As the City Council voted Monday night to sell off old skate ramps from the defunct Papa Jack’s Skate Park, several officials said the city had exhausted all its resources trying to find a new site to build a community skate park. The pronouncement brought criticism from a candidate for City Council, who blamed a lack of leadership for the failure to find a permanent home for a skate park.
Also at the meeting, council members voted to submit a letter in support of an item in Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposed budget, which would provide funds for stronger oversight and enforcement of drug and alcohol rehabilitation facilities.
Council members said the city’s best chance at a resolution to the skate park problem is the proposed trade of Charmlee Wilderness Park for the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy’s 83 acres of Malibu Bluffs Park. Under a tentative agreement, the city has five years to determine whether development of new recreational areas such as a skate park is feasible on the Conservancy’s land at Bluffs.
“Hopefully we’ll see if this swap provides a way to actually get [a new skate park],” said Councilwoman Laura Rosenthal.
But current City Council candidate Hamish Patterson said the city had failed to make up for the loss of Papa Jack’s, which closed in 2011. Lacking a skate park, local skaters have resorted to moving the old ramps, which are stored in the parking lot above City Hall at the end of Stuart Ranch Road, and skating on them in secret.
“I know who these kids are who are moving them around. That’s something in our community that’s not being addressed. We are missing an opportunity to help out the kids in our community. It’s up to you guys to direct it,” Patterson told the council.
The old Papa Jack’s ramps are too old and deteriorated to be put back into use, according to Parks and Recreation Director Bob Stallings. But that hasn’t stopped local skateboarders.
“Even though we have a fenced area and it’s gated, we still get some adventurous sportsmen that have been able to scale the fence somehow and been able to remove the site or move the ramps around at the site,” Stallings said.
With Monday’s vote, the city will now deem the old ramps “surplus property” and sell them off to the highest public bidder. If the city receives no bids, the city manager will be tasked with finding another way to get rid of the ramps.
“They’ve become basically an attractive nuisance,” Stallings said, adding that the ramps are “absolutely dangerous when they’re misused.”
While voting to support selling off the ramps, Mayor Pro Tem Skylar Peak remained adamant about doing more.
“Sounds like this is a call for our city to find some property to build a skate park,” Peak said after Stallings gave his presentation.
City Manager Jim Thorsen said the California Coastal Commission had stonewalled the city’s latest attempt to build a skate park on the 10 acres of Bluffs Park currently controlled by the city.
“We looked at so many avenues,” Thorsen said. “We actually hired a designer to look at building one out at the end known as the ‘whale’s tail’ [at Bluffs Park]. We ran plans through the skateboard ad hoc committee and then we ran it through [the Coastal Commission], who shut the whole thing down and said we had to have it away from [environmentally sensitive habitat areas].”
Though the council will look next to the potential Charmlee- Bluffs swap, the leases for each property have yet to be officially swapped, according to City Attorney Christi Hogin. The leases were originally scheduled to be traded last month.
City supports governor’s rehab enforcement proposal
The City Council on Monday agreed to submit a letter of support for an item in Gov. Jerry Brown’s budget proposal that allots for the hiring of 21 enforcement officers plus $2.2 million in additional funding to increase oversight of rehab and sober living facilities throughout California.
Malibu’s rehab industry garnered national attention last year when the city demanded the state crack down on local rehabs that were known to be in violation of zoning laws. The city alleges at least one major facility tacked on addresses to several pool houses and guesthouses, in violation of city law, and obtained state licensing to use the structures as five- or six-person rehab dwellings. The state has yet to act on the city’s demands.
Adding more state enforcement should be beneficial for Malibu and hopefully lessen the “clustering” effect many neighborhoods are experience, said Councilman Lou La Monte.
“This has become such an incredibly lucrative business…you no longer have a neighborhood, you have a hospital zone,” La Monte said.