage treatment system. The parking lot that abuts the pier was repaved.
Restoring the interior and exterior of the pier’s buildings are a part of the third phase of reconstruction. The original architectural elements of the pier and its buildings are being kept intact.